Wait a minute, housewives have vices? Aren’t they simple, complacent beings, grateful to stay at home and make sure everything happens smoothly and seamlessly behind the scenes for everybody else, right?
Allow me to reveal to you a stay-at-home-mom’s superpower: being a middle-aged woman, and/or a homemaker, means you’re totally invisible to the rest of the world. You’re washed up, past your prime, unimportant. Since what you do doesn’t matter anymore, no one’s paying attention: everyone’s eyeballs slide right over you.
Which creates the perfect setup for breaking the rules a little and having some fun. After all, we are living in the future—your housewife (or HouseSpouse, this is equal opportunity here) is definitely not lying on the couch, eating bonbons and watching The Price Is Right.
While you’re off running the world from the corner office of your city skyscraper, here’s an idea of what your wife or HouseSpouse might be doing with all that “free time”:
10) Trading sneakers online and making more money than you.
You were wondering how she got to be on a first-name basis with the UPS guy, weren’t you? And you never noticed that extravagant wardrobe she bought for herself, or the multiple weekends at Canyon Ranch with her friends? Hmmm. No wonder she has so many opinions about Ye lately.
9) Cooking.
Specifically, sneaking kale (and other veggies) into the brownies she baked for you and the kids (a la Jessica Seinfeld in Deceptively Delicious). Guess what? She’s tired of putting all that effort into cooking meals and having half of it wind up in the trash. Plus, someone has to keep you all healthy to offset your late night Cheetos habit!
8) Toasting.
Speaking of friends, what do you think happens on all those playdates she’s busy arranging for your toddler? Trust me, they are not actually for your toddler. Today’s moms stash bottles of wine in their strollers and pull out their Yeti cups to drink each other under the picnic table while their kids play on the playground. Mommy Wine Culture is real.
7) Cyber Gambling.
Her fortune was made and lost in the space of two months, with cryptocurrency or NFTs, while you were at the office toiling away. Chastened, she’s now turning to more respectable online trading, which explains all the recent dinner table conversations about the stock market.
6) Gardening.
You were wondering what that smell was, weren’t you? And why does your backyard suddenly look so green? Is that really kale in your brownies?
5) “Extracurricular activities.”
Let’s get real. The cliché about banging the tennis pro or the local firefighter is an overused cliché for a reason, is it not? Haven’t you watched The Shawshank Redemption? (I didn’t do it. Really.)
4) Getting ripped at the gym so she can kick your ass if you complain about what she does or doesn’t do during the day.
Also, so she can feel more powerful and less invisible. Plus, how else is she supposed to attract that tennis pro/firefighter? (see No. 5).
3) Getting a Brazilian Butt Lift/Botox/laser hair removal.
She will endure great pain not to make herself more attractive to you, but to a) fit in with the social scene (everyone is doing it, I don’t want to look old in comparison!) and b) to better attract the tennis pro/firefighter (see No. 5).
2) Trolling the internet with a fake account and blowing up the local town “Moms” FaceBook page.
Because everyone has an opinion about everything, and it’s fun!
And, the No. 1 vice of the humble housewife?
1) Writing satirical articles divulging all her vices and publishing it on the internet…
Because sometimes it just feels good to come clean. Besides, who knows what’s truth and what’s fiction, anyway?
