The dirty truth about the division of labour
It’s an age-old argument, but as official statistics confirm that men spend more time relaxing than women, one couple keeps score
Every Saturday morning, I ask my husband Anthony, as casually as possible: “So, what are you doing today?” Already I know my day will be spent with my computer trying to catch up with – (or is that desperately trying to get ahead of?) – all the work and admin I need to do. There are emails to answer, school forms to fill in, birthday parties to organise, basics to order, not to mention a new book to finish writing.
Anthony, on the other hand, always seems to have a day of unmitigated pleasure ahead of him; back-to-back tennis matches with various chums, punctuated by “grabbing a bite to eat” and “having a quick pint”.
“Any DIY on the agenda?” I ask sweetly, as I scroll through my Rolodex of tatty spots around the house I’d like him to touch up, or broken things I’d like him to fix.
“Oh no, don’t think I will have time for that,” he replies.
No man wants to be married to a wife who exudes seething irritation every time he wants to have fun. But the news that the Office for National Statistics has found that men spend 40 minutes more a day on leisure time than women sums up our – and the lion’s share of our married friends’ – arrangements. Men spend six hours and nine minutes daily on pursuits such as watching TV and listening to music, while for women, it is a mere five hours and 29 minutes; the gap is most pronounced in the North West, where men spend up to an hour on having fun each day, whereas the most even split is found in Northern Ireland.
To be honest, I’m surprised that the male average is only 40 minutes – I’d say add a couple of zeros. Because as much as I love my husband, this is the chief point at which we diverge. Men seem to believe relaxation is their basic human right; busy women, on the other hand, view it as an outrageous waste of time. The tone was set when while I was in labour with my elder daughter, Lily, now 15. While I groaned, Anthony snored beside me, apparently worn out and in need of a nap.
The story of my life is that I generally feel I have so much to do that I view walking up the stairs as a chance to catch up on emails. Booking a routine appointment with a GP? That’s almost as decadent as a luxury spa visit.
The problem is that, while Anthony, a journalist who currently works eight hours a day, five days a week in an office, can cross off his neat to-do list of chores, like many women I work even longer hours as a writer at home – but have also ended up with the emotional heavy lifting of parenting.
Keeping our two adolescent daughters on track in everything from their school work to their social lives and music practice is non-stop, 24/7 work – something that cannot be considered done after half an hour with a power drill.
Like many working mothers, I thought it was possible to have it all. Then I found out “having it all” meant “doing it all”. It is true that Anthony’s cooking does makes him a candidate for being a “new man”, but that’s where it ends. The laundry pile at the bottom of the stairs could be so high it is blocking access to the upper floors of the office, yet Anthony would still step around it rather than put it away.
It also seems ironic to me that in Man World, one chap’s job is another’s hobby – half the time they secretly enjoy activities like gardening, which they sell to us as manly chores.
With an extra 40 minutes each day, perhaps I’d give mindfulness a go. After all, everyone seems to talk about it but no one – except full-time yoga mums – actually has the time to make it happen.
So men, a word of advice. If we’ve worked a full day, put on load of laundry, overseen the homework and made the house habitable, it’s in your interests to physically drag us to the sofa, pour us a glass of wine and say: “You just relax, darling. I’ll deal with it.”
Women may now be running the world in the form of Mrs May and Mrs Merkel, but we’ve also never been so exhausted. Give us back some of those 40 minutes. You owe us.
‘Tanith is just better at some things than me – there’s a skill in recognising that’
Iam pretty sure that when Karl Marx came up with the idea of a technical division of labour, he didn’t have my family in mind. But that is how I approach the way my wife, Tanith, and I carve up the work around the house.
What it boils down to in my schoolboy knowledge of dialectical materialism is this: I do what I’m good at and she does the same – and in my view, when we’ve finished, we’ve earned the right to relax.
There is not much of the traditional gender division of labour in my house – we both work, and I also do all the cooking, because ask Tanith to toast a piece of bread and she will burn it.
On top of that I also do my fair share of duties like gardening and DIY – plus I should also win brownie points for gallantly removing all spiders from a 50ft radius of the females I live with.
But Tanith is just better at some things than me – and there’s a skill in recognising that. For one thing, she writes parenting books, so she tends to be the one to deal with the inevitable ups and downs of having two adolescent daughters.
Having girls means that Lily and Clio tend to gravitate towards their mum, and like most mothers, Tanith’s emotional radar is never turned off. She is always “on” – hearing about their day, organising their music lessons, planning birthdays, keeping in touch with teachers and picking them up from concerts or friends’ houses, and while I can strike the chores off my to-do list, her work never feels entirely done.
True, I do like to relax. David Cameron made an art out of “chillaxing” while running the country, so I certainly feel entitled to my downtime. For me, tennis is my reward for a hard week – the fact that it involves me seeing a few of my closest mates at the same time is merely a happy accident. To my wife, that must make it look suspiciously like fun.
So, yes, I will do my best to get away for an hour or two on a Saturday morning and, if I’m feeling cheeky, slip away for a game of doubles after lunch with the school dads’ group we’ve set up.
I tell Tanith that, since I’ve hit my 50s and national obesity figures are at record levels, this regular exercise isn’t just fun, but imperative for my health. And that’s (sort of) true – afterwards, I’m calmer and happier, a more productive worker, and probably a better husband and father, too.
Hitting the tennis court – and maybe even monitoring the fortunes of my beloved football team, Southampton – is payback time for doing the cooking, pruning the hedge and grouting the bathroom tiles. That rusty gate with peeling paint isn’t going anywhere – and nor are my Saturday morning games.
‘One man’s job is another’s hobby – they enjoy it but sell to us as a chore’