An Open Letter to My Husband

Dear Stephen,

I know you are a busy man.  I know time is at a premium.  I know you are trying to balance all the time you spend on the road with quality family time with the kids on the weekends, as well as the general maintenance and to-do lists of household projects.  For example, I love the new lattice you are putting up under the deck.  And I adore the fact that  you want to go canoeing and fishing with the kids.  ADORE.

But please, PLEASE, for the love of all that is holy, can we put “finishing our bathroom” back on the priority list?  If you love me, you will refocus.  Because I cannot take much more of the toothpaste-smeared, splattered mirror, wet toilet-seat madness that is the kids’ bathroom.  The fighting over who gets the sink.  The fighting over who gets the stool.  The constant makeupus-interuptus because I have to wet the 10-year-old’s hair down, and I have to ponytail the 8-year-old, and I have to wipe toothpaste off of the 6-year-old’s shirt.  And also his face.  And also his hair.  The “singing” your daughter does in the mirror has given me tinnitus.  And sometimes, she just watches me.  It’s unnerving.  Today, she spent an inordinate amount of time telling me all about her wiggly tooth, but then left the bathroom saying “well, it’s not really wiggly yet.”  I do not understand how it can be wiggly and not wiggly all at the same time and this morning I spent way too much time pondering this instead of getting ready.  I want to not have to check the toilet seat first.  I want to never have to use that toilet seat again ever.

I miss my privacy.  I miss not having to wait in line to use the restroom.  I used to hate how small our bathroom is, but now I see it’s a beautiful size…just big enough for one person.  I have come to realize it is glorious.  The builder obviously had small children.  As it turns out, his planning was thoughtful and spot-on, not cheap and lazy like we originally thought.  Well, OK, I concede there was some cheap and lazy.  But we’re going to fix that, right?

Right?  Please???

Signed,

Your currently-still-sane-but-not-for-much-longer-if-we-have-to-keep-sharing-that-bathroom wife.