Yes, it’s another column about husband #1. If you have had enough of these, you had better just put the paper down, walk away, get a shot of tequila and then just read it really fast. It’s like pulling off a Band-Aid. You don’t want to do it, but it has to be done. A recent former friend of mine, in a tirade about how terrible I am, also commented on my poor treatment of husband #1. But my response to her and all of you is that you cannot make this stuff up. I don’t intentionally try to think of these things. They really happen. And if they are happening in my house, I can only hope/imagine they are also happening in other people’s houses (though clearly not in the home of the person who thinks I am so terrible). Perhaps I am not alone in this ridiculousness.

Let us set the scene: three man-boys lying on the couch watching a baseball game. Harried, sweaty, delirious mom running up and down the stairs trying to pack son #1 for trunk pick-up the next day. “Can you please bring me down the t-shirts you want me to pack?” I say calmly and sweetly. “Whatever you pack is fine mom, thanks.” I am seriously thinking of delving into his Blue’s Clues wardrobe from when he was 3 years old and sending that up with him to be a counselor. Perhaps I will throw in the matching underwear that went with those ensembles. “Honey,” I say calmly and sweetly, “if you want to bring your suit with you to camp, I need the suit pants.” He looks at me with his yummy face and says “I am really not sure where I put them when I came home from Israel. I think I left them on the piano and someone moved them.” Aha, we all look to the biggest of all the lying-on-the-couch man-boys and hope he will know where these elusive pants are, since before Shabbos he is the harried, sweaty, delirious parent running up and down the stairs hiding all of our belongings before the Shabbos queen makes her way into our home and banishes us all into the dungeon.

“Um husband #1, I know you have had a really hard day and you are relaxing so nicely, but could you please go find his pants?” My husband of almost 20 years turns to look at me and says, and I am not misquoting, I cannot be sued for libel, he says, “What do the pants look like?” What do the pants look like? What do the pants look like? WHAT DO THE PANTS LOOK LIKE?!?! Breathe. Put down the bagel knife. Breathe. “Shmoopy, the pants look like pants. Like the pants he wears every single Shabbos. They don’t look like a dress, they look like pants.”

At this point, the other two baseball-watching lying-on-the-couch man-boys are laughing so hard they possibly have rolled off of the couch at this point and their father and I are in a staring match. “Please go find the pants. Please.” So husband #1 went to look for the pants while his giggling fan club was taking bets on what piece of clothing he was actually going to come down with. I was not a part of this fan club; I was too busy trying to figure out how I could use the bagel knife and get away with it. Just kidding.

Next scene: Husband #1 comes down the stairs holding the pair of pants. Did you hear the marching band that started to play? The fireworks that were going off in the background? The award he was given for finding said pants? The parade that was being led by his float? Hey kids, he found the pants, not Jimmy Hoffa, give me a break.

So off they went to celebrate this milestone and back to packing went the harried, sweaty, delusional mom. “Why isn’t he packing himself?” you ask. Because I don’t want him to put me in a nursing home. Will this actually help stop that situation from becoming a reality? No. But I just keep doing my thing hoping that when the time comes they will say “She did everything for us, how could we do this to her?” And then they will lock me up and throw away the key.

Hope everyone has a great summer!

Banji Ganchrow is, hopefully, walking around a museum in New York, and her children are, hopefully, walking around camp fully dressed because when you don’t pack for yourself, you get what you get and you don’t get upset…

By Banji Latkin Ganchrow