Why I Love My Wife

I wake early to get to my desk. I first grind the coffee beans, fill the espresso maker, ready the milk, empty the dishwasher while I'm waiting for the milk to heat, the coffee to come up. When she wakes I bring her a cup, usually, but not always, in bed.
When they wake I make breakfast for the kids, pack their lunches. I make sure their schoolwork is finished and packed, their backpacks by the door.
My wife takes them to school, on the way to the office, where she is the boss.
She is a publisher. I am a writer. Left alone, I work through the day, once or twice a week throw in two or three loads of laundry, wash and dry the clothes, linens, towels, put them away, except for her clothes, which I leave on her dresser, not wanting to put things in the wrong place. Amidst all the piles, I try to pay extra attention to her jeans and her fine articles of lingerie, which she prefers attending to herself lest I screw them up.
At 3 o'clock I pick up the kids, take them on some days to the Y for swimming lessons, or walk them leisurely and pleasurably home, stopping on the way at the grocery store to pick up milk (always milk) and anything else we might need for dinner.
She comes home at 6:30. I do the cooking. Usually something simple—roasted chicken with potatoes slathered in paprika, salt, and pepper, left to roast in the chicken's juices in the bottom of the pan; spaghetti and meatballs (she passes on the pasta but loves the meatballs: beef, veal, pork, one egg, bread crumbs, fresh parsley, oregano, basil, salt, and ground pepper); or I call ahead for rice and beans ("My wife will be there in 10 minutes") to the Cuban-Chinese restaurant that we love.
We clean up together.
We've got it down.
She describes herself as a control freak. Sure, she likes things done her way. But then again, I like things done my way. We are lucky enough that her way and my way often coincide. Once I asked her to clarify what she means by "control freak."
"Like when you were finishing your book," she said.
Oh, that.
There was a slight glitch that took place in our lives last year, and if I'm going to be honest the year before that, and the year before that, and a couple of years more than that besides. I was finishing up a novel I had been finishing up, or had been nearing completion of, ever since we've known each other.