Three's Company

So I'm watching an "encore presentation" of HBO's new polygamy-themed hit, "Big Love," last night, when it occurs to me: What a huge number of modern married couples need is an extra wife. No, not for procreative purposes or even to share the burden of household chores (though I don't know anyone who'd turn down an extra set of laundry-folding hands). But if all the articles, books, and polling about stressed-out women struggling to have-it-all are any indication, many marriages clearly could use someone to fulfill the traditional (perhaps partly apocryphal?) role of the patient, attentive, supportive emotional rock of the family--you know, the kind of wife who greets you at the door each evening with your slippers and a martini, assures you that everything on the homefront is running smoothly, and insists that you tell her all about your hard day at the office.

As it is, in many two-career households in particular, although both spouses strive to be supportive and attentive, often they're both a little too preoccupied with their own attempts to juggle work and home life to provide adequate comfort. An additional wife--or husband (since limiting this discussion to polygyny would, after all, be inexcusably sexist)--could go a long way toward smoothing out some of those whose-turn-is-it-to-take-the-dog-to-the-vet bumps along the road to domestic bliss. Provided, of course, that the new spouse understood his or her role as domestic cheerleader-in-chief.

Save your disgruntled emails. Obviously I'm not serious about this. But you can't blame a gal for fantasizing. I do so love a good martini.

--Michelle