Corporate Wifedom

In the last 18 months or so, DH has suddenly become a scary overachiever man. Not in personality, but in action. He's joined professional organisations, started his own consultancy, become vice president of our temple, and in general become, well, the male version of me (only his butt is wwwwaaayyy cuter.) A side effect of all this overachieving is EVENTS. As in, DH has to attend important functions and events, and as his wife, I'm expected to go as well. This means I have to get dressed up (blech), smile politely (ick), make small talk (double blech) and in general be the primped, proper, witty, charming and just fucking fabulous wife to the man who is overachieving. Plus our Rabbi advised me that I need to work on my "diplomacy skills." Oy. This is so NOT my scene. There is the added degree of difficulty in that pretty much all of David's work colleagues, plus his fellow temple board members, and a vast majority of people at these events are much older than me. Which means I can't stand in the corner with another wife/arm candy and bitch about what people are wearing - the other wives have the corporate wifedom thing down pat. All the way to the sensible shoes, frumpy clothes, and small talk skills.

Last night was not the first of these events I've attended, but it was one of the more important ones as I was to (finally) meet DH's business partner. Plus DH was involved in the planning and organising of this conference thingy, so he was like, you know, an important person in the room. I, by association, was expected to be - you know, witty, charming, blah blah gorgeous. I pulled it off, spectacularly. Except maybe for the moment when I spilled my drink ALL OVER the table. The geeky engineer to my left was kind about it, though, and just laughed and said, "Well, it makes our table look more interesting. Who likes white tablecloths anyway?!" If I do say so myself, I rocked. Charmed the freakin' pants off the business partner guy (and wife), chatted up the other people on the table, and in general made myself exactly the sort of wife DH needed at one of these soirees. Damn I'm good, even if I later realised my knee highs didn't match (one black, one navy) and the one on the right kept falling down.

As much as I hate this kind of thing (but am secretly proud that I excel at it), I did discover one huge bonus to this kind of crap. It feels really, really great to know you're sitting next to the guy that everyone is applauding, and that that scary overachiever guy is yours. I was so PROUD of DH. He's working so hard to build himself a reputation, to build a secure financial future for our family, and to make himself into a successful, socially responsible member of the community. Stockings and mascara and annoying small talk about painfully boring subjects are all worth it when your SO (significant other) is standing up there, receiving his bit of paper which says THANKS for being Mr Important to this organisation. (Of course, afterwards I felt quite miffed that all DH got for his efforts was a piece of paper. Um, hello, people? Wine? Plaque? Flowers? Gold watch? What's with just the paper? This is MY DH we're talking 'bout! Worth soooo more than a scrap of paper!) It does bear saying, though, that next time I need to get up and get my own bit of paper, I expect DH to wear knee highs and mascara.