Лекция: Have it your way.
San Diego police sergeant Steven Moss realized how much he enjoyed cooking after he did more of it for his wife and three children. “It’s relaxing and creative and I can make whatever I want,” he says.
Dan Kent of Atlanta cleans the bathrooms and vacuums the house because he likes it done his way. “May be it comes from being a lawyer, but I get very particular.”
Surprise! It works.
Dividing up household chores with your spouse is often difficult, but here are some tips to establish a more harmonious partnership:
Stop nagging.
Nagging brings out the worst in everybody. “It makes me feel like the Wicked Witch of the West,” admits Melissa Swartz. “Equals makes requests not demands or actions,” says Karen Blaisure, psychologist. Instead “Are you blind? Cant you see those stack of laundry?” Blaisure suggests more specific, such as, “I want us to take turns with the laundry.”
Spell out. Some women hope their husbands will pick up on a loud sigh over an unmade bed or a door slammed on a messy room. “That’s the fantasy of mental telepathy,” says Georgia Witkin, professor of psychology. “But people can’t know what you want until you tell them. It’s simple.” Cathy Weld, a writer who is married to Reb Cole, used to get frustrated when he cleaned the kitchen but never wiped the counter tops. Finally she pointed it out to him. “You’d be amazed what a difference it makes when you simply state what you would like in a non-angry way,” Weld reports.
Compromise.
“Negotiate a package that both can live with or it’s not going to work,” says sociology professor Alan Booth. Karen Clark, a computer consultant, gets very frustrated when she comes home to find peanut butter smeared on the kitchen counter. Her husband, Brooks, feels that there are more important things than immaculate house. “I wouldn’t trade a single minute playing baseball with my daughter for all the folded napkins in Martha Stewart’s warehouse,’ he declared. To get out of this impasse the Clarks try to maintain a minimum standard they both can agree on. Karen divides cleaning into three categories: Important, Sort of Important and Dreamland ones. Brooks has promised to stay on top of the important jobs and Karen is forcing herself not to get crazy over the dreamland ones.
Back off.
Many women say they want their husbands to take responsibility, but then have trouble letting go. When my husband took over a checkbook, a chore I’d always done, I would hang over his shoulder and say, “That’s not the right way!” Some part of me truly believed that this mature, intelligent man would wrack and ruin of I didn’t direct his every move. I shouldn’t have been surprised that Bill’s enthusiasm waned. Finally, he sat me down and said,” If you want me to do this, BACK OFF!” Now that the job is truly his, Bill takes full responsibility. And guess what? No checks have bounced and no creditors come calling. In fact, his system makes more sense than mine.
Quit the “don’t know how” game.
“I never learned how to go to the grocery store.” Harry Crowe, an architect, tells his wife Caroline. How to get around the incompetency defense? Don’t play into it. When he turns the laundry pink, let him wear pink underwear. If he can program a VCR or fix a cap, there is no reason he can’t work a household appliance.
Adapt. When trying to resolve the chore wars look at the total picture – not just vacuuming, child care and yard work, but the “invisible” chores such as remembering family birthdays, arranging social outings, coaching soccer. Who takes care of the car? The garden? When a couple swaps lists of everything each did that week, they can be amazed at how much the other accomplished. Sometimes they see things are fairer than they realized.
Say” thank you”. Every weekend Don Levine, a university professor, makes a special pancake breakfast for his wife and their three children. “One weekend I watched him as he flipped the pancakes and entertained the kids, and it struck me, as hard as I work in the house, he puts in a lot of effort too,” says his wife. “Now I make it a point to thank him, and get the kids to show appreciation too.” Recognizing each other’s efforts is a key factor in forging happy working relationships. The division of labour doesn’t have to be equal. What matters is that neither side is taken for advantage of or unappreciated.
I. Transcribe and translate the following:
Sergeant, immaculate, exhausted, exacerbate, negotiate, nurture, mature, spouse, harmonious, forge, impasse, psychologist, marital, bounce, smear, laundry.
II. What do we call:
1) The work that is recognized and appreciated?
2) A fully -grown and developed individual?
3) Something that is untidy?
4) A person having feelings of annoyed disappointment or dissatisfaction?
5) A kind of small railway with sharp slopes and curves popular in amusement parks?
6) A husband or wife?
7) Circumstance that is very important and decisive?
8) The occasion when we go out?
9) Clothing worn next to the skin under other clothes?