A woman who set the table for thirty thousand times

I have a husband who works from home, so I prepared meals three times a day—at least a thousand times a year. We've been married for almost 30 years, so I must have made meals about 30,000 times. I can’t deny it. Of course, the food might not have tasted great, so he probably didn’t enjoy it much. But even my mother-in-law once said:

“You’re lucky. Your wife’s cooking might not be the best, but that’s why you haven’t gotten any health problems at your age.”

I’ve done endless grocery shopping and cooking just for my husband. But when I ask him to stop by the store—just three or four times a year—he says, “It’s too heavy to carry things like milk, juice, eggs, and bread after jogging.”

So I can carry heavy bags all the time, but he can’t? Even though he’s the one eating most of it? He says we should just go to the corner store near our house, not the big supermarket five blocks away that’s fresher and cheaper. Just as we passed the supermarket, I asked again,

“Don’t you want to go in?”

And he answered,

“Where?”

Even though we were just arguing about whether to stop or not!

I had nothing more to say and just went home. I wasn’t even asking him to carry everything—just to help a little. But “Where?”? Seriously?

I’ve carried heavy bags and made meals for 30 years. And every single meal ended up in the toilet, gone forever. Does that mean it meant nothing?

Even though I’m not good at driving and often cause accidents, he still goes with me to Korean or American markets that are far away. While I shop, he stays in the car reading newspapers—he loves both Korean and American papers—and rushes me:

“Hurry up!”

Because of that, I got nervous whenever I went grocery shopping. If I took too long, he got annoyed. When I forgot something, he complained, but never gave me time to go back. Lately, though, he’s been kind enough to come inside with me and help. My anxiety is slowly getting better.

Other husbands cook too. But has mine ever set the table and said, “Let’s eat”? If he had, would I be complaining like this now? Maybe I could’ve let it go. I remember what my late mom used to say:

“Don’t go bragging about being a good worker. You’ll just end up stuck in the kitchen.”

I can still feel her spinning around me, watching me cook every day without helping.

If I could be born again, I wouldn’t be a woman. And I definitely wouldn’t be the wife of a man who didn’t truly appreciate the 30,000 meals I made. The kind of man whose face looks upset, like he has indigestion, just because I skipped cooking one day. 

In my next life, I’d rather be a small wildflower in a wide field by a river. A little leaf dancing in the wind until it gently falls.