Husbands of the world, take note.
A broom is not just a broom. A mop is not just a mop.
And to add to the confusion, a dishwasher is not just for cleaning the plates.
It could rinse away the possibility of divorce. It could eliminate the need for marriage counselling.
And, perhaps more importantly, it could add sparkle to your sex life.
If you volunteer to load and unload it, that is. And you don't have to be nagged.
That housework and sex are linked is not a new idea. It's in the realm of conventional wisdom that a woman's anger or resentment over her unfair share of household duties can undermine intimacy with her mate.
What has changed is that men are beginning to understand that doing housework, or at least participating in a discussion about the management of the house, unprompted, goes a long way to creating marital happiness.
And as Toronto sex therapist Betty Stockley notes, “What is or is not happening in the bedroom is what is happening in the kitchen and other parts of married life.”
Intimacy is not just for the bedroom, in other words. Foreplay can begin with a dishtowel.
And it's not because men look cute in aprons.
Both men and women, in almost equal numbers, agree that the division of household management is a crucial component of a happy marriage, according to a study from the Washington-based Pew Research Center, released last month. “Sharing of household chores” now ranks third in importance on a list of nine items often associated with successful marriages.
That's above such staples as adequate income, good housing, common interests and shared religious beliefs. It was even well ahead of children.
Faithfulness was ranked first (93 per cent of survey respondents) – no surprise there – followed by a happy sexual relationship (70 per cent) and then the sharing of household tasks at 62 per cent.
Interestingly, back in 1990, fewer than half (47 per cent) of adults said that co-dusting, co-cooking and other shared household duties were of great significance in determining marital bliss. But in the 17 intervening years, no other factor on the list has risen in importance as much as how partners divide the domestic labour.
Clearly, women entering the work force account for some of the need for men to pick up a portion of the home-management tasks.
Still, in the Pew study, even the stay-at-home mothers (or half of them, compared with 64 per cent of mothers working outside the home) said the sharing of household tasks was very important to the level of happiness in their marriage.
The key seems to be how much husbands appreciate their wives' housework burdens, and try to do something to help.
It's not about equity, it's about acknowledgment.
“My studies show that it's not so much who does what, and the balance or imbalance, but the way it is perceived by the couples,” says Steve Nock, a sociology professor who studies marriage and the family at the University of Virginia.
“I predicted that couples in which each felt that the share of tasks both inside and outside the home [was] fair and equitable would have the lower divorce rate. But I was wrong.”
The lowest divorce rate was among couples in which the wife felt the division of tasks inside the home was unfair to her and the husband felt that the division of household tasks was unfair to her, too. If both partners felt that the wife was getting the short end of the stick, the marriage was more likely to be happy.
It's the man's capacity and willingness to understand how women think that makes a difference.
“It's really a gift of gratitude,” agrees Prof. Nock, who has been married to the same woman for 32 years. “It's a gift of the husband acknowledging what the wife does.”
A friend of mine, whose first marriage ended in divorce and who is now happily remarried, says that her new husband's willingness to discuss what she calls “life management” is a big part of what makes him a wonderful mate. The children are grown, and both husband and wife work.
