Hey good-looking, whatcha got cooking??

Right before I married, I was given some very wise advice.

"Don't do anything in your first year of marriage that you won't want to do for the rest of your life."

And, I remember thinking at the time - "What could there possibly be that I don't want to do for the rest of my life? I love washing my husband's shorts and pairing his socks. I love scraping caked-on food off dirty dishes! I don't mind. . . because it's for him!"

What an idealistic bride I was. And what bullshit.

I really don't have any problem with laundry or dishes. For me, those are two soothing ways to clean and relax. Honestly.

What I really hate is cooking.

If you ask me what I'm making for dinner, I will tense up. My body goes rigid, my muscles clench and my head starts pounding. Why? Because I have no idea what we're having for dinner. All I know is I am not cooking it.

See, I really didn't take the wifely advice to heart. (If I had, the dirty socks from last year would still be under the bed and our furniture would never have been dusted.) But I didn't change what I normally did. Before I was a wife, I paired socks and hand-washed delicates. I loaded and unloaded dishwashers. I dusted furniture, and spent extra time once a month on baseboards and windows.

But I didn't cook.

I watched my roommate's cook. I might have even helped them dice and chop a few times. But my crowning culinary achievement was in college when I taught my roommie how to make bagel pizzas. (Preheart oven to about 350. Take a bagel, split it in half. Cover with leftover pasta sauces. Douse with cheese and top with your choice of bell peppers, pepperoni and sausage. Throw in oven until cheese darkens and bubbles.)

Hubby, on the other hand, cooks. In college, he would spend an entire day making the perfect stew, perfect chili or perfet five-course meal. And I would watch. Usually drinking something cold and alcoholic. Occasionally I would help dice, but we didn't always like blood with our food.

So, when I got married, I didn't change a thing. I did all the normal cleaning stuff I didn't mind, but I never had food on the table when Hubby came home from work. I never wore a little apron and pulled a roast out of the oven just as - perfect timing! - Hubby walked through the door. I never had anything more planned than a bowl of guacamole and some chips.

And, to this day, I still don't have supper waiting. Hubby comes home from work and opens up the fridge to start cooking. Or he calls on the way home to ask what we have in the pantry that we could use. But he doesn't ever ask what I am making for dinner.

Because he knows there are no buns cooking in this oven.