I slept in this morning, but when I got to my email at 8, I already had a lot of responses to today's column (You Can Be Smart and Married).
Overwhelmingly, I'm hearing from men who are disgusted at the idea of women playing dumb to attract men – and at the idea that men would fall for such a trick.
And in case you didn't know this about male Wired News readers, many of you wish you had the choice to trade in your professions for the traditionally female role of housekeeping and childrearing, and you even have a good idea of what you'd be getting into.
I've also had a few letters from women who know their husbands love their intelligence and professional success.
It strikes me as a particularly modern conundrum, really. Women have always worked outside the home. Maybe not wealthy or middle-class women. But before we had technology to make everything easy, women took on a lot of jobs. Upstairs maid, downstairs maid, cook, nanny, laundress, nurse, midwife, produce seller, flower seller, etc. So this idea that women stay home and men go to work really belongs to a certain economic level, and to our luxurious modern times with hot water heaters and washing machines.
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to empty the dishwasher and pick up the dog poop and go pick up a week's worth of mail before I get back to work.
