I don’t ever want to be that married woman who brags about how strong her marriage is, because I always think of the woman who wrote The Rules for Marriage and then just as the book was about to hit the stands it was announced that she was getting divorced. Whenever a couple I know, either personally or in the public eye, breaks up it makes me sad because no matter how confident you are it reminds you that every relationship is vulnerable—including your own.
Nothing was more heartbreaking than when Jesse James cheated repeatedly on America’s sweetheart, Sandy Bullock. How could he do that to her, especially after she took that poor black boy into her home and taught him how to play football? What made it worse was that in the months prior, every interview and every speech Sandra gave including when she won the Oscar was about how wonderful her husband was. This is why I purposely don’t say that many nice things about Peter—it’s a curse, because if you do, the next thing you find out is your husband’s been fucking a tattooed Nazi.
Having now written a book while being married I empathize with the author of The Rules for Marriage. Working full-time at Chelsea Lately and performing stand-up comedy around the country and into foreign territory like Canada allowed me only the weekends to write this book. As much as I truly enjoyed remembering these stories and laughing out loud as I typed, as I arrived home at seven p.m. on Friday night I’d start getting anxious about all the work ahead of me. Soon I’d become more and more resentful that Peter was going to golf with his slightly overweight, middle-aged friends on Saturday mornings. To say the least, a few fights were had. I’d say, “Why can’t you stay home and help with the kids?” And he’d say, “But the nanny is coming tomorrow so you won’t have to be disturbed.” And I would say, “What’s so fun about golf anyway? I don’t think you really love me.”
Clearly, any woman would agree, I was in the right. But being married with kids also helps take the drama out of relationships. When it’s just the two of you and your man pisses you off, you can cry, grab your keys, and run off in the rain (provided it’s raining), and go to your single girlfriend’s house, drink wine, and tell each other how great you both are. But when you’ve got kids depending on you, it’s different. I often ask myself, How long am I going to let this argument go? Do I really want to pack a bag and sleep at the Woodland Hills Marriot or Comfort Inn? Because my single girlfriends are now married and I don’t want to go to their house and end up taking care of their kids. I think our longest period of not talking—besides when I’m watching a Real Housewives or a Keeping Up with the Kardashians marathon—is about twenty minutes. Besides, we both like our king-size Tempur-Pedic mattress topper with our fourteen goose down pillows too much, so even sleeping somewhere else separately doesn’t happen much.
We are not strangers to marriage counseling, either. However, we’ve only been three times. On the third session Peter admitted he was wrong to yell at me about the crumbs in his car from the poppy seed cake and after that we stopped booking therapy sessions. Now all I have to do is to threaten for us to go again and he whips right back into shape.
Through the years, our marriage has gone through some changes. In the beginning I was still acting like a contestant on The Bachelor, pretending I was that sport-loving low-maintenance chick who’s up for anything. In the first three years of being married I rode an ATV, slept on a small rocking boat in the Galapagos Islands for seven nights, and attempted to ride a bicycle above the clouds of the Haleakala volcano down the road from Hana Maui at five a.m. because that way we could really enjoy the sunrise. Now when Peter makes those kinds of suggestions, I simply say, “No, thank you, go without me. I just booked a massage.” That way, we are both much happier.
Recently, Peter and I decided to purchase some furniture. The designer from the store met us at our house at seven in the evening, and as the hours passed on I became more and more exhausted and just wanted her to leave. I started to agree to everything she pointed at in the catalog and began to write her a huge deposit check. When Peter objected, saying we should go to the store and at least sit on the furniture once, I said, “No, we have to give her a check now. That’s how she said it works.” The next morning I came to my senses and canceled my $16,000 check to the furniture store and for the first time I had a better understanding of how innocent people confess to murders they did not commit after they’ve endured hours of police interrogation. After further discussion, Peter and I did put in a furniture order. However, making purchasing decisions can cause problems between Peter and me because I’ll think we’ve made a joint decision, yet when something goes wrong with the purchase, suddenly I’m the only one who wanted the new ceiling fan. So, to prevent future arguments like the one I predict that will happen the day my son spills his milk on our new couch and Peter screams, “I told you we should have gone with leather, but no, you wanted cloth,” I can whip out a contract I had a lawyer friend of mine put together that Peter signed, stating: “I, Peter James Dobias, do hereby, and with free volition swear, affirm, agree, and aver that the decision to make the furniture purchase of January 12, 2010, and the specifics of size, color, and upholstery attendant to said purchase, was made equally and with full agreement by the party of the first part, Peter James Dobias, and the party of the second part, Heather Ann McDonald. Should any breach of this agreement occur, contemplating the difficulty of determining the value of damage this would incur to the marriage, child rearing, and homemaking of the parties, damages shall be paid in the amount of one one-hundred-dollar Nordstrom’s gift card per violation. Signed in the Year of Our Lord 2010, Peter Dobias.”
It’s little preventive measures like this that have helped keep me sane—that and choosing to never take my children to restaurants that involve waiters. I’m the first to admit that the only green food my boys eat are their own boogers.
Being a working mom is not easy. That’s why my motto is not “having it all” but rather “having it most,” because once you become a mother to something other than an animal you simply can’t have it all but you can try to have most of it. You can’t decide to lie in bed hungover all day and read a Vanity Fair from front to back because at seven a.m. someone is screaming for cereal and you can only say “five more minutes” so many times before your child climbs on your head and begins to jump up and down. When you’re hungover this is really unpleasant.
I am far from the perfect mom. That is why I rely on a good Catholic school to whip my boys into shape. They attend the same Catholic school I went to, which I loved. In fact, when the nuns and the priests used to talk about receiving the “calling” to devote their lives to Christ, I wanted to do the right thing. Still every time the phone rang I was petrified that it was going to be Jesus on the other end asking for me and I had just seen a movie about a woman becoming a nun and there was a scene where the priest cuts off all her long gorgeous hair on the altar, a priest mind you, not even a licensed beautician. So I promised Jesus that I would become a nun but only after I got married, had all my children, and my husband died. Then when I was say, sixty-years-old, I’d be happy to sport a short hairdo, move into the convent, giggle with all the other sisters in the garden, and drive my nun car around. (At my parish, they all drove white Toyota Tercels. Some big donor must have owned a dealership.) I was never more relieved than when it was explained to me that “the calling” does not involve AT&T or their long distance plan to heaven.
Being a parent at the same school I attended is a little déjà vu, because during teacher-parent conferences I am in some of the exact same classrooms I was in thirty years ago and I get that familiar pit in my stomach. At the last one the teacher said great things about Drake, but then she said the “only thing is,” he was late eight times this semester. The “only thing” he failed at had to do solely with me. Though at seven he is extremely advanced, he can’t drive himself, so when she said that about being late it was pretty hard for me to try to pass the blame but I still managed to do so by blaming my husband, saying that he’s the on
e who drives them every morning.
Sexually, my husband still couldn’t care less that I was virgin until I was twenty-seven except that it resulted in a book deal. We have a good sex life; at least I believe we do. Another great thing about having very few partners and experience is that I don’t have much to compare it to so I don’t know any better. I often have sexual dreams where someone other than my husband is hitting on me and in the dream I say to myself, “Look, you and I both know this is a dream, so it’s not adultery—just go for it.” Infidelity when it is confined to dreams or Lifetime movies is not considered a mortal sin by the Catholic Church.
I’m happy that people can’t come out of the woodwork and say I was bad in bed. Even today, with many years of experience under my belt, I don’t think I’m amazing in bed. To be perfectly honest, Peter and I are your average bread-and-butter boners. When it comes to viewing porn it consists of HBO original programming and a little Cinemax, which results mostly in my husband and me arguing about which street in the San Fernando Valley we believe the film was shot on. I do however love to fantasize. My favorite is to come up with scenarios featuring my husband but at a time when I was still virginal. One summer day after we went swimming and the kids were watching The Polar Express in the playroom, I said to Peter, “OK, let’s pretend it’s nineteen ninety-seven and we’re at a pool party in the Hollywood Hills. We’ve been drinking all day in the hot sun, and we’re just meeting now waiting in line for the bathroom, let’s do this.” Or we play doctor and I pretend I don’t have insurance. Sometimes it works out and sometimes Peter gets frustrated by it all. He’s not an actor so he’s not great with the improvisation, and he doesn’t stick to strong character choices, which are all necessary if we’re going to bring things to a climactic point. But who am I kidding, The Polar Express does eventually end or the DVD skips, at which point sexy time is immediately over.
The best conversations I have with my husband today are when he is driving us for a weekend trip a few hours away. Even though we are interrupted a few times to pass a juice box back, for the most part we can really talk and I love that. The other weekend on our way to Palm Desert I asked Peter, “If I died and all of my friends were single, which one would you marry? ” Peter said, “I’m not going to answer that.” To which I replied, “Come on, if you died I know which one of your friends I’d marry.” He then gave a big sigh and said, “Heather, if you died, I would never ever get married again. … I’m just so goddamn tired.” Well, that is not a compliment but at least I have the comfort in knowing that Peter will never marry again thanks to what I’ve put him through.
Just today my mother-in-law sent me a photo she took in our driveway last weekend and in the photo there was a beautiful girl, two cute boys on bikes, a Lexus, and a white picket fence. Wow, all my dreams really have come true!
Being a virgin well into one’s twenties isn’t for everyone. It never paid my rent or got me free trips to Hawaii, but I don’t regret any decisions I’ve made and feel very blessed to be where I am today.
On this season of The Bachelor: On the Wings of Love with the dorky bubble-butt airline pilot, he was down to five girls and one confessed to him that she was a twenty-three-year-old virgin. She went on to explain that she is still very sexual and that it doesn’t define her and he told her he thought it was great and then that night at the rose ceremony, guess who got the boot, the virgin. No rose for the girl with the scarlet V on her cocktail dress. My advice to her would be not to tell the next guy too soon, but seeing as how she just announced it on national television, that might be difficult. So instead I’d like to say to that Bachelor contestant and any other cute, attractive virgin in her twenties out there, be true to yourself and blue ball until you don’t want to blue ball anymore!
Acknowledgments
I would like to first thank Chelsea Handler, the most generous performer I know, for hiring me to write on her show, Chelsea Lately, and all the stand-up gigs, vacations, shoes, sushi, cocktails, and general perks that come along with being one of her employees—and, more important, from her friendship. I’d also like to thank Chelsea for introducing me to my agent, Michael Broussard, the best in the business.
I’d like to give special thanks to my sister Shannon, for always being there, from driving me to a seniors-only party to lying on my bed laughing as we watch our kids play together. Also thank you to all my family, which includes the rest of the McDonalds, The Dobiases, The McAvoys, The Careys, and anyone else in Ireland who is somehow related to my father, Bob McDonald.
To the best mother-in-law in the world, Virginia Dobias, thank you for taking care of my children and raising my husband.
To my husband, Peter, and my children, Mackenzie, Drake, and Brandon, thank you for making my dream of being a wife and mother a reality.
To my two best friends—Elizabeth Killmond Roman, whom I met in first grade when her desk was moved next to mine at St. Mel Catholic School, and Tara Klein, whom I met at my high school entrance exam at Louisville High School— and to all of my other girlfriends and sorority sisters I met at USC, especially Maia Dreyer and Stacey Jenks for making my life so much fun and for always encouraging me to follow my dreams.
To my editor, Zachary Schisgal, to Stacey Creamer, and to everyone else at Simon & Schuster Touchstone Fireside who helped make this book so great. To Bernie Cahill and Jordan Tilzer at Roar; Sandy and Brian at The McCabe Group, and Stephen Bender and Sue Carswell for all their help.
To my friends and coworkers at Chelsea Lately, especially Guy Branum, Tom Brunelle, Sue Murphy, Chris Franjola, Steve Marmalstein, Jen Kirkman, Chuy Bravo, Sarah Colonna, Brad Wollack, Jeff Wild, and Johnny Milord—thank you for making the last three years of my life hilarious. Also to Jillian Barberie-Reynolds and the Kardashian-Jenner clan for being so supportive of my career. And to the Wayans Brothers especially to Keenen, Shawn, and Marlon who have hired me numerous times. Yes, the black man has been very good to me.
And to all of my friends, whether real, or in cyberspace on MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter, thank you for coming to my shows and for buying this book.
Finally, to my parents, Bob and Pam, thank you for sacrificing so much for me and for paying for twelve years of private Catholic education and for footing the bill for four years at The University of Southern California solely because I said if you didn’t let me go there I would get depressed every time I saw a USC license plate frame. See, it was worth it! Also for loving me unconditionally and bragging about me every chance you get. I love you both!
You’ll Never Blue Ball in This Town Again Page 22
