The Steins’ different views about their responsibilities at home led them to want to be appreciated, and to appreciate each other in ways that did not correspond. Seth wanted Jessica to identify with his ambition, enjoy the benefits of it—his large salary, their position in the community—and to accept gracefully his unavoidable absence from home. The truth was, Jessica did understand the pressures of his work as only a fellow lawyer could. But he didn’t seem to want to be home, and he wasn’t. For her part, Jessica wanted to be appreciated for the sacrifices she made in her career, and for her mothering. She worked twenty-five hours a week now, fifteen billable hours, but had been keen to develop a larger family law practice, and perhaps write a book about it.
Seth ignored this sacrifice—indeed, was it a sacrifice? Wouldn’t a twenty-five-hour-a-week job be nice? He was also too tired at the end of the day to notice much of Jessicas contribution to home and children. A man like Peter Tanagawa may not have done much of the second shift, but he cast an appreciative eye on all his wife did; Seth was too exhausted to notice.
The clash of ideas about what deserved appreciation led each to resent the other. As Seth put it, “We both feel ripped off.” For example, Jessica had recently complained that she’d passed up a chance to go to a family law conference in Washington, D. C., because Seth couldn’t stay with the kids. On a different occasion, Seth had been too engrossed in a litigation case to take the chance to go sailing on the bay with friends. Jessica didn’t imagine it was hard for him to mow over another weekend like that; she figured he was “sneaking in more work.”
Small events sometimes symbolize bigger ones. So it was with a birthday gift Seth bought Jessica. As he explained: “For her birthday I bought Jessica this gold chain, because I know she likes gold chains. But she felt I hadn’t gotten her the kind of chain she really wanted, so she was mad. And I was mad that she didn’t appreciate the trouble I’d gone to in order to get it. We were both furious.” Which was the real conflict—that over the gift of the gold chain with the round links that Seth was able to find on a lunch break or the one with the oblong links that Jessica had had her eye on? Or was it a conflict over getting too much of your career, or getting too little? Having to be away from home, or getting stuck there?