Mutual Admiration

IN HER NEW BOOK, "Peer Marriage," Pepper Schwartz argues that marriages between equals are not only politically correct, they offer the most satisfaction to both partners. Today in scene, we tell you a little about the book, offer a glimpse of Schrartz's own peer marriage, and a questionnaire to determine whether your marriage is peer, "near-peer" (couples who try, but no cigar), or traditional (man at the top). Plus, for those "near-peers" who want to get to peer: how to get there in five not-so-easy steps.

When she first started research for her book on peer marriages, sociologist Pepper Schwartz thought peer couples would likely be people like herself and her architect-planner husband Art Skolnik: "Fast-track, post-yuppie couples, post feminist. . ."

Instead, she more commonly found couples who opted to slow down hell-bent careers to make time for family.

"I couldn't do that, that's not who I am," says the 49-year-old Schwartz.

Indeed. Peer marriage she has. But it's peer marriage and coparenthood in the warp-speed lane.

Ring. (It's husband Art asking for a ride to the photo session for this story.) "Hi, sweetie. . . Is the bus a pain? What do I know, I never take the bus. . . I'm in the interview now, then I have some bills here that are just SMOKING, and I have to write the 5 p.m. newscast. . .No, I'll pick you up; 12:10, and I won't be late. . ."

Schwartz and her husband probably talk on the phone six or eight times a day. (They've been married 12 years, lived together two years before that; working on his 1979 King County Council campaign, she perked up to hear his marriage was over; they went for coffee, and it happened - SNAP - just like that.) A conversation might be about who they're having dinner with that night, or something the kids need.

Six to eight times? That might sound insufferably on top of each other, but you've got to consider that they may talk more than they actually see each other.

Typical day: Schwartz, Skolnik, and their two children, 9 and 11, commute together from their Vashon Island horse-and-llama ranch to Seattle in the morning. (Well, more or less together. Schwartz and Skolnik may drive in separate cars, but they sit together on the ferry.)

Their full-time, live-in nanny (male, 6 foot 4) usually picks the kids up from the private Bush School in Seattle and takes them to an afternoon activity.

Once or twice during the week, Schwartz and Skolnik do something together, such as dine with friends. Schwartz confesses she almost never makes it home for a family dinner; Skolnik tries to get home to eat with the kids two or three times during the week. (The nanny cooks for the kids; he also cleans the house.)

Schwartz and Skolnik do their outside the family socializing on weekdays, since with their work schedules and the ferry commuting time, Schwartz reasons they wouldn't make it home for dinner, anyway.

"Pepper depends more on those (evening) hours to connect with people than I do. I can connect during the day," Skolnik explains later, of his greater tendency to be a homebody.

Weekends, Schwartz says, are strictly for family; if friends want to see them, they have to go to Vashon. They'll make an occasional exception for something like a wedding of good friends.

Ring. "I could send you my CV (curriculum vitae, as they call an academic's resume), but it's 16 pages long. It's easier for me just to tell you now on the phone. . . I'm professor of sociology at the University of Washington, immediate past president of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex, I write columns for Glamour and American Baby, I'm a news commentator for KIRO-TV, I'm on the boards of Planned Parenthood and the AIDS Foundation. I raise horses and llamas on a ranch, I have two children. . . . yes, I got my Ph.D. from Yale. . . I'm multiorgasmic - oh, these resumes are so boring, you know, that's something different (pause) this is a JOKE, A JOKE!..DON'T - DO - THIS!. . ."

The time crunch will get better, they hope, when they move to the new house they're building on 80 acres in the Snoqualmie-North Bend area. Then they won't be losing so much time commuting. Before they moved to Vashon a year and a half ago, Schwartz says, she still often didn't make it home for dinner but customarily got there by dessert or coffee time, say 7 p.m. Then there was time for talking and reading with the kids, and private time for each other.

She hopes to get back to that pattern when they move.

Even so, do the children get as much time with her as they would like? No, says Schwartz, though of course children never get as much time as they'd like. "Should they get more? Yes."

She and Skolnik have a monthly ritual of "looking for white space" on their respective calendars, to plan for couple time and family time.

They'll do a two-week family car vacation, for example. And they make "dates" with each child individually - she took her son with her when she went to a press conference in San Francisco, and she'll be taking her daughter when she goes on a horse-business trip to Kentucky.

Schwartz has always worked outside the home, except for the three months she stayed home with each baby. She says they've only been able to maintain intense careers because they've been able to afford high-quality child care and other hired help, such as their farm manager.

"I never miss a school play; we're both there for teachers conferences," Schwartz says. "For the everyday things, the nanny is there. Would they prefer me? Yeah." But, as she tries to explain to them, "I need a life that makes sense to me."

(Ring. It's someone she's been playing telephone tag with for three months; they make a date for breakfast.

Ring. Discusses details of moderating a meeting.

Ring. Promises to put aside sociology books for someone.

Ring. Gets an invitation, says she'll have to check with Art but sounds OK.

Ring. Tells the nanny if he just buys the ferry tickets and holds off on the other stuff, he'll have enough money for now.

Ring. Ring. And so it keeps going, the phone ringing just about every five minutes for two hours straight, until Schwartz closes her office; after the photo and her TV commentary, she's off to a national sociology conference . . .

As far as couple time, Skolnik and Schwartz try to get away for at least one adult vacation a year plus several adults-only weekends, plus an occasional night in a hotel downtown. "We pretend we just met," Schwartz says.

Romance, she says, is very important to her. "Art's my role model," creative and attentive, giving gifts that take thought and time. Like, for her 40th birthday, making a movie of her life, from photos collected from her family members' albums. It went from birth to present (except, she laughs, funnily enough this movie omitted any men in her life).

The hallmark of their peer marriage, says Schwartz, is the mutual respect she and Skolnik have for each other. "We like each other's spirit and energy." Says Skolnik: "I don't see a downside; I don't feel I've slipped off the podium - or she's been deprived of a podium."

They make sure there's a balance of who's doing what, and when things feel out of balance, one or the other will call on it: Hey, I did all that stuff for the kids last week, I need to make up that time back this week . . .

He does more "boy jobs" (as he characterizes them, tongue in cheek) like fix-it chores, and she more "girl jobs," like clothes shopping, he says. He tends to do everyday weekend cooking more, she does more special event cooking, though both discuss the menu. Usually their schedules determine who does what, although lately with her work hours and book tour, he's been doing more child care.

Not to say they don't have their differences.

"Every relationship has its scratchy places," says Schwartz. "Our scratchiest is over our very different ideas of childraising. I'm permissive, he's a disciplinarian. When things get scratchy, I'll say, let's go away for a night . . . have a nice dinner, go to bed early so we can really make love. . ."

Speaking of which, Schwartz says they're determined not to fall into that too-common peer-marriage problem of less frequent sex. "We make sure the physical relationship bears a relationship to when we first met." And if it slacks off, "I'm like, `excuse me, that ain't over til I'm dead.' "

Their scratchiest time came some years ago when Skolnik took a dream job in San Diego. They both agreed it was an opportunity he shouldn't pass up. He commuted to Seattle on weekends. At the time, Schwartz was pregnant and they had an 18-month-old.

It was OK for the first year, but by the second year she was getting angrier and angrier. Things got so bad, they mutually agreed he would quit. Earlier she'd thought maybe she would move to San Diego, but "my life was too established here. The way to put this together was here, not there."

Skolnik, now 50 and manager of economic development for Metro, says he learned a lesson: "I learned to separate egotistical needs from personal needs."

Both Skolnik and Schwartz are on their second marriages. Her first was also a peer marriage, his was traditional. Of hers, she says it failed because they weren't living in the same place, they didn't make the necessary commitment and compromises and ego-taming for it to work; they're still good friends.

Of his, he says his wife's art career didn't take off as his did, and she was doing more child-care. "If you don't bring in income it does taint the equalness," he says, though this was not so much true in his eyes, but in hers. "Having an already established income and identity (as Schwartz did) does make it easier to deal with having an equal relationship."

When it comes to the Schwartz-Skolnik finances, they like the freedom and flexibility that come with separate accounts, the ability to buy presents for each other secretly. They have coordinated wills and estate plans, share farm expenses and divide up certain bills, but don't pay a lot of attention to who's paying what other stuff.

Taking her own advice that a couple should have a concrete project that they share - something other than the children - Schwartz says theirs is their horse and llama ranch. It started as a hobby, has gradually grown to a business.

"He's a little more llama, I'm a little more horse."