This started as a comment on Becca's blog [1], but I found myself thinking and writing enough that I thought I'd better take it here. Go read her post (and click through to the Salon article if you want) and come back. Ready? OK. [Edited to add that Becca seems to have taken that post down. Here's the Salon story. [2]]
I'm in the beauty spot since I work AND stay home. I'm unassailable. But I'm also an advocate for stay-at-homes; that's what my work is. I don't want to take part in the mommy wars--I refuse to--and yet I recognize that some biologically or emotionally connected adult being home, making home, leads to happier family lives. I believe that firmly.
I also recognize the reality of Western family life--let's face it, the reality of Western motherhood. And that is, it's still on us. The house, the kids--it's still on us. We're still here, on duty 24/7, whether we work outside the home or not. My husband does more with the kids and the housework than my father did, and is generally great--but when the kids are sick at night, I'm the one who gets up. He has to go to work in the morning, but I'm pretty sure that if we both had to go to work in the morning I'd still be the one getting up.
We all hear about the marriages where everything's 50/50 all the way around. How many are there? For the rest of us, it's the double shift--work, and then come home and work some more. Why would you do that if there were any possible way around it? Division of labor is that way around, and if it's a betrayal of feminism I fail to see how living the double shift life so many women live is a fulfillment of it. One of my friends says, why should we accept anything less than 50/50? My answer: We're married to men NOW, not 50 years into a hypothetically more equal future. We have to meet our partners where they are. We can ask for more, but expecting change unless someone wants to change is a recipe for making yourself crazy. And divorced.
If it sounds like I'm saying most women have to make a choice between career and home, I guess I am. Men by and large don't have to make that choice, but you know what? Men also can stand up and pee a whole lot easier. Some things are just the way they are. If you're a career woman and have a family member of some kind who can handle the home front--your partner, your mother, your sister, someone who has an emotional stake in you and your children rather than a financial one--go for the full plate. But a family member has to be home if at all possible when there are children involved.
I have more thoughts on this, but that's all for today. I will say this, though: Total 180 sounds like a Total Whatever.
Categories: feminism [3], Total_180 [4], motherhood [5]
Technorati Tags: Making Connections [14]