Mama? Me? Yeah.

To Hell With All That—Flipping the Joneses the Bird, Namaste

2012-02-10T08:27:00.005-05:00

I just finished reading Caitlin Flanagan's To Hell With All That, prompted by an interest in her after first reading her latest, Girl Land. The tag is "loving and loathing our inner housewife" and that dichotomy is there throughout the book. I'm never really completely sure what she's embracing or eschewing, and it may just be observational social commentary, not really pushing for anything, though it seems she leans toward the stay-at-home mom model, or at least acknowledges its value. She disses social climbers, from her apparently upperclass roost. She makes me glad I dropped out of "the game."

Flanagan tosses me back and forth with agreement and disagreement with her, or maybe more accurately between feeling an affinity then non-affinity. For example, I like how she critiques the middle class tendency toward social climbing ostentation with their fancy princessy weddings, but then later I don't see how someone who isn't even working could justify having a 9-5 nanny, even if she has twins.

She inspired me to purchase the book Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House by Cheryl Mendelson because I like to know how to do things and I like reading. But, on the other hand, I am not going to become superhomemaker. Actually, that’s not what the book is about. I think Flanagan uses it as more of a contrast to the Martha Stewarty world of flair and superficial graciousness when she deconstructs the oppressiveness of real housework in the post-feminist era. To me, the whole housework drudgery bit is so tired. In today's world, we have lots of modern machines and fairly low standards and low level of formality in our lives when it comes to keeping homes so I just don't see it as that difficult to maintain a generally acceptable living space and get home-cooked meals on the table.

Back to the mothering part, Flanagan seems very pleased with herself for staying home with her babies, but again, she had that nanny. What gives? She seems to write from a place of privilege, which is fine, suggesting a return to old-fashioned values re-enacted in a highly stylized 50s cum 80s manner, whereas my model is 1970s lower middle class. She expresses a certain disdain for the highly-engaged stay at home mom that rubs me a little the wrong way—even though sometimes I feel it, I'd never articulate it so plainly.

I liked a lot of Flanagan’s observations about the “executive child” and moms shuffling their charges round and round from one highly enriching activity to the next—a topic by now that has been hashed out ad nauseum but still seems to be “an issue” (To Hell With That was published in the mid-90s). She ties this in nicely with the “experts’” call for unstructured time and regular family dinners—which some experts say must be scheduled, ha ha. Flanagan observes that family dinner “requires a mother who considered putting dinner on the table neither an exalted nor a menial task, and also a collection of family members whose worldly ambitions are low enough that they all happen to be hanging around the house at 630." This is totally me and my household. And I know my kid is only 4, but while I see her participating in an activity or two, I don’t see it overtaking our lives and as I always remind myself—thank goodness I only have one so I can manage these sorts of things. Yet, in our family of 4, with two kids, we still managed this growing up.

Flanagan goes on to say "If children are to have unstructured time, they need a mother at home; no one would advocate a new generation of latchkey children. But she must be a certain kind of mother—one willing to divest her sense of purpose from her children's achievement. She must be a woman willing to forgo the prestige of professional life in order to sit home while her kids dream up new games out in the tree house and wait for her to call them in for a nourishing dinner. She must be willing to endure the humiliation of forgoing a career and of raising tots bound for state college."

I know she must be being facetious, or is she? Luckily for me, our state has some really, really fabulous colleges. Maybe the fact that I am hoping for the top state college just puts me in a different (lower?) league than those of whom Flanagan speaks (and herself?) but I don’t care. Epiphany: I am beginning to really see the glories of being a middle-class bohemian, being reasonably comfortable but not rich or caught up in social climbing—and not giving a fuck about the Joneses. This is me.

Flanagan also analyzes the "mommy wars" a bit, invoking Dr. Spock, citing "one of the most compelling appeals for full-time motherhood I've ever read" (her talking there):

"The important thing for a mother to realize is that the younger a child, the more important it is for him to have a steady, loving person taking care of him. In most cases the mother is the best one to give him this feeling of "belonging," safely and surely. She doesn't quit on the job, she doesn't turn against him, she isn't indifferent to him...If a mother realizes clearly how vital this kind of care is to a small child, it may make it easier for her to decide that the extra money she might earn, or the satisfaction she might receive from an outside job is not so important after all."

This was in regard not to those mothers who had to work to actually make ends meet or even those with special professional training who felt they must work because they wouldn't be happy otherwise, but to a third group who would just "prefer to, either to supplement the family income, or because they think they will be more satisfied themselves and therefore get along better at home..."

Flanagan, predictably, because she is one of those "professional" women, noted:

"Obviously he's right about a mother being uniquely suited for the full-time care of her children. What more persuasive argument could there be than his simple and moving description of the maternal bond? What he could not have predicted was that such a huge number of women would fall into his second category. Mothers with professional training are thick on the ground these days, and their desire to work is at once more complex and more profound than the great man imagined. To be a woman with an education and a desire to take part in the business of the world—to have a public life only one-thousandth as vital and exciting as Dr. Spock's—yet to have one's days suddenly dwindle to the simple routines of child care can handily diminish what is best and more hard-fought in a person. It isn't simply a matter of ‘extra money’ or ‘satisfaction.’ For many women the decision to abandon—to some extent—either their children or their work will always be the stuff of grinding anxiety and uncertainty, of indecision and regret."

To that, I was at first humbled, or softened, because I though, OK, maybe I was just never a professional or ambitious enough woman and that is why I could so easily opt to stay home with my kid for her 0-5 years. Also, it helped that I was able to work part time from home. Still, it wasn't a big deal. I like the work I do, but it's for money, it's a minor part of my identity that could be filled with something else if need be. Maybe that's why I don't get the issue for people who "don't need the money." Still, it's their choice—whatever.

But then, I sit here and think, how self-aggrandizing of them, of many of them, anyway. They're not all cancer-curing or even baby-delivering doctors, or even teachers, many are financiers just making money to make money and they love what they do, so vulgar. Some are producing crappy TV. I mean, these are the things you'd leave an infant in daycare for? And because they identify as “professionals” this is part of their identity they can’t let go of? It seems more just like an issue of different personality types to me, more than anything else. I know I must try to nurture my softened, humbled thoughts on this and set aside the critical ones because the negativity doesn’t do me any good personally. I guess it is helpful that I can identify my personality and to allow my focus to be on nurturing the positive in that, and if I have some underlying desire to be evangelical about it, highlight the ways it works for me instead of trashing other personalities.

Girl Land—Embracing the substance, transcending the style

2012-02-09T08:29:00.005-05:00

Caitlin Flanagan's latest, Girl Land, discusses the challenges of raising girls in a cultural landscape devoid of "commonly held, child-appropriate moral values." She notes something I have definitely felt during my few years of parenting—that "the 'it takes a village' philosophy is a joke, because the village is now so polluted and so desolate of commonly held, child-appropriate moral values that my job as a mother is not to rely on the village but to protect my children from it." It's funny, I like the substance of much of what she says, though she's a completely different kind of woman than me, style-wise. In Girl Land, the things she positions as so essential for girls were not at all essential for me. Prom? Didn't go. But maybe that's my problem—or my advantage. I tend to eschew mainstream markers and rites of passage, and their associated confused trappings.

Many contemporary feminists seem quite flabbergasted, if not offended, by Flanagan's assertions in Girl Land. I don't buy them all wholesale, but they don't seem wholly unreasonable either. She tells parents to take a "15-minute tour" of the web, typing the word "porn" into Google and seeing what happens. Been there, done that. Yeah, there's a lot of scary shit out there. So, age-appropriate, you teach them that there are some really creepy people out there, on one hand, and on the other hand, that sexuality is complex, and what's most important is autonomy. She suggests parents make their girls' bedrooms "internet-free zones." I honestly don't know how I feel about this one, as someone who is often online all day long. She says that an adolescent girl needs quiet downtime for contemplation, and I actually agree with her on that point, moreso for reasons of quieting the mind than concerns about a girl getting into trouble with web-based sleaze. She also urges parents to get a girl’s father involved in her dating life. Agreed. Her father has to be realistic and already have an established, healthy, non-authoritarian relationship with her, though. She emphasizes that "giving a girl limits doesn't limit the girl." I really like much of what she has to say, but at the same time, the stylings of her "Girl Land" conjuring images of poster beds, pink pillows and princesses seems so contrived—not like my teen years, not how I envision my own girl, with her non-frilly tendencies.

She calls for a counter-culture, but seems a little stuck in old-fashioned, mainstream culture when it comes to how I’m reading her execution of things. I’m on board with her substance, though, if not her style. Flanagan writes:

The question parents of girls must ask themselves is to what extent they want their daughters raised within this culture, and to what extent they want to raise them within a counter-culture that rejects the commercialization of sexuality, the imperatives toward exhibitionism and crudeness. Creating a counterculture is hard work, but it can be done, and it is my strong belief that the young women who emerge from Girl Land having been protected from the current mainstream values are much stronger and more self-confident than those who have been immersed in it throughout their adolescences.

I think I can do this. I can admit to probably being out-of-touch with contemporary teen culture so I might not know “how bad it is out there.” I do read things about frat houses, bros, “slutty” girls and I see news items about how women are portrayed as sex objects in videos and fashion. I saw the trailer for an upcoming movie, Miss Representation, which “exposes how American youth are being sold the concept that women and girls’ value lies in their youth, beauty and sexuality.” I get it, but I have to ask, if so many people are aware of this, why does it continue? Do people just not have the guts to eschew mainstream cultural drivel? I can imagine someone saying I am naive and that it is going to be really hard to keep my kid from wanting to be a part of the crap culture when she is older. But, I am managing to create a healthy environment for her now in ways that, according to popular anecdote, many find difficult. So, maybe I have a good start, a leg up. But I have no doubt that I will have to remain vigilant. You know, actually be engaged with my kid and have a real relationship with her!

So, what the hell happened?

2012-02-02T08:29:00.005-05:00

"Why did you say you were finished with this blog in June and now there are posts starting again in December? What happened between June and December? What's with these new posts? What the hell is going on? Are you a personal trainer now?" All fair questions! Let me explain...

No. I am not a personal trainer now. In fact, I've gained, like, 15 pounds, since the June "Fin" and am now trying to lose them. Maybe this will make me more likable to other women? Although it seems now that many of the moms I am encountering are 5-7 years younger than me and many more pounds lighter, but that's cool. I'm doing my journey.

I'd said I'd stop blogging because I felt like it was maybe not good for me or something, but the truth is, I have ideas and they keep coming. I tried blogging more publicly on a domain attached to my name, but I don't think I want to do that because I want to have the freedom to say things I may later wish to reneg and to just generally let fly with thoughts more than I might want to actually attach to my "in real life" person. In real life, I just want to get along with people, help my kid navigate friendships, school, etc. and not cause any trouble. But in my mind I have thoughts I want to hash out and it's for my own mental health that I'm going to blog, as needed, right here. So, that's where we are today.

"Girls' Night Out" should not be exhaustingly soul-sucking

2012-01-28T08:26:00.000-05:00

The problem with being fake is that you set up a dynamic wherein you have to keep being fake. The problem with not being fake is that you can alienate alot of people if you have different views than most of the people you come into contact with. I feel I do. A lot of the time, because I am a mature adult, I am not compelled to spout out my opinion that may be in contrast to others' or make too stormy of waves in conversations. Even if I have an opinion. Say, for example, I don't think you should let a baby cry it out at bedtime. If someone is talking about how they're having trouble with their baby sleeping and they just had to leave the baby crying til it fell asleep, I will probably just put a sympathetic look on my face and nod. I will probably say something mamby pamby and fake like, "You are a stronger person than me. I'm such a wimp. I couldn't let my baby cry." I'd act like there wasn't anything wrong with what they were doing and it was only my emotional weakness that prevented me from also doing that, when in reality I think it's rotten to let an infant cry it out. There, I said it. I can generally handle a little necessary fakeness in the interest of keeping acquaintances and maintaining diplomacy. I play nice when I am in moms groups, girls night out and such. I smile and nod and sip my drink. Then I go home and feel awful. It takes alot of energy to be inauthentic and not true to what you believe.

Last weekend, there was a "girls night out" incident that I think was a tipping point for me in that I am not going to go out with this particular group again and in general I am not going to put myself in situations where I have to be fake. The group consists of women who were in a neighbor's new mom class at a local hospital. I like many in the group well enough, some smart and interesting women, but I just have to be too inauthentic around the group as a whole. After dinner, we went for coffees and were sitting around talking about family vacations and then schools—how would various family vacation traditions, time share schedules, etc. fit in with school schedules now that all the kids would be entering real school as kindergartners. The conversation moved from declarations of not caring about pulling a kid out because they don't really learn anything in kindergarten anyway to bemoaning the dearth of before and after school care provided by the county, to bitching about half-day Mondays they have in our county, to serious bitching about teachers in general. The vast majority of the bitching was done by one person.

She "cited a study" that said, according to her interpretation, "Teachers are the most overcompensated public workers there are!" She continued to rail about how teachers complain too much, how their jobs aren't that hard, how teachers are mostly people who didn't do well in college or partied, and she generally had a seriously shitty attitude about teachers. My brother is a dedicated teacher, my husband is a former teacher and I have some friends who are former or current teachers and all of them are fine people.

This was not the first time I'd heard this from her, the teacher bashing. She's gone on diatribes before about how when her kid's in school, she's gonna tell them how it's going to be. She's not going to take any crap. She's going to demand this or that if she has to. I mean, our kids aren't even in the school system yet. Nothing bad has even happened yet—and already the combative attitude. Our county has some of the best public schools in the nation and this one is just looking for a fight and something to bitch about. I can't even stand it.

So much negativity—always complaining about the husband and in-laws. I usually nod and try to come up with some mild and innocuous complaint about my own husband...uhm, yeah, he leaves crumbs on the counter and his underwear on the bedroom floor—what a bastard! I try to do the "girlfriends connecting" thing by parallel bitching something fake. I hate it, though. I don't really want to bitch about my husband—or my kid. He's generally a pretty good egg and most of the time I'd rather be out on a date with him than doing a "girls' night" anyway—her too.

I remember a while back we were talking about the before and after school programs and if we can't get in or didn't want to use them, my friend was suggesting a collaboration of mornings at one of our houses and afternoons at the others, and that we moms would have to work it all out because "They just don't do anything anyway, so we'll figure it out!" "They" being the husbands. This infuriated me. I played it relatively cool, but had to stop this line of thinking. "You know, that's not really true for me," I explained. "My husband and I actually have talked about staggering our work schedules to cover mornings and afternoons and he is fully on board with spending the after school time with our kid, and doing what it takes as a team to make it work, so please don't lump him in." To suggest that I'd better band together with her because my husband—my partner in life and the father of my child—wouldn't be of any help. It made me pretty sick. But I let it go and tried to be friendly.

Anyway, at the coffee shop, in the midst of the bitchfest, some 20-something girl comes up to our group and says, "I couldn't help overhearing and before I left, I just wanted to say, we are not overpaid and we do work hard. That is why I am here grading papers on a Saturday night. Not all teachers are lazy and stupid!" I was so embarrassed and tried to give this poor girl knowing looks while sideways glancing at my "friend" to try and show her I did not agree with the spouted out bullshit coming out of that woman's mouth and please do not lump me in with these people.

Then, the rest of the night was feeling uncomfortable and more fakeness of trying to convince my friend that she was just stating her opinion, among friends, and this other woman had no right to come insert herself into our private conversation, blah, blah, blah. What I really wanted to say was "Shut the fuck up!" What's really idiotic is that in talking about the before and after school care, the Mondays, the summers off and the vacation schedule issues, I said, "Sometimes I think I would really just like to homeschool! I think it would be so cool to just take it on myself. We could work on our own schedule, my child could be more self-directed, with a more individualized education..." and that was greeted with a chorus of "OH NO! I could never stay home all day with my kid!" And who was the loudest? The one saying how sucky teachers are and how overpaid.

So, let me get this straight: You can't stand even the idea of spending the whole day, every day, with your own one child, and yet you think someone who spends every day with 20 (or more) of them is overpaid? OK, then!

I felt yucky about this night for days afterward and I still don't know how I am going to manage the next invitation for something. I just don't want to be in that negative place and have to listen to crap I don't agree with and keep my mouth shut to that extent ever again. Some might argue that I should have some balls and speak my mind, but first of all, with some people it's hard to even get a word in, and then, you sometimes get the sense of "why bother?" if a person is so weirdly hyped on these intense trains of thought they dump on everyone. Is it worth the effort to speak your mind, or best to just fade away?

This all brings up an interesting topic about how we do—or do not—connect with other mothers of children our own child's age. Often we are thrust into social situations with people with whom we have little in common other than having same-age children. Oh, but we can all kvetch about those sleepless nights, those absurd preschooler demands, the hapless husbands, the minivans, the new china cabinets, the Disney trips...right? Well, no. I do not wish to talk about any of these things! I am the kind of person who can converse with almost anyone about anything, but do I always enjoy it. Not really. Why should people be friends just because they have kids the same age? Did our parents do stuff like that? As a mother of an "only" I want to foster good friendships for my child, but does that mean I have to be friends with the parents, whether or not we click?

In contrast, I did have a really fun "girls night" a few weeks ago. These were all women who I worked with at one point. Completely unrelated to me having a kid. It was a more diverse mix of women: two twenty-somethings, not married; another married mom, like me; a 50-something and a lesbian, my age. We had fun. That night, I didn't even want to go home as early as I did. We talked about light work stuff. We talked about which celebrities, male and female, we thought were hottest. We talked about movies. We talked a little about kids and parents, but fun stories that made us laugh. It felt more real than the moms night, and I don't think anyone bitched or kvetched about anything!

Nobody wants to really talk about it

2012-01-23T08:15:00.002-05:00

I really enjoyed yesterday's Penelope Trunk post on a key to productivity being choosing phone calls wisely—and saying no to things (I would carry this to things in general that are not satisfying or helping you get closer to your goals, not just phone calls). I am all over this practice in my day-to-day dealings and actually treat phone calls as client massaging (or friendship maintenance when it's personal) NOT as a truly effective way to exchange information or get things done. There are some people who, if you get on the phone with them, will suck an hour of your time away, just like that.

What really stood out for me, though, was something a little more buried in her post—"...that group child care for kids under two is very bad for the kids and people should spend their money solving that problem." (Wiki link included in her post.)

This stood out because not a lot of non-religious or non-conservative, non-old-fashioned types (see my re-run of a Dr. Laura-based-post below) really go around saying things like this nowadays. I agree with this statement myself but always feel like I can't speak my mind on it in general company because daycare is, like, the number two holy grail of feminism, under abortion rights. You'll make people feel guilty for their choices, you'll look like a weirdo for caring what other people do with their kids, things like that. They'll assume you're a crazy Mommy Wars lady, when all you want is to have an honest, intelligent discourse about choices and what's good for children.

But, I still think what I think, and it's uncomfortable to so often not be able to say what I think and so very gratifying to hear someone else (who is not religious or conservative or housewifey) say it, especially on the heels of another post I read yesterday on The Hidden Benefits of Daycare. Here we have a non-low-income person claiming benefits observed for low-income people as a benefit in general. It may be of some benefit to the mothers, but is it great for the kids, really? And do studies showing benefits for a low-income group translate to something beneficial to middle-class people? And furthermore should we be even saying "well, this is good for low income people" and keep them in that less than ideal, band-aid situation rather than tackling the core problems that make daycare really just a societal band-aid?

Penelope Trunk has another post on The Big Lie Homeschoolers Tell that discusses this notion of something being good for some people but not good for other people, only with homeschool (not daycare) and she uses breastfeeding as an analogy. It's pretty fascinating. It also is watering the seeds in my mind that have already been planted about homeschooling—which I sort of think I might like to do, but oh, I could not do.

Anyway, these issues have been on my mind for a while—and I've come to the conclusion that they key question for moms shouldn't be to work or not to work, but when to work and how much—and I recalled some relevant posts from the past on them: questioning why progressives assume that mothers of young children should work and scarily finding ways I kind of agree with Dr. Laura on some things (but not all).

Life is (still) good

2012-01-18T08:13:00.001-05:00

I often think to myself how good I have it. I am so over the blog posts and feature articles about how hard parenting is. Yes, I have my grumpy days, but most days I really do think, “Damn! Am I lucky!” This “Don’t Carpe Diem” one was really popular recently, and while I get it, it really didn’t resonate with me as much as it annoyed me. I kind of actually do carpe diem (to use her parlance), and while at the end she gets to the point that we should pay attention to the good things and be grateful, and offers some lovely examples, I really don’t buy the “parenting is like climbing Mt. Everest” analogy. Really? Something like 1500 people in all of history so far have climbed Mt. Everest. Billions of people have had children. In the comments to the Carpe Diem post, there were actually people saying that if you don’t think it’s hard, you’re doing it wrong! I don’t think people should feel bad about themselves or feel guilt if they have a bad day—or week. But, I think people need some perspective.

I just saw another one today—14 Reasons Why Being A Stay At Home Person Sucks. And then there’s the pissing contest about who’s got it harder, working moms or stay-at-home-moms. What an odd thing to want to argue—I’ve got it harder than you! Well, I’m here to say that I love my life—sure it probably is easier than many people’s, but “the complainers’” lives are also probably easier than most of the world’s population, and people throughout history as well. And I am so grateful.

I am hesitant to post this because in some ways, in the “mommyblogosphere” it actually seems subversive to be happy, without qualifications, about your life and your kid. People will think you’re bragging, or maybe just misery loves company more than someone saying how wonderful things are when another person may not be feeling so wonderful. But, I think it’s important to talk about when we’re happy, too. I think the “parenting is so hard” meme has just gone way too far.

I would challenge the Don’t Carpe Diem types to actually, yes, try to savor the moments, even the “screaming Target” ones (I seriously don’t understand how asleep at the wheel one has to be to find themselves in a situation where their kid has taken merchandise off the shelf or opened food in the store unbeknownst to them, and I don’t get the tantrums in stores thing, but I digress, maybe those anecdotes are for effect). But savor those, too, yes, do try. Much has been written about mindfulness and how it actually alleviates stress and makes people happier (Google it). Counting the minutes til your day ends? On a regular basis? Something is wrong with how you manage your days.

I remembered in the back of my head a post I’d written before, generally on this topic, though I didn’t remember it being quite so far back in time—actually when my kid was in the supposedly “terrible” twos! It’s heartening to know that more than two years later, I still feel the same. Maybe the good times can last! My post doesn’t even touch on comparisons between the average American mom and those in Africa who have to walk 5 miles to get water or something. Doesn’t even touch on the blessing of having healthy kids (as most of us do) versus a kid in the cancer ward (imagery my dad, who works in a hospital, was quick to invoke when we were discussing the relative hardness of parenting). My post is about much lighter things than those.

I was discussing this with my mom the other day. How happy my life is now, these golden years of long days (but for me, seriously not long enough) at home with my young child. I worry about the transition out of these days. I often envision my mom with me, back in the 70s, before my siblings came along, just us. Long days. Baking. Playgrounds. Doing art. Reading. A young, young mother just in her early 20s. I envision idyllic days for her. But, they had less money than we have now, and presumably more worries (?) She didn’t have the internet (for better or for worse). And, she was so young. I asked her if she had any fears or anxiety in her time about what would happen someday if X, Y or Z happened—because the flipside of gratitude can often be anxiety about losing what you’ve got. At least for me, if I don’t keep it in check. She told me she used to think, “OK, what is the worst that could happen?” And, she told me, she saw those “worst things” actually happen (including the death of a child). She observed that all these things happened, and, there she was, surviving. And there she was that day on the phone with me, dropping some serious knowledge on her daughter. Maybe she ought to have a blog.

Interesting or good? Interesting or happy?

2012-01-12T08:11:00.000-05:00

Mies van der Rohe, a design hero of mine, once said “I don’t want to be interesting. I want to be good.” He meant his architectural designs, of course, but what are we doing other than designing our own lives? The comparison can be pondered generally about life, as well. Interesting or good? By “good” Mies likely meant serving a purpose, in the form follows function vein. And without superfluous decoration. As explained in the Wikipedia entry, he strove for a minimal framework of structural order balanced against the implied freedom of free-flowing open space. I could go on and on relating minimalism to contentment, but then I wouldn’t be being minimalist, so I hope, dear reader, that you “get it,” at least a little.

Interesting or happy?

Recently, I stumbled upon Penelope Trunk, a former startup exec, now homeschooler, conflicted work-at-home mom, blogger and generally supersmart and interesting ultra drama queen, who is going to say in her forthcoming book (I think) that it’s better to have an interesting life.

She has many posts on her blog about a happy life vs an interesting life, including a quiz she says helps determine whether your life is happy or interesting. My result was -1, which means: You are suspiciously well balanced. Or lacking a self-identity. I’m not sure which. I am going to go with well balanced. I don’t seek happiness, I seek contentment, which is even better, but maybe even more boring.

For me, it is more important to live a happy/content life. I think it is important to be able to find it without relying on material things or even other people. As I type this, I don’t know that valuing this is, necessarily, that much different from having an interesting life, it must depend on who’s assessing it, and I can only assume that each person must be responsible for assessing whether their own life is interesting or not. I mean one person’s interesting, is another person’s harried. I hate harried.

Trunk says in another post, “I think I want an interesting life. Not that I want to be interesting, but I want to be interested. I’m talking about what I think is interesting to me. I want to choose things that are interesting to me over things that would make me happy.” I do, too, but I don’t believe that I have to live in New York, change jobs alot (or even have a job), or insist on alot of choices to be interested. In fact, I am overwhelmed by being interested.

Part of my “problem” is that I am interested in too many things. I wake up, thinking I’m going to check e-mail, see what’s up on Facebook since I last checked before going to bed (and sometimes if I wake up in the middle of the night) and then move on to my day. But, I often stumble upon a link someone posted, or remember something I wanted to find out, then one thing leads to another, and another and I am dreaming up some new side project or buying a book I must read, or finding out about something I must try. This happens too much. This (and having to actually work to come up with money for living and tuition) is why it took me 10 years to complete an undergrad degree. To some extent, this keeps me from achieving the Miesian goal of being “good” (jack of all trades, master of nothing). To get good, you need some focus, right? I’m good at focusing on specific projects, like in a work environment. I am good at meeting deadlines for others, but when it comes to the openness of my own mind, my own life, it’s another story.

One such recent Facebook post (thanks again, LotusBluMama) lead me to this idea of keeping a logbook (instead of a full-on journal, where, you know, you have to write longhand sentences and full thoughts). The logbook is brilliant. Quick bites of things that hit you that may be useful or interesting to remember. I started one for the new year and already what stands out to me is how I want to be more present with my child. So, I have to find more interest in things I can do with her than in my internet explorations, or at least strive for more balance than I have now. This is likely to be my last winter at home with her and then, last spring, and maybe even last summer, before school and bigger-kid life sets in. I need to be more focused on savoring this time. I need to be present.

A Mayo Clinic article talks about cultivating contentment and lists among its tips devoting time to family and friends, and living in the moment. I know I have heard in yoga practice that being present is key to contentment. I would like to find more scholarly articles, maybe studies on this to link to, but I think in my heart I know it (INFJ, here). And as I try to complete my thoughts and wrap this post in a good way, my girl is literally clamoring for my attention and so I must go.

This post is shared, but by no means complete. But if I don’t come back to it for a while, it’s a good thing, because it will mean I have found the strength to focus on things to make me more good. And, in one is good the way Mies meant it, they are bound to also be interesting.

On Yoga, and Progress

2012-01-01T08:07:00.001-05:00

Today I went to a special two-hour hot yoga class. Not Bikram, but a vinyasa flow class in a hot room. It was awesome. Loved it. It was challenging. Humbling. Exhilarating. I was going to write this post about how I am content doing yoga DVDs at home casually—my “brown bag yoga”—how gratifying that is, etc. but being in this class kind of took it to another level.

I guess it was just a really good class (Jennifer at Mind the Mat). I’ve tried classes now and then, some were alright, others just bleh. Now, I want to find ways to go again—same studio, same instructor. It was just that good. She had the perfect pacing of challenge and rest. She incorporated partner assists that were actually really effective and not awkward. I did an assisted handstand! I never do handstands! I sweat my ass off. It was wonderful

I will still do my at-home practice, of course, because really I can go to a studio, at most, once a week. I really saw today, though, how complacent I’ve gotten just doing my DVDs. It is hard to focus in your own home. Your kid needs something. There’s dust under the TV cabinet. My laptop is right there. Do I have e-mail? I am re-committing to make more of an effort in my home practice, but I think this is the year that I will add real, live classes.

I’ve actually been doing yoga semi-consistently for a couple years now (see past post about what yoga Means to me and how yoga can help with stress) but I can’t say I’ve progressed in my practice. So, in addition to “brown bagging it” I am going to enjoy feasting on classes with some regularity this year.

Stirring the pot about bake sales, obligation and community

2011-12-17T07:59:00.001-05:00

I am the rare woman (apparently, judging from what I read online) who doesn’t feel particularly guilty about my choices and doesn’t have a problem saying “no” to non-business demands on my time that I’m not interested in. Maybe that’s why I can say to those who would bring something from the local grocery store to a school bake sale—why bother?—and mean it without any snarkiness.

The latest nontroversy in the henhouse of first world privilege was sparked by a piece in last week’s New York Times about whether “‘Store Bought’ Spoils the Potluck Spirit.” There are so many layers to this “very important” discussion. The title and parts of the essay talk about potlucks, but the main issue seems to be surrounding mommies who bake goods for bake sales vs. mommies who drop off store-bought goodies.

As far as potluck dinners someone may be invited to, or office parties calling for contributions, things like that, I don’t see a problem with bringing something store bought. Personally, I prefer homemade food and would make something from home myself, but, not everyone is a cook. I still recall a Harris Teeter cherry pie brought for dessert by couple we had over for dinner and it was amazing.

For bake sales, though, it just seems silly to contribute store bought goods. It’s beyond ridiculous to have a situation wherein people are in a gymnasium paying 50 cents per Oreo or something. The point of the bake sale is the school gaining from the value-added labor put in by the dedicated home bakers for the baked goods, not the markup on costs of ingredients. Or is it? I mean some school districts actually forbid home-baked goods at bake sales due to allergies, lack of controls over home kitchens, etc. So, why in the world even have a “bake” sale?

Honestly, as much as I like baking, the bake sale does seem like a relic of times past in which women had a “signature cookie” (I do!) and keep flour, sugar, butter and eggs on hand in the house. I’m not so sure people do this anymore, in general. But, practical matters aside, the NYT article generated alot of discussion of broader issues from feminism, to how pressed working moms are, to how needy schools really are…

In the many online responses to the NYT story, we heard angrily indignant outbursts suggesting bake sales are just a way for stay-at-home-moms to show off, we hear of the life-altering anxiety some women feel when asked to bake something (really?!?) and a whole organized discussion on NYT itself showcasing a range of opinions on the matter. There are those who claim it’s sexist to have bake sales because of an assumption that it is incumbent on the women to bake. But, that is about people’s own hang ups. I personally know a man who is a president/CEO who took a personal day to do holiday baking, so there! There are people who moan that they just don’t have the time. Again I point to my CEO friend, and would also argue that it only takes about a half hour to make basic chocolate chip cookies or a batch of brownies.

Really, though, people, it’s simple: If you don’t like baking or, at any juncture in your life don’t want to bake or don’t have time to bake then just don’t sign up for the bake sale. You don’t have to do everything. You can find another way to contribute, if you wish.

I took great pleasure in dreaming up the cupcakes pictured above—my constellation cupcakes for a space-themed event. I looked up constellations online. I mixed what I thought was just the right shade of blue frosting to represent sky (definitely an abstraction, of course). I had to go to the city to Dean & Deluca to get silver dragees to decorate them with. I didn’t know they’d be so hard to come by, and pricey, when I designed the cupcakes, but I had a vision. And, I won a Starbucks gift card for my trouble (not sure how that factored into the profits of the fundraising event, but mine is not to reason why in this case…)

I am not big on school fundraisers, personally. My view is, charge me more for tuition (in the case of our current private preschool). Or, ask for donations, if it has to come to that. Or, raise taxes for the public schools.

Also, my view about “community” and how to be a part of it has a changed a little since I blogged about baking cupcakes for a preschool affair two years ago, right around the same time a similar (though less widely publicized) blurb came out on the web, and while I still like to bake and will do so at any opportunity given, I’ve had a dose of reality about how much contributing to such things actually makes one part of a community.

After a healthy amount of volunteering, I still don’t feel super connected in my kid’s school community, so it takes something more than this, and I am still trying to figure out what that is. I have made a couple of friends, but I still feel a little bit like an outsider. That may just be my own issue. I’m not sure why. It could be because since I do work some, I am not free at any and all hours for various activities. It could be because I only have one kid. I don’t know why for sure. But, I’m OK with it, since she’ll be going to another school next year for kindergarten and I don’t know that the public school scene is as insular, and I do know that I don’t care all that much. My kid will find her friends and be fine. We’ll both learn as we go.

I am kind of eating my words about community, though, but stand by my love of baking!

Extreme cou-pining

2011-12-12T08:01:00.000-05:00

I came across some tweets a couple weeks ago on the Extreme Couponing fraud controversy and was like, what?!? (This, apparently, is old news.) After briefly admiring the cleverness of the numbers game the fraud lady played, I was taken aback by the effort of it all. Coincidentally, a couple days later, a friend of mine blogged about the show, basically capturing my feelings on couponing, extreme or otherwise: It’s not my thing.

Now today, after sitting on this post for a while, worrying about looking like some rich bitch who’s too good to want to save a dolla AND trying to find time to come up with some jazzy imagery, Jezebel posts on couponing, inspiring me to get off my duff and finish my post—and it’s just what I was thinking: most extreme couponers aren’t doing it for the savings.

I remember my mom clipped coupons, for a while. We were a one-income household of three kids and she was doing her part to spend my dad’s earnings wisely. Even mom gave up, though, after realizing that time (and effort) to some extent, really is money. The time it would take to go to this store versus that for the better deal. The time to go through the paper, organize the coupons, keep track of expirations and such. You have to buy two of this, four of that. Sometimes its just better to dash out and get what you want or need when you need it, rather than being lured into buying certain things because you have coupons for them. And, oh yeah, you have to remember to bring the coupon to the store! (I can’t even remember to bring bags to re-use.) OK, well, I guess it’s not that hard, if you keep it basic, but for many women, even this feels just like so much more household drudgery and wouldn’t we really rather be reading the paper instead of combing through coupons for processed foods we shouldn’t be eating anyway? I have NEVER seen a coupon for an apple or a tomato.

These extreme couponers employ strategies like buying multiple newspapers for more coupons (even the “realistic couponer” buys two newspapers), and then stockpiling goods, and buying things they never even would use—just for the thrill of the deal. Or, is it something else that drives them? A yearning for some sense of purpose? Has the dignity of keeping a home been reduced to commercial feats of acquiring the most goods while saving the most money? And at what cost? Does couponing provide them with a feeling of security? Maybe having 100 cleaning wipes, 450 rolls of toilet paper and 250 paper towels in stock makes a person feel prepared for anything? Of course, maybe to many it’s just good fun, and how someone chooses to spend their free time is really not my business. I’m sure many wouldn’t “get” why I’d choose to go run in the woods for four hours. Like the hoarders, though, in my view, extreme couponers seem to be pining for something beyond a good deal or well-stocked cupboards that I am not sure the couponing experience can deliver.

Fin.

2011-06-30T21:51:00.003-04:00

So, I came really close to buying the $600 personal training study kit and exam ticket from ACE, but I didn't. I'm just not sure. If it was free, sure I'd try. But, what does it say that I can't even commit a mere $600 to a new career?

Anyway, I think I am at some kind of crossroads right now and I don't want to waste $600. I can always do it later. I just have to chill and live and think and let things kind of simmer for a while. Maybe I'll start a dog walking business, maybe a catering business, maybe art, maybe the training, or maybe I'll just go back to an office. Any way you slice it, I'll make it. That's just how I am.

A big reason for wanting to do the personal training study right now was for some kind of forced escape from the world of my bad habit of obsessively reading, thinking and commenting on parenting and feminist issues—including the work-life balance thing. But, bringing this blog to closure is a free way I might be able to settle that down. I've come to realize that, for the relatively short time I've been obsessed, at the points of my most intense obsessions I've been most frustrated. I feel sometimes like a prune face grouch person when I think of my feelings and expressions on parenting or feminist issues, when in reality, I just actually am completely off the grid and below anyone's radar in my little suburban bohemian paradise. I don't want anything to take away from the last year or two of my "sabbatical" in which I know I can be home with my kid and working part time. I don't want to waste my time feeling other people's angst and "catching" the disease, when I, myself am still clean and healthy. So I'm stopping. No more New York Times Motherlode. No more Babble. No more Feminist Breeder. And no more blog for me, here.

I have an idyllic life right now. Yes, it is sometimes wearing on me to hear the chatting and constant questions and demands of a child all day long. But, we have such glorious days together. My child's creativity and brilliance is nothing short of inspiring. I want to soak it all in with no more ridiculous disruptions or imaginary online battles. I want to focus more on her and me and what I can do with my life that's good for us. I've said this before on this blog, but I never knew how I'd find closure to the blog, til today when I noticed a link for Blog 2 Print, and can make this blog into a book and end it. I may create another book or album or something somewhere down the link, but for now, this is it.

As far as my recent foray into rediscovering Buddhism, trying to be more compassionate and such, I will say it's fledgling. I enjoy the denial of the self theories but it's hard for me to have the purity of compassion for others when I feel so distant from them. I think that by removing myself from the parenting/feminist/mommy blog world I might have more of a chance of feeling compassion.

Going for it—Training to become a trainer—OR NOT

2011-06-29T21:03:00.010-04:00

I've been reading Diary of a Mad Housewife and just watched Kramer vs Kramer the other day, both prompted by my reading of The Mommy Myth, and I must admit I was struck by the seeming lack of options for women and the way men seemed to hold women back as little as 20 years ago (Kramer) and of course over 40 years ago (Diary). I have not felt any such limitations in my own life, and in fact, felt I was only limited by my own frivolousness and lack of direction and maybe a lack of being implanted with intense ambitiousness from parents who were curious and creative post-hippies.

Anyway, now as I've pondered options for my future employment, daydreaming about part-time office gigs, shuffling schedules with my husband, perhaps continuing to build my business—or come up with a new business, one of my ideas was to get certified as a personal trainer and see if that, coupled with my current line of communications consulting, might be a good fit in terms of a flexible schedule for being home in the mornings before school and in the afternoons after school. (Since the wacky school hours simply do not accommodate a typical 8 hour day plus commute, I'd have to use before and/or after-school care.) I've had an interest in it on and off for a while and have been super-athletic and average at different times in my life so I know both sides. Friends say they think I'd do well. I know I can talk to people. Why not?

In the past when I'd talked of going to graduate school or pursuing some other line of work, my husband was not entirely receptive. He, understandably, questioned the cost-benefit of the whole deal (not to mention I wasn't exactly sure what it was I'd get the degree in), and also, quite realistically, wondered when I would really have time to pursue school while also doing my consulting (now) or working for someone else (later) and caring for a child. He also wasn't that receptive of my personal trainer idea at first.

But recently, when discussing scenarios for our child's entrée into school—kindergarten, first grade—he said that trying out the training for a year might be a good idea, since I wasn't going to go back to any kind of full-time office job anyway til she was through with her first year of school (kindergarten) and into first grade, you know, to give her a chance to first get acclimated to full-day school before having any before or after-care tacked onto the day.

So, I am going to go for it. I really need something new to focus on so I can force myself to pull away from all the parenting/issues commentary obsession and dig into something more profitable and productive. For this, I also need to dig into books I've had on my shelf for a while that I've been neglecting, on web design and development subjects (Wordpress, Drupal) so I can bolster my existing business acumen, as well. I know I won't be able to tear myself away completely from the social commentary, but maybe I can try to do this on a weekly or bi-weekly basis only.

"No gifts, please!" & Thoughts on "the end of gender"

2011-06-29T16:23:00.013-04:00

In the past, we've always noted "No gifts, please!" on invitations to our kid's parties. Most of our friends had, too. In the past, we'd stuck to our (somewhat) crunchy birth class friends, the kids were just babies, and it was just all a little simpler. Now, with the girl in preschool and our circle expanding to people with values maybe a little different from our own, we experimented with leaving that off the invites for the fourth birthday party. Most of the parties we'd gone to, of children from her preschool class and friends of friends from the neighborhood and such had done the gift thing. Many even had the "let's sit around and watch the child open the gifts" portion of the party, too. I worried my kid would wonder why other kids got presents at their parties and she didn't. She even mentioned her friends bringing presents, cutely and excitedly, in a totally age-appropriately-greedy little way, but not overly so.

So, her four guests brought presents. Mostly cute, small little things. One brought a game we already had that we were able to re-gift (with the recipient knowing the story) to another child. One brought a ladybug growing kit. One brought a dolly. And one brought...a Disney Princess Kitchen set. It was a kind and generous gift that I think retails for $79.99 or something (yikes!) but the mom is a really savvy bargain shopper and she assured me she got a deal. Still, when it was presented I got the sense that I was supposed to be super dazzled and I also worried a little about what the other guests might think.

I also was a little freaked out because we don't really "do" Disney here and certainly not the princesses. I mean, we have some cheesy thrift store play jewelry with their silly little princess heads on them from the mother-in-law, but these are largely ignored and the princess aspect not really noticed. I don't have anything major against the Disney princesses, other than that they are garish and cheesy looking and think I'd be OK with them, in moderation, if my kid showed any interest, but, she doesn't. Coincidentally, the one who brought the kitchen set is one who gave me, two years in a row, razors (among other toiletry items) for Christmas and left me wondering whether she did not notice that I don't shave (legs, pits, at all) or if she was trying to send me some kind of message that I should! I wondered the same thing about the kitchen set. Did she not notice we didn't have any Disney stuff and whenever she talked about going to Disney, I just smiled politely and nodded and indicated no interest in going, at all? Did she think we were too poor for Disney and she was doing me a favor? I don't know, maybe she was just getting what she thought was a nice gift for my kid. And it was, mostly, but I was a little worried about having it in my house, even in the play area. I mean, it was just so...tacky. So I was happy to discover when I was putting the crazy plastic thing together that it did not come with the stickers of the princesses and their silly little faces already on it, and, I could choose to leave them off! Brilliant! I could also choose to not put in the batteries so we wouldn't have to hear the thing recite "princess phrases" (whatever those are). I can live with a pink stove and sink unit...with hot pink turrets and bejeweled handles. Princess characters on appliances I cannot live with, though.

All this might make me sound kind of like an angry anti-feminine person or battler of gender differences, but I assure you, I am not. Here, too, I "walk the line" because I understand, to some extent, problems with gender bias and with pigeonholing people, but at the same time I don't like to overdo the gender neutrality thing. I think gender neutrality is actually not achievable (or desirable) in reality. Males and females are different. We should obviously have equal rights for those basic things like owning property, voting, running for office, access to education. Girls should in no way be inhibited from doing what they want to do (nor should boys, naturally), but that doesn't mean we have to go to bizarre lengths to erase any reference to gender, as they are doing at one school in Sweden.

What bothers me alot about this is that, in my view, erasing the pronouns and denying one's gender, they are actually reinforcing the power of gender stereotypes. I was led, by the Feministing.com article referenced in the previous paragraph to a site explaining the term "genderqueer" and was saddened. It said:

The term "genderqueer" began to be commonly used at the turn of the twenty-first century by youth who feel that their gender identities and/or gender expressions do not correspond to the gender assigned to them at birth, but who do not want to transition to the "opposite" gender...

It explained that sometimes these folks refuse to attach a a label at all to their gender identity because they feel that no word can capture the complexities they face with regard to gender. I can respect their feelings, but, what all this tells me is that what needs to change is the attaching of certain colors, accouterments, attributes, etc. to just males or just females and kill the idea that people are one way all the time. I mean, aren't we beyond that now? I think a girl can be a girl, can have long, pretty hair and want to wear mascara but also kick ass on the soccer field and not like to cook or not want to have babies. A girl can also want to shave her head, wear no makeup and combat boots but enjoy knitting and want to have ten babies. A boy can have long hair and wear makeup and want to be a stay-at-home-dad, or have long hair and wear makeup and be a linebacker...you get my drift. People should be able to do what they want and be who they want to be, as long as it doesn't hurt anybody else. But, do we have to erase gender to do that? Can't we just expand on what it means to be a male or female?

If I had a little boy I'd be just as inclined to let him play with a pink kitchen set someone gave us as a gift, but would have been just as disinclined to go out and buy a Disney princess one myself! As far as gifts, I think I may return to the "your presence is your present" policy for year five. By then, I think the girl will be old enough to understand the concept of having so much already and not needing more.

The Mommy Myth

2011-06-27T07:45:00.015-04:00

I read speed read The Mommy Myth by Susan J. Douglas and Meredith W. Michaels over the weekend. I have to say, it really gave me a better understanding of where I think many posters online are coming from when they get so defensive about daycare, their wanting to work, their feeling pressured and guilted and generally disgruntled about life for moms in America. Reading the book certainly underscores my own sense of not being like other people, though, because I don't really feel the way they do. I wonder, too, how many real-life women actually living in the world feel this way because I haven't met any in person. Maybe these are just not things that the people I know talk about? Maybe they're afraid to talk daycare and social change with me because they see that I stay at home right now and think I think a certain way and I'd judge them? I mean, a good number of women must feel this way, based on comments I read online. It's really hard to know, but, let's give it to the authors and assume they do.

Douglas and Michaels in the introduction say their main point is: "Media imagery that seems to natural, that seems to embody some common sense, while some blaming mothers, or all mothers, for children and a nation gone wrong needs to have its veneer of supposed truth ripped away." I can see this, I myself have applied the "so many kids have been sent to day care since the 80s, that's why X is like X..." and I know, of course, there's more to it. I certainly don't want to align myself with those figures that The Mommy Myth authors are up against, either—the Pat Buchanan, Pat Robertson, Nixon, Schlafly, moral majority tribe (now would be expanding to Palin, et al, and wait, they even complain about Bill Clinton not doing anything about their child care, Dukakis, neither!) At the same time, I don't buy what the authors are ultimately selling—which appears to be big government funded daycare for everyone.

They say about how lots of mothers aren't buying into the retro momism (as they call it) although "it works to make them feel very guilty and stressed." The authors go on to say "they want and need their own paychecks, they want and need adult interaction during the day, they want and need their own independence, and they believe—and rightly so—that women who work outside the home can be and are very good mothers to their kids. Other mothers don't want or need these things for the time being, or ever, and really would rather stay home. The question is why one reactionary, normative ideology, so out of sync with millions of women's lives seems to be getting the upper hand."

And I ask, what upper hand? Over 50% of children under 5 are now in day care, so, where's the upper hand of the other side? Women are doing it. They're doing what they want (or, those who may not want to are forced to do what they don't want because of the unbalanced economy). The thing is, they want someone else to pay for it. They sort of seem like they want to help poor, working women get quality care, but to me, they come of more sounding like they want their own daycare to be cheaper and better (really? any grown up knows the vast majority of the time you can't have both) and they think it's the government's job to make it so. They write "...the problem with the new momism is that is insists that there is one and only one way the children of America will get what they need: if mom provides it. If dad 'pitches in,' well, that's just an extra bonus. The government? Forget it." It is on this matter that I am so torn. (And since when is financially supporting one's family, as many dads do, considered merely "pitching in"?)

I want to be a good progressive, I want to help people who need help and I am not one of those greedy "don't raise my taxes for social programs" kind of people. But, I really, really don't think that little babies should be cared for in large, institutional settings and by people other than their mamas (or, a distant but acceptable second, a dad or grandma or truly loving relative). I know some circumstances make it necessary for this to happen, but ideally, that baby needs to be cradled and near that mama's breast for the vast majority of its day and night when it is under a year old—less and less as it grows, naturally. (But, I have to observe, here we are looking at women who actually gave page space, and credence—if not complete buy in —to the concept of artificial wombs.) I just don't think setting up some kind of government care that makes it normal for babies to be warehoused like this is in the best interest of humanity. Just so women can work and feel independent? There are others ways. Fix the economy. Educate women about the reality of life with a baby, birth control and the work-life balance they are going to need to make sure they can create for themselves. Don't just throw money at setting up day care centers. Pay for a year of maternity leave. Subsidize another 6 months (for the first two children only, please!). Make it the cultural norm that women workers take time off and don't give them shit for it.

I guess this would necessarily create the situation commonly now referred to as "mommy tracking." The authors, and many women, are critical of what I think is a decent idea, and what businesswoman Felice Schwartz proposed in the late 80s. "Companies should allow 'career-and-family' women to drop out of the fast track while their children are young so they could spend more time with their children. they could return to the fast track later." What, I ask, is wrong with that? Seems like a perfect solution? (Schwartz got skewered and changed her position.)

I know the "cities on the hill," those places known as Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and other European countries in varying flavors, have childcare programs that are government funded, but, they also have generally different cultures there than here. It's unfortunate because I appreciate and align more with these aspects European cultures, described in a Salon interview with Douglas, where she observes, "They have made a choice as a culture that's very different than the choices we've made as a society. Their choice has been work is work and family is family—and family matters. So everybody leaves work between 4 and 5 o'clock. Everybody. Dads, moms. They go home and spend time with their families." That said, what's wrong with "mommy tracking" everybody, then—men and women—at different points in their lives? Part of my problem with the hard driving feminists (and others) who would have children in daycare from six weeks on is that they raise the bar and crack the whip and drive the rat race to an even more unsustainable pace. How about everybody (men and women) just take it down a notch and be human? I think it's a good idea. But, apparently it is not enough for the women who "want it all."

So, what is "it all"? The authors repeatedly go back to the call for government funded (but locally ran, that part is certainly more palatable) day care centers. Repeatedly. All the content about media messaging, pressure on moms to be perfect, parenting styles, psychological and medical advice messing with people, I can agree with most of what they say, other than that I have not felt affected by it because I guess I am a bit of a social outlier (?) I even like alot of the early feminist lore and the action behind the lore about women fighting for equal pay, women progressing beyond days where they couldn't hold their own credit cards, have their names on a mortgage deed, things like that that we take for granted today. Those are all very important and reading the book renewed my respect for alot of what feminists did back then. But, what of all the weirdness? Again, the artificial womb comes to mind. The underlying current of wanting and desperately needing to escape from one's own children because they're so vexing and tyrannical. (OK, we all need a break from kid stuff sometimes, but not enough to take it into social institution territory—have a cup of tea or a glass of wine and throw them outside for an hour or put them in front of a DVD if you have to. There, you're renewed!)

So, with the repeated call for large-scale, institutional day care, they reference World War II era day care centers created by the government in cooperation with the defense industry to encourage women to go to work as they were much needed during war time. This bit of history is fascinating to me and I definitely want to know more. There are several, kind of random, patchwork links to be found in a cursory web search that shed a little light on the centers: a site that is critical in general of daycare, a personal history-buff/scholar site, the Kaiser Permanente site, the Oregon Historical Society site. The Mommy Myth authors talk about how great the centers were, how they were high quality, not bad for the children, but good (?). Apparently these, still, only took children who were at least 18 months old. The authors wrote of how there were laundries, infirmaries if the children were sick, staffed with skilled nurses, oh, and there were hot ready-made dinners to take home at the end of the day. All this while mom spent the day working in a factory (to support a war). Yay! Where do I sign up?

Seriously, though, it's a boon, perhaps, for people who really need the money, for those whose husbands were at war, and I don't mean to slam honest factory work. But, the authors are proclaiming these shipyard centers to be the cat's meow and it just doesn't resonate with me. If a kid is sick, other than the care of a doctor if it's serious, what they need is some down time, in the comfort of their own home, with the person who cares more about them than anyone else in the world. The workplace needs to understand this, understand the hands on value of mom to her children, not say, hey, we've got you covered, you come on to work the line, nurse Jones over here will take great care of your sick child. I mean, I appreciate the gesture, but...And the idea of an institutionally-prepared dinner at the end of the day. Again, thanks, but no thanks. I'd rather make my own homecooked meal. We all know what kind of meals governments and institutions pull together. They're just not very good.

What's more, what makes them think that people want to have their lives reduced to dropping their kids off in the morning, working all day, picking up a box of dinner, going home, sleeping and doing it all over again. It all seems to be to be very much in service of work and treating humans as cogs in the wheels of production. It's OK if a company wants to do that for employees because maybe it's good for their business and any thinking person should have the expectation that businesses view their employees somewhat as human capital. For the government to view their people as human capital, though, is something else. I'm not comfortable with the whole worker-commerce model being the be all and end all of everything. That women in their capacity as mothers (and of course their children) create a chink in this worker-commerce model is cool, for one thing, and important to society, lest we all just become worker drones at various rungs on the ladder to nowhere.

Another example of daycare provided to women workers is that of the WearGuard company. Their daycare sounds all well and good and fine, but, that's a private company providing a benefit to its employees. That doesn't really bolster the case for government-funded daycare. (I would add that the shipyard daycares, too, were funded largely by the companies and only subsidized by the government, and the whole war connection as impetus there is obvious.)

My final analysis of The Mommy Myth is that while it was, in many ways, a thought-provoking and enjoyable read (I like the authors' wry, sort of sarcastic humor, even when I don't agree with how they're using it), the dogged focus on government-funded daycare and general lack of respect (and refusal to face what is just the plain reality of the biology) of motherhood is not something I'm on board with.

The birthday party & "Mommy Myths" come to life

2011-06-25T14:59:00.027-04:00

"You can go be a CEO, and a good one, but if you're not making a themed birthday party, you're not a good mother..." —Letty Cottin Pogrebin, quoted in The Mommy Myth

Ha! Well, with that metric, I am a great mother (my lack of CEO status notwithstanding)! Last week today we had my kid's fourth birthday party with a butterfly theme and a great time was had by all—even me, although it left me kind of exhausted. In fact, I keep thinking today is going to be such a great and relaxing Saturday compared to last week, in which I was kind of running around shopping, cleaning (inside the house and out), preparing food and activities (starting a day or two before, actually.) Since I am a scrappy bohemian type with (mostly) down-to-earth friends, I took the "I did it myself, therefore it is quaint and lovely regardless of the quality or perfection" route. This always works for me. If other people think poorly of me or my productions for it, they certainly don't show it. And, I guess this is a real-life illustration of what I am already finding problematic about The Mommy Myth book I quote from above—one can be a hands on, in-the-trenches, seemingly Martha Stewarty, crafty mom, but not really be, because I am, but I'm not. I do the stuff, but I do it to my own ability, patience level and financial capacity and to me, it's the doing (alongside your child) not necessarily the perfection of the result that counts. The Mommy Myth authors, though, seem to have too big a chip on their shoulder to just give it a try (or not and just own that they don't want to)—but more on that in another post. First, about the party...

My daughter and I made our own invitations for the party. We (I) made our own food and cake and games. Some highlights: pin the body on the butterfly, butterfly shaped grilled cheese sandwiches, make your own goodie bags where we laid out art supplies with which the girls could stuff treats from a butterfly piñata, and a pretty butterfly cake. For the parents, I had a spinach, gorgonzola, walnut and cranberry salad and some baguette, fresh mozzarella, tomato and basil stacks. We kept the invitees to girls in her preschool class and a couple other girls. With a few that couldn't make it, we ended up with the perfect number, 5 girls, including mine. Very manageable. But, they are four years old after all, and some girls are noisier and pushier than others.

It ended up with 2 noisy, pushy ones and 2 mellow ones, then mine, who is decidedly on the mellow side. For some reason the noisy, pushy ones really wore me out. They ventured into the kitchen and asked for food that just happened to be in my house and was not set out or designated for the party. They asked for food before it's ready when there was already plenty of food out. They inserted themselves into my adult conversations with other parents, loudly and relentlessly. They had to be held back from getting the first grab at the piñata ribbon or blowing out the candles on the cake (I mean, we are gracious and polite to our guests, but it is my kids's birthday celebration after all.) I was totally nice, though and smiled through it all, gave them the food they wanted and all that. Anyway, it all left me feeling super tired and wondering if it was worth it.

For a day or two before and the morning of, I had to tell my kid, no, I can't do A, B or C with you right now because I am doing X, Y or Z, for your birthday party...you know, with all your friends. As the lovely, good-natured child she is, she accepted it, but I still felt a little bad. A little. The morning I was decorating (hanging 24 little cardboard butterflies from the deck gazebo thingy for a game, that also served as decoration) she watched and said "Thank you for all your hard work for my party, mommy! The decorations looks great!" She really said this. LOVE. So, I guess it was worth it.

It's funny that I should come across the quote I opened my post with on this very day that I set out to read The Mommy Myth, a book I'd previously heard of, but which I now became interested in again after it was mentioned in one of the Motherlode comments in a recent online discussion. I've just made it through the introduction and it's already exhausting—but interesting! So, there'll be a future post on that soon.

Not feeling "Torn" about my life choices

2011-06-24T16:46:00.012-04:00

I read the first book in the New York Times "Motherlode" parenting blog's new book club. I'm glad I read Torn, and, as another commenter said on the site, more for the essays I didn't relate to. I already know about my life, and I learn a lot from being allowed into those of other people.

I enjoy this stuff—little sociological sketches. Personally, I'm not "torn" because I'm lucky enough to work part time from home while my kid is little and plan on mapping out my own schedule of ramping up the more she is in school. Although, now that we've made it through the baby years, I would be comfortable with her in care, if we needed to. There was really nothing to decide for me, my gut wouldn't let me put a baby in daycare and we could afford not to. What is the most "tearing", I think, are those who don't want to have their little ones in childcare but have to because they need the money.

As one might expect, the discussion over on Motherlode got pretty intense, treading into "Mommy War" territory with myself as a participant. The blog post for discussion had thoughts of readers who, to me, seemed a little dramatic and defensive. They felt that it was somehow insulting that it's even suggested that women are "torn" between home and work. "Of course I work." Some said. I think that may even be a title of one of the essays in Torn. At the end of the day, though, it's just a book of other people's experiences, none really that I felt super resonated with me, but many of which I found interesting.

I found the overall message (disappointingly to me, an old-fashioned girl) very, very pro-work for mothers, even of small children. But I really liked the essays that took a critical look at daycare and that highlighted some of the pleasures and benefits of staying home—"Muthering Heights" and "Harvard to Homemaker" come to mind.

In the Motherlode comments, much was made about so many people not having a choice in the matter of whether they would work or not, even with small children, and then there was the ensuing analysis of lifestyle choices, the proud "but I like to work" comments, all what anyone who reads parenting and mommy blogs would expect.

The question of "choice" brought to mind another book I recently read. I consider myself progressive in some areas and friendly to the interests of working people, but I read The Flipside of Feminism by Suzanne Venker and Phyllis Schlafly anyway. While I didn't find the book to be particularly well-written and the tone was, at times, catty, they offered some good ideas, among which are that young women might do well to plan for motherhood.

We're told we can "do it all" and we should go after our interests, go to college, etc. BUT young women might want to consider the reality of what working in different professions might mean and make informed choices based on the possibility that they might want to have children someday and they might be "torn" (as I think they should) about leaving infants in daycare. Young women should also choose partners who can support them, if having children and raising them in the 0-3 years themselves is important. You can't live on "love" and you can't eat love or pay the mortgage with just "love." Young women should be mindful of their spending habits and those of their boyfriends/potential husbands when they are single and dating. Why not start saving for that house and building a safety net just as soon as your student loans are paid (and try not to accrue much, if any loan debt). All these considerations would make it much easier for those women who want to stay home with young children to do so. My husband and I don't have particularly high paying jobs for the area in which we live, but, bless his heart, he was always planning to buy a house, get married and have a family and so he was saving for this before we even met and had his loans paid. As soon as we got serious, he set me straight to do the same. Of course, not all choices are right for all people, but I do think that young women (late highschool, early college) are not led to think through the whole picture of what their lives might hold. A couple days later, a writer's letter to Motherlode's Lisa Belkin described a scenario where she was doing just that, preparing in the way she felt was right for the distinct possibility of future motherhood.

One commenter on Motherlode wrote of how she found intellectual stimulation in parenting. (The complaint of many being that staying home with small children is positively mind-numbing). This was met with some cackling that this could not possibly true and that this woman is making much more of the day-to-day reality of parenting than it really is. My thought was, since so many are keen on the "not judging" ( we hear this alot when we observe that we don't think daycare is a great place for babies) I don't think we should judge what different people find intellectually stimulating. Actually, I think its best when people are able to find intellectual stimulation where they are, wherever they are. I thought it was cool that the woman found this place for herself and observed that if more people had bigger minds they'd find this, too.

Toward the end of the arguments, I felt I, again, shared some eye-opening exchanges about motherhood and working and how women feel about it all. Reading heartfelt comments from people about their tough choice certainly is softening. Even hearing from career women about how much they love their children and how they feel their bond with their child is as good as mine is softening (I don't know that I believe it, but that fact that they want to believe it is touching.) I still feel very firm about my belief that, if at all possible, kids 0-3 don't really belong in long-term childcare. Of course, I understand the reality of life for many people today. It's frustrating. What I really don't want to be is a mean, guilt-mongering, holier-than-though person. In another Motherlode discussion where daycare came up, I tried to make clear that my anti-daycare stance isn't anti working people, it's anti the system that has daycare as a solution to problems of not being able to manage a household on one income, or single mothers, or dads out of work. It's anti- policy and social concepts that have led us to a place where two incomes are needed just to survive (gee, thanks, feminism!) and where there are fewer social/family community connections (and yes, government assistance to some lesser degree) that offer relief to folks on hard times. My anti-daycare view is not anti-individual, anti-working families or anything like that. Still, that so many upper middle class feminists blithely act like its no problem to put babies in daycare because their careers are more important, and then criticize those who "opt out" is troubling— and angering.

The anger dawned on me as I was finishing up Torn tonight and I came across the Katy Read essay I previously blogged about, on the regrets of a stay-at-home mother (all financial). In it she invokes Linda Hirschman, Leslie Bennetts and the like, and, I was reminded why I get so angry. I mean, work if you want and have someone else look after your baby all day, but don't act like I am doing something wrong (or foolish or bad or against some "sisterhood") because that's not something I could stomach.

Family Food Friday—my delicious, hodge-podge week

2011-06-24T09:07:00.019-04:00

So, I am participating in the "Family Food Friday" that TFB initiated on her blog.

This was a busy and crazy (somewhat) week because we had my daughter's birthday party on Saturday last week, Fathers Day on Sunday, which included a ball game and night out for pizza—both of which left me kind of wiped out. Then the real birthday during the week where we ate out and went to a local ska show in a park. The meal plan was sort of a jumble of partying, but many recipes were made, so I am just going to list the ones that were homemade without specific dates as these span back from last Friday (June 17) through now, rather than a Monday through Sunday thing. This, though, is actually a decent snapshot of how most weeks go as far as dinners and such, even when things aren't feeling busy—I kind of do a blend of complicated and easy and let my tastes and cravings drive what I make. We are big beer lovers so I've included the beers we enjoyed with each dish, where applicable.

Pad Thai (beer pairing: Ommegang Hennepin)
BBQ Quorn Tacos (beer pairing: Dogfish Head 60 minute IPA)
Veggie Burgers (beer pairing: Troegs Nugget Nectar)
Salmon Caesar Salad with Garden Veggie Side (beer pairing: Sloeber Strong Pale Ale)
Fresh Veggie Wraps (beer pairing: Dogfish Head 60 minute IPA)
Quinoa Salad with Cherries and Pecans (beer pairing: it was lunch! I didn't drink! ok, that doesn't always stop me...)

For the Pad Thai, I have a basic recipe that I used to "teach" me how to make it, and now I just kind of throw it together how I want, riffing on the recipe. We don't eat meat (but we do eat seafood) so instead of the chicken, I loaded it up with tofu and veggies. Sometimes I'll use shrimp. I had alot of fun going to a local, huge international foods market to get the real rice noodles and other crazy things like black fungus (still don't know what I'll use this in yet, but I read it's in alot of Asian dishes, and now I've got it), tamarind (I added some tamarind juice to my Pad Thai) and galangal (I steeped the noodled in galangal water).

The BBQ Quorn Tacos is one of my "original" recipes, but with a forced twist. I usually make tempeh tacos (tempeh can be bought at the store, but is made by natural culturing and fermenting that binds soybeans or grains into a cake form, similar to a very firm vegetarian burger patty). Whole Foods was out of tempeh so I bought Quorn instead (which is like a vegetarian faux chicken). So, it's simple but so tasty...you just slice a red onion and a red pepper and saute them in a hot pan in some olive oil. You cook the onion first til it starts to brown and carmelize (maybe add a dash of salt) then once that's going, you throw in the peppers, getting them tender but not overcooking. Then you throw in the diced Quorn (or sliced tempe). Cook it a few minutes til the Quorn (which is cooked right from frozen but does not technically require "cooking" like real meat, same with tempe) softens and gets some cooked color from the pan. Stir in some BBQ sauce and maybe dashes of garlic powder, cumin, chili powder, sweet smoked paprika (this is my favorite seasoning these days), depending on your taste and the BBQ sauce you use. Then, you just put that mixture with some shredded cheddar cheese into tortillas and enjoy. I am big on just sautéing up things I like and putting them in tortillas! We're big on leftovers around here and my husband insists on them being available for him to take as lunch to work to save money.

Veggie Burgers are just veggie burgers. Warm them up in a pan and go. But, I am picky, so I will do things like toast the buns, spraying them with olive oil and sprinkling some garlic salt on them. We'll add sautéed mushrooms and onions to the burgers, maybe some sliced avocado, and of course, melted cheese. Trader Joe's makes a really good garlic aioli mustard that we put on our veggie burgers. Bake up some oven fries, add a side salad and you've got your meal.

Salmon Caesar Salad is another easy go-to meal for me. Just pan sear or bake some salmon filets and top the classic romaine salad with it. I am a big fan of Whole Foods and their caesar dressing (in the produce section, chilled) is very good. Normally, I hate store-bought or packaged dressing and I make my own vinaigrette all the time, but this one I like, especially since making caesar dressing is a little more involved than whipping up a vinaigrette. The Garden Veggie Side was just some extras I harvested from our little garden. I had some carrots and leeks so I braised them with apple cider vinegar, finished the cooking under a quick broil with butter and parmesan, then lemon squeeze, salt, pepper.

Speaking of Whole Foods, the next thing on the list, Fresh Veggie Wraps, I learned about from a kids event at our local store. Not that it's something you need to "learn" exactly, I mean, it's a veggie wrap, pretty simple. But, sometimes you just need a fresh look at ingredients, or to be reminded, hey, this is out there, put it together with that. So, that's what we did. They had out for the children diced veggies in rainbow colors—red peppers, carrots, corn, shelled edamame, shredded purple cabbage—you can choose the veggies your family likes best. Smear some hummus on a large lavash (or tortilla, but I like the big size of the lavash to really get everything wrapped up) and then layer in the veggies with some mixed salad greens and wrap it up. We took these to the Fathers Day baseball game.

The Quinoa Salad with Cherries and Pecans I learned of from a Facebook friend and made back on Memorial Day. It was yummy so I decided to make it again and take it to lunch with a friend last week. Here's the recipe for that.

Back again!

2011-06-21T16:54:00.003-04:00

OK, I am super busy now, but I just can't keep away from the blogging. I need it as an escape valve! I am going to try and "play nice" if I post on other blogs, you know, keep it real, state my opinion but try not to be offensive. I stand by what I think about maids and all that jazz, but I guess I don't need to be like a mad dog with a bone when arguing my point. I closed my Twitter account even after getting a whole host of followers after "The Help" debacle. I thought I wouldn't want to blog again. But I do. So, here goes! I will try to loop around and update on my Compassion project, and, I have to give the post-mortem on my kid's birthday party last weekend. But for now, just wanted to note what got me wanting to get back blogging, and, it was, the good feeling I got from actually being nice in my comments (and I genuinely felt nice). For example, I think The Feminist Breeder's meal planning and sharing project is really cool (but, do I want to commit to this? I don't know...I will try). And, her post about taking her baby to the movies, I thought, was really cool, fun and sweet. Totally something I would have done!

My only concern is that I have to do real work-work and I have to give my kid appropriate attention. In fact, right now I am being called to help with a drawing, so...TO BE CONTINUED!

Lest we forget!

2011-05-06T06:02:00.002-04:00

Some (semi) "final" thoughts...

2011-05-05T23:01:00.007-04:00

So much of the womens/"mommy" blogosphere seems all the same to me. For example, the latest "discussion" I got involved in, about people's thoughts on hiring help around their house (basically cleaners/maids) has been a doozy.

To all who say “there’s no room to judge”…I am really just stating how I feel about household help, I may be saying it in judgmental tones, and that reflect my feelings on the matter, but what’s the point of discussion if you’re not going to ASSERT an opinion?

It seems to be the thing on these mommy blogs to EITHER:

Be part of the (pathetic little) club whose members all agree and go on about how hard one’s life is and how we have to, as such SUCH hardworking moms do A, B or C just to get along because I have ten kids and am running five businesses from home and working on a book (hahahah)…

OR:

Have a different view and meekly add “but I won’t judge anyone who does…”

Well, I don’t feel the need to overstate and overwork the “not judging” thing.

Because, I do kinda judge. Not in a “I think I am better than you, you deserve to die you moron” way, but in a “I think my way on this is more enlightened, I am more in touch with something I think is better” way.

Now I am trying to do a new thing where I let my ego fall away and I don’t go around being “more enlightened” on topics than others…however, it’s going to be a long process and I don’t expect to be “over it” any time soon…and I would observe I am not alone in this bad habit.

Anyway, to those who assert that one "has no room to judge" because A, B or C is not in line with an argument being made (for example with household help issue, those who have asserted if you buy from stores or get haircuts or do any other modern conveniences type thing you have “no room to judge” the household help bit) I would disagree. I say that we CAN control what goes on in our homes more than what we can control out in the world, in the factories in the fields, etc. and you have to start somewhere.

Maybe these mommybloggers and their sycophants need to not bite off more than they can chew and get back to the nuts and bolts of taking care of their own lives--including their stuff!

Logging off—for a bit

2011-05-05T21:39:00.004-04:00

I didn't do too well on my first day of not being egotistical. I got caught up in posting on all the reasons I think it's distasteful to pay someone to clean your own house, and alot of it was about how un-bourgeois I am. Yay me! Who cares?!?

Barbara Ehrenreich has a really good, though-provoking article on the matter, though, that is definitely worth a read.

So, this video, meant to be funny, is also true. It's funny because it's true!

Letting go of the ego (slowly)

2011-05-04T15:39:00.018-04:00

So in my last post, I mentioned a pedicure and that I was reading Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life. I have always wanted to be a loving, peaceful hippie yoga girl, but now that I don't smoke weed daily (at all) anymore and am living in the real world (as much as spending most of one's time with a preschooler constitutes living in the real world) it's not so easy. Hell. It's never been easy. But, I've been feeling so down and poisoned by my own negativity that I've decided I need to take action. Now. I've been reading Riane Eisler lately, learning about how the only way we're going to grow a better world and survive is to work toward a culture of partnership instead of domination. Then, a friend posted on Facebook about the Charter for Compassion, which brought that to the top of my mind and introduced me to Karen Armstrong and her book. Twelve steps, I thought...it would be broken down and I could follow the steps and do it!

And Armstrong right in the introduction recognized what would probably be the biggest challenge for me. She wrote:

The demands of compassion seem so daunting that it is difficult to know where to begin—hence the twelve-step program. It will immediately bring to mind the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. We are addicted to our egotism. We cannot think how we would manage without our pet hatreds and prejudices that give us such a buzz of righteousness; like addicts, we have come to depend on the instant rush of energy and delight we feel when we display our cleverness by making an unkind remark and the spurt of triumph when we vanquish an annoying colleague. Thus do we assert ourselves and tell the world who we are. It is difficult to break a habit upon which we depend for our sense of self.

Exactly. My middle name is Snark, my surname is Cooler than Thou (no, not YOU...you, over there, probably...) By acknowledging this part of me that I had not really had anyone acknowledge (diagnose?) before, and understanding that others have this addiction, this affliction, too, that alone was a big step.

So when I was getting my awkward but nice pedicure yesterday and the nail lady asked me no less than three times if I was sure I wanted the green color I'd chosen, I had a thought. I guess not that many people choose this shade of green? Or maybe just not that many women my age? Or maybe just not that many women my age in this suburb? In any case, it made me feel unique.

I know it's egotistical to want to feel unique, but I still like to feel unique. Don't most people? You know, just a little bit special and different. Maybe, I thought, as she stroked on that great green polish, this is why women do things like express themselves with clothes, jewelry, hairstyles and such? A harmless, non-ugly expression of one's uniqueness? And by non-ugly, I don't mean as in being pretty, I mean not mean, snarky or mean spritied. I have tended in the past to express my uniqueness in more, uhm, substantive ways. I am more of a hard-ass on this subject or that (breastfeed til at least 2! don't let that baby cry it out! you put a 3-month old in daycare?!?!?!). I am tougher on this matter or that matter. I know the real facet of issue A and you people have it just a bit wrong.

This describes different discussions, mostly online, in which I can tell the whole truth about how I feel at that moment, but that I don't necessarily say in my real life because, I guess, I am nicer than that, or, I know I can't be a bitch in real life and still interact, you know, with people...but, how unsatisfying, and yet I keep going back for more. BUT, it doesn't make me feel smart and unique, though, after a while and just makes me feel kind of tired. Only once in a while did I get agreement or a "recommend" or a "thumbs up." OK, sometimes I got quite a few. But, something in me knows this isn't right, or good. If the opinions I'm expressing weren't things I'd express to actual real people, to their face, and the majority of thoughts that crossed my mind are critical and mean, then, I have to find something else to do with my views...a more productive outlet. Such divisiveness and nastiness is not going to save the world, or even win anyone over to my view. Something has to change. So I'm changing.

But again: It is difficult to break a habit upon which we depend for our sense of self.

So, I have to create a new sense of self.

Armstrong explains:

As in AA, the disciplines learned at each step in the program have to become a part of your life. There is no hurry. We are not going to develop an impartial, universal love overnight. These days we often expect things to happen immediately. We want instant transformation...But it takes longer to reorient our minds and hearts; this type of transformation is slow, undramatic, and incremental...If you follow the program step by step, you will find that you are beginning to see the world, yourself and other people in a different light.

For now, I have my green toes and my book. And I will try to be nice. I will try to find ways I can be unique in ways that aren't obnoxious until I master this to the point that the egotistical desire to be unique, too, fades away.

Pampering schmampering—or not

2011-05-04T11:52:00.010-04:00

So I'd scheduled a massage for myself today and to make it totally decadent and "me me me" I thought I'd get a mani-pedi, too. I have not done this for probably ten years. Seriously. Ten years! But, I can probably count on one hand the number of mani-pedis I've had in my entire life, so I guess it's not saying much. I am (was) more of a massage girl. I got them regularly for a while after landing a professional, well-paying job. Then faded out after working from home, being a mom, rationalizing to myself that my husband gives great massages, so why pay?

The problem is, he doesn't give them for an hour long, and, well, he's not a professional and usually wants sex (not that there's anything wrong with that.) But, I digress.

I've been turning into a complete and total bitch lately. I will defend myself in saying that it is not altogether unjustified that I should be cranky. I've been doing alot of menial housework lately and that always gets me crabby. My child has been difficult at all the wrong times. Though I must say she has been doing a great job of entertaining herself and playing for hours while I've been doing all the aforementioned cleaning, clearing and organizing. But her independent playing does not come without a price because she makes messes I have to go back and clean up and then she gets needy for my attention later, big time. Honestly, I don't know how mothers of more than one child get along. I know, that makes me sound like a total ass.

Anyway, I have been an awful, mean bitch...to my actual family who I am supposed to love. So, I had to check myself. I want the world to be a better place. I am, I guess, a "peacenik"...let's take care of everybody, share, healthcare for all, paid leave for moms and dads, care for those in need, educate...Kumbaya, my lord! But what kind of hypocrite am I if I am mean to my own family and what kind of hypocrite am I if I criticize others or am uncharitable with my views and opinions expressed online. If I can't even rein in these basic, close to home matters, is there any hope for humanity? Not that I, personally, have that much control over humanity as a whole, but, you know, it starts with one, and if everyone acted like I've been acting, and did so on a world-size scale, it would be, like total armageddon!

So, I decided I need to take care of me. Take a time out so I can feel a little more rested, a little more grateful, and all that. Thing is, the whole mani-pedi thing is a little awkward for me. I don't really know the drill, and the woman doing it was this little old Asian lady who barely spoke English, but she did a valiant job in guiding me through it all. I apologized for my nasty, leathery feet. I did not apologize for my hairy legs. I declined having my cuticles cut. I read from my iPod Touch Kindle while the pedi went down.

I just started reading, last night, Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life, almost in desperation because I have been feeling so terribly mean, ugly and awful, and so here I was reading about Buddha and Confucius, as the author, Karen Armstrong, was laying the groundwork for the steps with some history, while a little old Asian woman (not Chinese, though, probably Vietnamese) does my feet. My instinct is to feel weird. I am the person who says I will never hire a cleaning lady. I am a woman of the people. Working class girl made good. Salt of the Earth. I don't want to be the rich white lady (I'm not rich anyway, by U.S. standards, although probably rich to many of the rest of the word's standards). But, I tried to take the exchange with gratitude instead of shame or awkwardness. She was making an honest living doing a service for me to help me feel good. In the end, I got a cute pedicure and manicure and felt nice—and a neat lesson I will write about in an upcoming post. I probably won't do it again for another 10 years, though.

Thoughts on homebirth

2011-04-30T08:24:00.002-04:00

A local dramaversy is unfolding surrounding a baby's death during a homebirth gone wrong. According to the WashingtonPost, a 43-year-old woman wanted to deliver the family’s first baby at home. She sought out an Alexandria, Va., midwife practice, BirthCare & Women’s HealthCertified Nurse-Midwives. But there was a complication; the baby was in the breech position, meaning that it was upside-down rather than having its head closest to the birth canal. BirthCare advised the mother that the case was too complicated for a home delivery, but she preferred to deliver at home. So she sought out a midwife with a reputation for experience with difficult deliveries. The outcome was tragic.

The discussion about the incident, and homebirth in general, has gotten a bit out of hand, though, as seen on the D C Urban Moms (DCUM) website thread.

I had a homebirth myself, with a midwife from BirthCare, a certified nurse midwife (CNM), and my Bradley birth class teacher is the birth assistant, allegedly connected with the case. While I feel sorry for the woman who lost her baby and I can't comment on the qualifications of the indicted midwife or the details of the case (since I was not there), I will say that, reading many of the comments on the DCUM thread, and comments on a post from the notoriously psycho Dr. Amy on the recent homebirth of The Feminist Breeder's new baby, pisses me off a tad bit.

The attitude that a healthy woman with a normal pregnancy having a homebirth is somehow reckless or selfish or in any way worthy of reproach is ridiculous. Sadly, the woman in the Alexandria case who lost her baby was risked out by moderate—some would argue conservative—homebirth midwives (who also practice in their own birth center and have hospital privileges at RNs) because of her age AND the position of the baby (and possibly other undisclosed factors).

So, in thinking through what I had to say about this all NOW—as someone who's had a homebirth safely and found it very empowering, but is cautious in recommending it wholesale to others because I really do think it takes a certain kind of mindset/personal makeup to do it—I came across something I'd written when I was pregnant that addresses why I made the choice I did.

Misunderstandings about birth

This is from the Boston Globe last summer. I stumbled upon it tonight while looking for stats on what percentage of women give birth naturally…

The author completely ignores any data on how interventions beget more interventions and thinks that women who choose natural childbirth do so as some rite of passage in which pain ushers them into some quasi-religious experience.

“It’s an interesting secular variation on a religious narrative where unbearable pain suddenly transmutes to boundless joy – just as it is believed that the brutal crucifixion of Christ led to the opening of heaven’s gates, or, for that matter, just as men blowing themselves to bits with suicide bombs think they will immediately appear in a paradise of virgins,” he writes.

He later says, “If anything, reliance on pain to create meaning during childbirth indicates a constricted imagination. Surely there must be more innovative challenges than voluntarily refusing effective, safe, and available pain relief during labor. ”

For me, I am choosing natural childbirth not because I need to feel pain to create meaning during childbirth, but because I believe that giving birth is a natural body function and that my body was designed to do it–so why should it be treated as an illness? Additionally, I believe that each medical intervention one accepts opens the door to another and another, and that can snowball to a situation where it’s not about the mother and baby but about hospital protocols and schedules. Furthermore, I’m not convinced that I will feel this pain that’s often described because I’ve read about and heard from other women who say differently.

He is completely closed to the idea that it is possible not to feel pain, as is explained in Grantly Dick-Read’s books and the HypnoBirthing book, or that the pain may not be “unbearable” but manageable with the proper preparation. What’s more, he quotes Sylvia Plath, using her description of labor as an illustration. For those who don’t know, she was NOT a healthy, well-adjusted woman!

Anyway, I’d be curious to hear other women’s reasons for choosing natural childbirth…and whether one-sided articles (the Ina May quotes notwithstanding) piss them off too.

I was much less rambly then, I guess! Need to work back toward that...

People who "hate" just don't get it, and I imagine no amount of going on is going to change their view. I guess this can be a lesson for me that might be applied to other matters I used to want to argue with people about online.

My baby's birth story

2011-04-29T08:49:00.006-04:00

For those interested, to go with an upcoming post on homebirth...this is now old news, but worth reading for those with an interest in natural birth.

I count labor as starting at about 5:00 am on Friday morning, since that's when I was awake for good and able to really identify and time contractions, but in my mind, it all started with a little pop around 12:15 am Friday when my water broke, since I knew then that labor would need to begin within a certain amount of time.

I decided to clean up, sleep it off and call the midwives' practice, BirthCare, and my birth assistant, later in the morning since there was no sign of meconium in the water, the baby was moving and I was experiencing only a little abdominal achiness and very light cramps. (I was told later I should have called them right away...so any future mamas out there, do that!)

The midwife on call, advised me to take castor oil to help labor along and get me going within the 24-hour limit I'd have to give birth after the water breaking. We walked over to some nearby shops to restock on just a few groceries (fresh fruit!) and the castor oil. I took it at 8:30 am and its work began, slowly, behind the scenes. We hung out around the house for a bit and got a feel for how the contractions were going. They were coming about 7 minutes apart, lasting less than a minute, for some time, and quite manageable.

We went for another short walk around the neighborhood for about 30 minutes. I remember saying to my husband that I could handle contractions, like, ten times worse than what I was having at that time (little did I know what was coming).

After getting back home, we wanted to have some lunch before 12:30 pm, when we were supposed to call back the midwives and birth assistant. By now, the contractions were becoming a little more intense so that I ate most of my lunch but had to stop before eating it all. When I called in, I was told that the midwife at BirthCare with whom I'd developed a special connection, agreed to take over with my birth that day. That was great news, so I checked in with her and she advised a nap to be well-rested for what laid ahead.

The nap didn't pan out so great. I sleep a little, on and off for about an hour, as the contractions started to come a little more quickly and intensely. By this time, they were coming five minutes apart and lasting a good 70 seconds. I had to stand up and sway my hips, or bend over and hug a pillow, moaning in a low tone, in order to handle the contractions. I tried my best to rest in between them. My husband was coaching me through it all, at first comforting me with gentle, relaxing touches between contractions—we tried a little back massaging during them, but that wasn't working for me. Really, just him being there and being engaged in the labor with me was good, with me knowing I could call upon him as needed. He also helped by bringing me water, and making calls to the midwife and birth assistant when I couldn't deal with talking to anyone anymore. I managed to snack just a little from time to time for energy between contractions, even as they were getting tougher.

It's difficult to describe what the contractions felt like. Some women say they're not painful, but just a discomfort. I would say they were painful, but a productive pain. My understanding of what the uterine muscles were doing with each contraction helped me deal with how it felt.

I started to get a little concerned about the birth being imminent because I really had no idea how long it could go or how bad it could get, and it had gotten pretty intense by now. I was starting to feel alot more pressure with the contractions. I threw up once, and I was going from hot to cold and back, which I had heard were signs of transition, and though I wasn't thinking "I can't do this" (another sign of transition) I sure was thinking, "I don't want to do this...why did I choose to do this this way, with no medication..." so I thought I was reaching my limit. I was so wrong. I'm not really sure when transition was, officially.

Eventually, after a few back and forth phone updates between my husband, the midwife and the birth assistance, we decided we would do the birth at home and they'd be on their way over. I couldn't imaging coping with the contractions during a car ride. Even though it might only be twenty minutes, my need to stand, squat, curl over a pillow and the primitivism of my moaning just didn't seem suited to car travel.

When the midwife arrived, I was no longer paying attention to timing contractions, they were just coming and I was just hanging on and dealing with them any way I could. I think I threw up again.

The midwife gave me words of encouragement and praise for my ways of coping with the contractions and also talked to me a bit about our house, the yard with all its different trees, the nice deck. Eventually, she suggested we go outside for a bit, if I was comfortable with that. I think we all knew that the fresh air and change of scenery would give me a second wind and change up the energy a little bit.

It was a lovely evening by then, with cool summer breezes. Labor continued to be very intense, but with the midwife's advice, my husband's comfort and now, my birth assistant, too, there providing her support, I just took it one contraction at a time, as they say you're supposed to, and tried my best to chill out, rest, and gear up for the next one in between the contractions.

I began to start feeling the intense pressure and the urge to push and was grunting away out on the deck for a while. The castor oil was in full effect and things would have gotten extremely messy were it not for the endless expert and astute changing of Chux pads beneath me by the midwife and birth assistant. Being a wild woman in labor, I cared nothing about the flying fluids and mess and even found all the fussiness annoying at the time. However, looking back, I am grateful and amazed at how neat they kept the birth, and how much of my dignity they preserved by doing so.

Although I had the urge to push, the midwife checked me and noted I was only dilated 8 cm, so I had to hold back. Not pushing when I felt this intense urge was very difficult. She advised that if I breathed out during the contractions when the urge was building, it would keep me from pushing too much too soon. In order to do this, I had to grip my husband's hands really, really tight and I needed the midwife and birth assistant to work on my lower back as a counter pressure. I rested in between contractions while they took care of preparations for the next phase, and I called them back with each contraction for more help on my back. I must have squeezed my husband's hands so hard, but he took it all and supported me the whole time. He was there to remind me to blow out and coach me through the challenge as the intense contractions worked to open me more. The midwife sensed that the birth could happen soon and advised we move inside the house since it was getting cool and breezy for a new baby.

There still was another hurdle I had to clear before giving birth, though, which was that even as the cervix was dilating, there was a little lip that was in the way. After some time, the midwife said she could try easing it out of the way during a contraction to help move the labor along. I knew from other birth stories that it would not be pleasant, and would be a bit painful, but I really wanted to go forward with the labor as quickly now as possible and meet my baby.

The midwife expertly moved the lip and it was now time to push, which meant much more hard work. Pushing was tough. Maybe the toughest part because it was now about more than just coping with pain. I now had to accomplish something. I took in as much breath as I could, held it and pushed so hard for what seemed like the longest time. I pushed and pushed with each contraction, I thought it would never end. The midwife talked me through how to push with control as my husband and birth assistant comforted me. With each push, I felt burning and stretching. They later told me I had good control and followed the midwife's direction well to avoid tearing and damage to my perineum.

Everyone was getting excited and they told me they could see more and more of the baby's head with each push. With the last push, I thought they actually had to cut me because I felt a little something acutely sharp before the final relief, but they didn't. The next thing I knew, there was this sense of elation and the midwife was handing me my baby.

Holding her, I was filled with complete joy. She was absolutely beautiful, so soft and pink (for whatever reason, she came out very clean with little vernix on her at all). I felt such relief and love and peace. My husband cuddled us and held her for a moment, too, as we finished the birthing and basked in our happiness.

Kids are people, too...and so much more...

2011-04-23T11:06:00.013-04:00

I remember when I was about 12 an incident that ended up with me being grabbed by the shirt, slammed into a kitchen wall, smacked around and yelled at, by my dad, for wanting to wear my shirt tails untucked from my pants. This was the style at the time--mid 80s. I'm sure by then my dad was fed up with my appropriation of the "New Wave" look, a girl wearing silly skinny ties and chopping my hair on top more and more so it would spike better. The poor man probably didn't know what to think. I remember wanting a handcuff belt and it being totally forbidden, but it never being explained why I couldn't--or shouldn't--wear one. During the shirt-tail-wall-slam incident he expressed anger that I wanted to dress like a slob. This was somewhat confusing to me because we were a working-class, informal family. Looking back, maybe that's why it was so sensitive, he didn't want me looking like a working-class "slob"? But he was not one for putting on airs. I told him that that was "the look"--"casual". He flashed his dick in a fury and said, "Casual? I'll show you casual!" I think this might have been when mom stepped in. She wasn't a big stepper-inner.

Anyway, my dad is alright. He did some deplorable things, sure, but we've moved on and despite what some may think of the flashing incident, he wasn't sexually abusive, in my view. He never laid a hand on me in that way. I think his outburst was just pure dramatic frustration. I am sure he is very, very sorry.

But, it's not without reason that I still cry pretty much every time I hear the song "Daughters" by John Mayer. Say what you want about Mayer, but that is a great song. It makes me remember the things that went wrong for me growing up, it inspires me to not have these things go wrong with my own child...and, sadly, it makes me regret mistakes I have already made in just few short years of parenting. I can totally see why my dad lost his temper. Children can be really annoying. If you are not on your game, feeling in control, sure of yourself and your place in the world, it's probably easy to lash out at them for being annoying, seeming ungrateful or disrespectful. I remember my dad sometimes yelled at me and even spanked me for "my attitude". This was at age 10 or 11, and I remember really, truly not knowing what the hell he meant when he scolded me about "my attitude", so it wasn't like I was consciously being a smart ass to him. I guess he just interpreted it that way? This is something I never want to do with my child. I think it helps to always assume the best of people, maybe.

Challenges now, for me, are seemingly straightforward, including things like not wanting to pick up toys, not wanting to cooperate for bedtime preparation, or getting dressed or ready to go somewhere. Typically preschool "I'm flexing my independence" stuff. Overall, though, mine is a good girl, not malicious, not very sneaky (she has been known to hide in her room and give herself marker tattoos, which I have told her not to do before school). When I am feeling good, I take it all in stride, when I am not, sometimes I don't respond as I should. I know, though, that it is really on me and it's my job to be in control---not of her, but of my emotions and my reactions to her.

What about future challenges? I read some good posts on Babble the other day that relate to this. One is a mom's reflections on her own childhood, how she felt back then, and a reminder to herself that kids are people. They have their own feelings and desires and we should honor them as much as we can. This goes for teens, of course, and on down to the little ones. I think lots of people forget that babies, toddlers...they have feelings that we should honor. Maybe they don't feel like eating X today. Does it really matter so much if we cajole them to eat X as long as they generally eat well? Does it really matter if they don't want to take a nap? Maybe they aren't tired anymore. Of course, maybe they are and are just too wound up to know it, in which case mama has to do her best to set the stage and encourage the nap. But, I digress.

Another post loops back around to the issue of teen girls (or pre-teen in this case) and sexy clothes. The Babble post refers to a CNN blogger who comments that it is the parents' job to make sure their girls aren't dressed too sexy. The Babble post raises really interesting questions about who the onus is on---why is it so much on girls not to look too sexy but boys (and men!) are looked on as being unable to help what they think or do because of the way the girls are dressed? Nobody wants to dig into why girls may want to dress a certain way or not. It is some marketing, but it's not all marketing. There's their own feelings, their own explorations of who they are and what they want to be in the mix, but that is pushed back as a topic of discussion because what's most important seems to be making sure they aren't too sexually appealing or tempting to men.

My parents could have explained to me why I shouldn't be wearing a handcuff belt. I was 12, I think that's old enough to know. It's ugly, maybe, but it would have been a good teachable moment. In case you don't know why a 12 year old shouldn't wear a handcuff belt, I would say it's because it does very much have sexual overtones--the whole S&M association, and even worse, taking that association further to the fact that it would have been a child wearing that, you have the sickening issue of child trafficking and that whole mess. No wonder my dad was freaked the fuck out by this! But at that time, neither of my parents were college-educated, they were fairly young, as parents go, and I'm sure he just didn't have the nuts and bolts skills to talk to his 12 year old daughter about such things, so he just blew up in frustration. I understand. On the other hand, if he would have just treated me like a person, approaching me with some empathy, or pity, that I, as a child, had no idea what this was all about and yet here I was, in this culture, being exposed to things I didn't understand...I don't know if that takes a high level of education or just, really empathy and effort. I'm not here to judge the past, though, just to try and learn from it so I can take a cleaner path with my child.

So it's funny while concurrently pondering all this, I stumbled, too upon the catchy song "Teenage Dream." I like the song, and it revives in me happy, playful, lusty feelings for my husband, and I wonder how much the song is really for old people recapturing something, since it seems kind of to me the lyrics are best acted out by grown-ups. So, like, it would have to be an 18- or 19-year old teenage dream, at least...but then if it's just a "dream" I guess it's OK for younger ones to be dreaming of what they might do when they're older? Being a parent makes being a conscious pop-culture consumer tricky! In all this, though, I try to hold on to the idea that if I am compassionate and thoughtful and treat my daughter like a person, it might just all end up OK.

Photos and videos and just living life

2011-04-20T08:47:00.007-04:00

There's a post over on Babble about whether or not parents are comfortable posting pics of their kids on the internet. I am kind of in the middle. It seems like with so many pictures of so many children out there, the evil pervs have millions to choose from and what are the odds they stalk me and mine. Also, I think I read somewhere that a majority of molestations, abductions and such are from people the victims actually know. As far as any virtual shenanigans that might be done with an image, well, after all, it's just an image, it's not the real person. And, besides all that, I have a sense that really bad and awful things won't happen to me. So, of course, I post pics of my kid on Facebook, now and then, and I used to even have a public, yet personal, blog detailing her milestones and growth as a baby. That kind of fizzled out around age two or two-and-a-half, though.

And that got me to thinking, oh no, I am not documenting my child's life anymore the way I used to! What am I missing? Cue mini anxiety attack! And this was while I was doing yoga, a time that I typically think about such pressing things as what I will have for breakfast, what deadlines I need to tackle today, if we'll have time to hit a playground, are my husband and I supposed to have sex tonight, what beer will we have with dinner...

And what about the baby book? Yeah, that kind of fizzled out, too. But that was my husband's domain. I am more of the electronic media virtual girl. It dawned on me I haven't transferred video from the camcorder (do people even use those anymore?) to DVD in a while. It's hard to keep up with all the work-for-pay work, reading, housekeeping and child-engaging I need to do, let alone be the family archivist. Then I got to thinking, the media will probably change over time and we won't even be using DVDs anymore. Uploading to the cloud may very well become the standard. But, what if the cloud blows up? That said, all the paper photos could burn up, be lost, or destroyed in some kind of natural disaster, too, of course. Nothing is forever!

Nothing is forever and so it seems pointless to worry about documenting a life when you should be living it, right? Right. I can live in the moment. I can really look, really pay attention to my child in the here and now. I can create memories and hold them in my heart, and my mind. But, but, but...what if I get dementia or Alzheimers when I am old? No. Remember? Bad things don't happen to me. So instead of sweating it too much, I am just going to do what I always do. Live my life, snap a few pics here and there, post them on Facebook and maybe print out a book once or twice a year. And really try to be in the moment.

Anxiety crisis averted.

Do I have a right to NOT play?

2011-04-10T09:14:00.006-04:00

So I am sitting here, aching all over from yesterday's marathon. I just woke up. Haven't had breakfast, just drinking some water and surfing the web a little, waiting for the first pangs of hunger and the motivation to get back off of the couch before I eat something. I have already given my child her breakfast, of course, twice (two bowls of cereal, mixed kinds with milk, and juice...just like she asked for) and she is supposed to now just be playing around me, herself, while I interject words of interest here or there about what she is doing and engage, loosely in it all.

But no, the time of coasting has come to an end. I've had to comment favorably on her puppies that she's taking to the museum. I've had to ride to the museum, that was easy, I just sat on the sofa while she draped some beads on me as a "seatbelt so I can be safe." But now, we've arrived at the museum which means I have to get up and walk...somewhere...that she will pretend is the museum.

The thing is, I just don't want to! I want to just sit here for a few more minutes. I will play with her later, for sure I will. But, damn it, I am tired...and sore. I spent the whole night with her, as I sometimes do, cuddling on the futon on the floor. I know I'm a decent mom. So why do I have to play what she wants when she wants? Fact is, I don't. But she demands it and then cries when I don't. What do I do? It's infuriating. I tell her I'll play later. Not good enough. I tell her to go to her room until she can stop crying and be quiet. So that's what she does, saying to her stuffed dogs, "Sorry puppies" as she continues to cry.

The crying stops after a very short time, though, like less than minutes, maybe 2 minutes? And now I hear her "reading" aloud to her puppies, peacefully and quietly. Maybe now I am ready to play a little or engage, because the sound of her voice reading softly to herself and her pretend puppies is so sweet, and I realize that I've had my five minutes, I am not working or doing anything really important right now, and so why not go to her?

Thoughts on a very long run today

2011-04-09T23:24:00.010-04:00

Today was a challenge.

I ran a marathon. My time was slower than I'd hoped. Probably slower than I could have done if I tried harder, now, looking back. But, I am happy. I am glad it's over so now I can just go back to running more normal distances and perhaps just enjoy running more without this big...event...or goal...looming before me.

I did not sleep well the night before the race. The hotel room made all kinds of weird mechanical sounds, as hotel rooms usually do. I am very sensitive to these buzzings, clickings, whooshings. I didn't want to wear earplugs, though, because I didn't want to miss the sound of my alarm. Also, wearing earplugs makes me feel too vulnerable. I'd want to be able to hear and wake up if something was wrong. In addition to that, husband was sniffling loudly, and what seemed to me to be obnoxiously, all. night. long. My kid tossed and turned and proclaimed she didn't love me for quite some time before falling asleep, only to wake up with a coughing fit around 4 am, proclaiming that, yes, she does love me. (This actually warmed my heart and I didn't mind. She is my baby, after all.) Then there was the dog's chains. Since husband was sniffling and stirring, he trusty sidekick was constantly on the alert as well. It was awful.

So, I headed out to do this race and I tried to keep a happy mood, or make a happy mood, this cold, cold morning, heading to the race start, in shorts, alone, in the dark. Standing around in the crowd, waiting for the inexplicably delayed start, a muscle in my back and neck out of nowhere tensed up. I figured, it's a long race, I'll just work through the pain.

I started the race uneventfully and slogged on through. People always pass me in droves at the beginning of these races. People I know I will pass at some point later. I am not the fastest, but I am good at pacing myself. My thing is I never, ever, spend it all. I always save something for the end. I've always got a little left. Today was no different. I seriously contemplated skipping out of this thing at the half-marathon point. I was tired from lack of sleep, feeling down, I just didn't see the point of going through all this. I though about how I could make a legitimate quick answer for people who asked how I did. I'd say, "Eh, I wasn't feeling well, so I decided to just make it a half." Thing is, people don't really do that. I knew I'd feel like a big loser if I did that, and I'd always have "that time I dropped out of the marathon halfway through." So, I told myself I could go as slow as I needed to in order to keep myself from feeling pain and from suffering too much. It's hard to conquer that thought process when you're still in the single digits...mile 7, 8, 9 and you just want to stop at 13. But, once you get to 13, you can tell yourself, "OK, I survived. I just have to do that, again, one time, and I'll be done." And that is just what I did.

I worked through alot of thoughts and emotions during those 26.2 miles today. I had alot of anger. I was angry at my family for keeping me awake. I was angry at my fellow man, my fellow runners in this race for lots of petty little things that didn't matter. They were wearing headphones. The rules explicitly said "NO HEADPHONES." They were senselessly chattering about useless and petty things. One young college-age girl was going on about what the problem with healthcare in America today was. Like she had it all figured out. Some conversations I eavesdropped were interesting, though, and helped keep me going by taking my mind of things for a bit. A woman was working for a medical device company developing some device for blown out knees. Another was a 1st grade teacher in the D.C. public school system. A man told of how he liked to move every 5 or 6 years because life got stale. Faster people passed me. Slower people fell behind me. People who didn't know pacing kept passing and kept later falling behind. And then there were the walkers. They'd walk, then run and catch up, then walk again. And on and on. My view is you don't walk. You run. Even if you run slowly like me. You run.

What I came to realize in this marathon is that I had to run my own race. Today's race. For me. The race I ran today was all about just keeping on as best as I could. I wasn't trying to hit any personal best. I wasn't trying to be a shining star athlete today. No. I was just basically trying to survive. It didn't hurt too much because I just didn't let it. And for me, that was a really fun and gratifying way to run the race today. I enjoyed seeing how slow I could go without being ridiculous, but while not really being in pain or pushing. I never really was winded or breathing hard. It's the bones and muscles of my body that ached. I couldn't help but think, again, just like I did on so many of my training runs, that all this would be easier if I lost a little weight.

I became re-acquainted with the fact that there are many ways to do things. I know this from graphic design and art applications. There are often many ways to accomplish the same goal, different tools to use, different techniques, to do the same thing. Same for running, same for life. For me today, the tools for finishing the race were just to go slow and steady and keep on keepin' on. For someone else, it was different. Today may have been there day to go faster. They may always be faster, or they may someday decide that being fast wasn't what interested them that day. Like me today. I learned that it is much more relaxing and freeing and pleasing to let go of thoughts that dictate something's got to be done a certain way.

One reason I didn't quit at the half was just purely because I had no definite place to go or thing to do. My husband and kid would be out getting bagels or at a playground, waiting to meet me at the end of the marathon, a couple hours later. I thought maybe I could just go back to the hotel room and sleep. But they would be there. I loved them, but I was still annoyed with them. I needed to be alone (albeit in a crowd of runners) for a while longer. I needed to think more. I thought about how I just want to be nice and loving to my family. I thought about how marathons are alot like life. You have good days. You have bad days. There will always be people "better" than you and there will always be people "worse." You just have to know yourself, your pace, what you can do, and sometimes push and sometimes don't, but you have to know yourself enough to know when to do which.

It was really freeing to be able to take the relaxed approach I took to the marathon today. Made me think I could try fighting less and resisting less in day to day life, as well, especially dealings with my preschooler, and to some extent my husband and the whole world.

Soooo NOT awkward, and more on playdates

2011-03-09T08:50:00.005-05:00

Well, I survived the pool playdate and let me tell you, it was not awkward at all. First of all, there were lots of little kids and moms at the pool. I will say very few moms were actually in the pool. Most sat on the sidelines fully dressed. I think many of them had kids in an actual swimming class. As for us, well, we just chatted and the conversation totally flowed. The girls splashed around, we interacted with them, but did a fair share of talking amongst ourselves, actually. It was good to be in the water and have my body shielded a little that way, hee hee. I can't believe I was ever so weirded out by the idea. Not that I am in a hurry to do it again. I like swimming laps and going to the beach, but I am not that big on just hanging out in a pool, especially an indoor pool.

Of course, I told my husband about our day, and he said, "Oh, who's idea was that?" I told him it was the dad's idea, but quickly reminded my husband of our many trips to nude beaches, our honeymoon stint at a nude town in France, and his general propensity toward licentiousness, and he left it alone. Still, I can see how he'd be a little "bleh" about having to go to work in an office all day while I was at a pool socializing with Mr. Mom. At the end of the day, though, he didn't care much one way or the other.

I have to say, I kind of enjoy socializing with this dad more than I have with most moms as far as parents of kids my kid has done playdates with. Nothing bad about the moms, but you know, in my 20s, most of my friends were guys. I think it's just that lots of time guys are more easygoing, the talk seemed to flow very quickly beyond parenting and kids to our participation in sports, to world events, and more. But of course, this is just a very small sample size and just one and a half interactions.

My kid had a playdate with this guy's kid once before where she came over to our house to play and I gotta say, that was the best of all because I didn't have to talk to even him for very long. My kid had specifically asked me to invite this other child over and so I made the gestures. I found out her mom was being deployed to Afghanistan and the dad was going to be the primary with the kids for a while, so I'd have to deal with him. I told him, when making the invitation for the playdate that he would be welcome to just drop his kid off and let her play here while he went and ran errands or did whatever he wanted, if he didn't feel like sitting around coffee klatching with a mom (me). I said, maybe he'd hang out for a while, get a feel for our home, make sure it was safe for his kid, she was comfortable here and all that, then go on his way if he felt comfortable with it. And that's just what happened. And those are the playdates I prefer. My kid has a friend over, they play, I work, read, hang out and supervise from afar, minimally, rather than having to make conversation with a parent I may or may not have much in common with for hours.

Of course, I have my own friends and some happen to be parents, so it's not that I don't want to hang out at all, it's just cool that when kids start getting older they can have their own friends and their own playdates and we're moving away from the "mommies club" kind of thing.

AWKward!?

2011-03-08T09:14:00.008-05:00

It's about an hour before we're due for a swim playdate. I'm not entirely looking forward to it. OK, I wish I didn't have to do it. It's early March and I know it's an indoor, heated pool, but I also know I am probably going to be cold. I like swimming laps, but I don't really like just hanging around in the water, indoors, at the county rec center pool. So, why did I agree to this playdate? I wanted to be a good egg. I wanted to say "yes" to someone. This someone, though, is a dad, so on top of being cold and wet, I am going to be worried about what I look like in a bathing suit.

I'm not fat. I'm training for a marathon. I lift weights regularly. I look fine. Not bikini model material, but a healthy, athletic almost-40-year-old woman. So, why do I feel like this is going to be awkward? Maybe I'd feel less awkward if I was straight-up overweight, with no potential for attraction? Why did I not mention it to my husband? Why do I feel guilty and weird? I am not a prude at all. I am not attracted to this man—at all. And yet, I feel weird. A little. I am guessing my hairy legs and underarms will put him off enough to not see me that way.

I feel like if this were outside at the neighborhood pool it would be less awkward. It would be summer time. There would be other moms, dads and kids around. But, here, still in winter at the rec center, it's likely it might just be me and him and our girls. Maybe not. We'll see. Although he did say when suggesting this playdate that it will be nice for his kid to have someone else to play with since it's usually just her.

So, will we be sitting there having a conversation, in our swimsuits, under the cold, grey lights of this indoor pool while they girls play? (They are too little, at 3, to be in the water themselves, with us on the sidelines, I'd say). Or, will the girls occupy enough of the time and activity that we won't have to interact that much?

I was up late reading last night and sort of couldn't go to bed because I was wondering about all these things. Again, why did I just go along with this playdate idea, even though I thought maybe it was a little odd? I wanted to be easygoing. Go along with it. It would be weird for me to feel funny about being in a bathing suit and having to talk to some man. I shouldn't feel funny, should I? I shouldn't wonder about what he thinks of me in a swimsuit. That is vain and weird, and of course not what what this is all about. Part of me didn't mention it to my husband because I don't know if he would think it is weirder for me to do the playdate or weirder that I would have all this ambivalence about it. I know I can't coach my daughter to not talk about it, or lie, that would be going too far. But still, I hope we do enough other things after that she doesn't mention it. She probably will, though.

I'll report back post-pool playdate and let you know what happens.

I walk the line: the challenges of being progressive but with ‘old-fashioned’ values

2011-02-21T08:47:00.002-05:00

I signed the Planned Parenthood online petition this past week, both times, once before the House passed their measure to cut its funding and the other, after, when PP was looking to let the Senate know they should not cut funding. I saw alot of different discussions about this and other related issues online, and knew which side I was on for the most part in these discussions.

The MoveOn.org link, too, was valuable, in outlining several the “Top 10 Shocking Attacks from the GOP’s War on Women,” although I am sure they (the Republicans) don’t see it as such and I honestly really don’t understand the Republican motive behind all this. Do they think they can shame people into what they feel is appropriate behavior? Do they think women go out looking to land in a spot where they need an abortion? Most of the things on the 10-point list are obvious, no-brainers that any progressive can get behind opposing.

But, I would feel a little disingenuous if I did not say something about what what I really think of point 6 on MoveOn’s list:

6) Maryland Republicans ended all county money for a low-income kids’ preschool program. Why? No need, they said. Women should really be home with the kids, not out working. {emphasis theirs}

Let me just first say that at the end of the day, I still support what MoveOn is driving at—that is, not pulling funding from low-income kids’ preschool programs. I get that. They’re low income. Further, I think that by simply raising taxes on the rich (I, too, though not “rich” would be willing to pay more) and then people just being a little more efficient and earnest in how they manage these funds, many of the budget problems would likely be solved, or at least it would help.

My problem, though, is the way MoveOn phrases it, as though it is a preposterously wrong idea that “Women should really be home with the kids, not out working”—wrong on the same level of Republicans allowing women to die rather than allow them an abortion, or on the level of changing the legal definition of rape, or on the level of making it legal to kill abortion providers.

I just don’t think the idea that mothers of small children should be home with their kids is really so wrong. It is idealistic, to be sure, in today’s world, but, it is not wrong. In fact, I think it is very much right. I think more people who can actually afford it should do this. I’m not saying women should not work, ever, I’m just saying that I really do believe it is better, most especially for infants, for them to be at home with their mothers and to slowly ramp the children up for full days at school over the 5-6 year early childhood stage. I do not think it is ideal for infants to be in day care centers or for toddlers or preschoolers to attend all day programs. I’ll provide a link here to some more thoughts on this including scholarly citations on the subject, though, as is the case with “proving” breastfeeding is the right thing to do, I do dare say that it seems to me to be common sense that small children, new to the world, need not be exposed to the fray of a group dynamic under the care of paid workers for extended periods of time. But, I digress.

To paraphrase a great thinker (cough cough…not really…but the sentiment works in what I am getting at there) we have to deal with the world we live in NOW not the world we want, or how we hope the world will someday be. Sure, I want a world where all mothers can afford to stay home with their infants, then send them to preschool for a few hours a week at age 3 or so, then enroll them in Kindergarten and be there at 3 pm to ask how their day was. However, I am a realist and I understand that that is NOT the world we live in right now. Therefore, we need to try and help out the best we can, which might mean, yes, funding full day preschools for low income kids. It also might mean subsidizing low income mothers staying home with their infants or preschoolers, or maybe attending classes part time, if they hit a set of targets ensuring they’re doing right by the kids and the system and not squandering the benefit.

I also understand that even among those who have a little money, with good jobs, mothers often choose to work because of a need for the healthcare benefits associated with their jobs. Another common scenario are the professionals who have to both work because their student loan payments are so high. Fixing both of these issues by bringing America more in line with other industrialized countries that do not tie healthcare to employment and that have much more reasonable systems of higher education would definitely allow more parents to do better by their young children.

I guess I am just dismayed that the progressives, with whom I share many values, think that what I believe to be ideal for children is wrong or somehow laughable or outrageous. But, the alternative—not supporting Planned Parenthood or MoveOn and allowing the attacks on women and children the Republicans are trying to pull—isn’t really an option for me either.

No regrets: Why I won’t hedge my child’s psyche to safeguard my future comfort

2011-01-12T08:45:00.003-05:00

The latest buzz on the interwebs ingniting the fizzling “Mommy Wars” with a new spark comes from journalist Katy Read who regrets “opting out” of her career years ago to raise her sons, now that she’s divorced and can’t find much good work. In her Salon piece, not only does she tell her woeful tale, she warns new mothers against making the same mistake she did. “So if some young woman with a new baby were to ask me about opting out…I would warn her not to do it,” she concludes. She’s honest, she does mention the mixed feelings, the good times with her young boys, but in the end, it’s not worth it.

Many voices analyzed the piece, most echoing its sentiments. Two Babble bloggers discussed the piece, one a SAHM, the other a former SAHM, both clearly in the cautious camp. Some rightly hone in more on the divorce angle. And a dad blogger gives what I think is a smarter perspective. Right now, we’re in a recession. It’s just as easy to stay at work after having a baby, so better safe than sorry, right? I guess hindsight is 20/20 and one “never knows.” Feminists generally emphasize women’s need to be financially independent in case their husbands divorce them and act like its a fool’s game to stay home with small children for a few years because of the hit a career could take.

I say, one should live their ideal life, prudently, of course, if they are able and should not settle for less in order to hedge their bets against an unforeseeable future—certainly not when it comes to the well being of one’s children. Sure, there is no argument against the reality of the numbers that if you’re at home with kids and not working for money, or if you are working part time for less money, that you are going to take a financial hit. I am contributing less to my retirement fund, yes. Do I care? No. Am I unique in my confidence that my husband won’t leave me? I don’t know. I just know that’s not how I life my life. I believe in prudence, of course, which perhaps has given me the luxury of having the choice to stay home and run a low-key business for a few years while my child is young. We saved, we don’t spend wildly now, we have simple tastes, and of course we are blessed that my husband has a stable, well-paying job. I understand that other people have different circumstances and I’ve learned (mostly) not to judge. I do have a problem with the advice to young mothers from this person who has experienced the bad-end failure to do something different based on her individual circumstances.

I tend to believe that if you hedge against staying with your husband forever, that very act of hedging alone chips away at the commitment and bond. If you have the “just in case” idea poison the purity of your vow, then, there’s a crack in the foundation. This is why its so important to choose your partner well. If you work because you want to work, you’re embracing life and living it. If you work because you’re thinking maybe your husband will leave you, that’s not feminist. That’s presupposing the standard is that you’re supposed to be “taken care of” and you don’t trust that you’ll get that. If you approach marriage as a partnership between equals, the choice to stay home and raise your children (who are your husband’s children, too) is you doing that part of the partnership that you and your partner together decided was a good way to run your family. The bond has to be there and I don’t think it’s healthy for the bond to make contingency plans. (This is very different from life or disability insurance, to me.) Its recognizing that raising your children is as important as paying the bills (at least!).

The real problem here is divorce, I think. I strongly believe that if a couple has children they should really, really make the most valiant of efforts not to divorce. I don’t believe that a full half of people in marriages commit such heinous crimes that divorce is warranted. People. Work it out. You’re not that hot on the market. You need to find your happiness in your own soul, not chasing the next great thing you hope will come along, not cutting the dead weight you think is your spouse. Get it together for your kids, seriously! Men who leave women with kids in bad situations are reprehensible. Women that leave men over small things and then moan that it’s such a struggle to raise kids on their own, I don’t wanna hear it!

I believe it is best for infants and small children (preschoolers) to be cared for at home by their own mother. Yes, I know about tribal cultures and villages where many cared for the babies and youth of the tribe. The children were passed around, everybody had a hand in it and played their role very fluidly. I respect and admire those cultures, and such an arrangement may well be good for children, but that’s not the reality of the culture we live in today in the West and using daycare is in no way even a close approximation of that way of life. (It’s a common line quoted to defend daycare…”it takes a village!”) You can believe what you want about early childhood. But, given what I believe, and given that I have the means to do it, I feel absolutely compelled to stay home til my child is in school (we’ll see what the next transition will bring in a couple of years) and no fear of my future earning potential could waiver my resolve or make me regret my choice.

I scrabbled a life together for myself for many years when I was young, before getting a degree, before getting married, and I have confidence in myself that I could do it again. I hold raising my daughter as the most important job I can do. These two sentences, to me, encapsulate more of what feminism should be than the weakness and fear the one won’t be good enough later and that one doesn’t matter in their child’s early years.

In defense of the Disney Princess (sort of)

2011-01-11T08:45:00.003-05:00

It’s a common theme in fairytales and fantasy that if you believe in something strongly enough, it can happen; conversely if you don’t believe in, or give power to, an “evil,” you will be unharmed. These concepts probably aren’t very useful in many real-world situations of oppression where countries are run by militant warlords, women are routinely raped, there is no rule of law, and people are generally depraved. However, in the West, when dealing with matters of cultural and consumer warfare, I think the “not believing in” strategy can go a long way toward “protecting” ourselves against things we deem detrimental.

Consider the Disney Princesses.

Much has been made of the evil of Disney Princesses in contemporary feminist discussion. One blogger notes, “Arguably one of the toughest things about being a woman today is living in the shadow of all these fictional women we have been brought up to idolize.” Another speaks of Disney’s far reach “This is what little girls all over the world are watching.” And the well-known, scholarly Barbara Ehrenreich spoke out against the princesses back in 2007. Most recently, a mom and educator said in a guest blog on a “feminist” website (tongue-in-cheek, but with real complaints to back it up) that “Disney Princesses should come with warning labels.“

Now we don’t really do Disney in our house. Not in this way. We have some things that happen to be Disney. I know they took over Pooh. We have some old books with Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse and the crew that we bought at the thrift store. But we don’t have princess stuff. It’s not so much that I would be troubled by the messaging because I honestly think that all the subtext feminists are reading into it is beyond most three year olds (the age of my girl) and if they are attracted to princess stuff its because they really just might like pretty things. I don’t have princess stuff in my house or watch the movies because I don’t care for the aesthetic and I think the stories are boring and stupid. I wouldn’t mind so much the aesthetic of the old-school Snow White, but I think watching a full-length movie is too much screen time at once, uninterrupted, for a three-year old anyway. Other Disney movies I like: Bambi, Dumbo, Fantasia. To me, it’s about aesthetics. I don’t like the way people or anything else really looks in the new digitally-animated, hyper-stylized Disney animation. But, I’ve digressed.

What bothers me most is the assumed power this media has over children. Last time I checked, I controlled what my 3-year-old consumed—both in terms of food and media. And, shouldn’t this be so for all parents? Both the highly-educated, high-minded Barbara Ehrenreich and the local, home-grown person I’ve never heard of on The Feminist Breeder (TFB) blog act like they can’t exert any control over their preschool children.

“In faithful imitation, the 3-year-old in my life flounces around with her tiara askew and her Princess gown sliding off her shoulder, looking for all the world like a London socialite after a hard night of cocaine and booze… it may be old-fashioned to say so, but sex–and especially some middle-aged man’s twisted version thereof–doesn’t belong in the pre-K playroom.” Ehrenreich says.

The other blogger write of how she sends her boyfriend (not the child’s father) to get a gift for the child and he goes to the Disney store. (Two big “whys” in that sentence right there…) He gets the “wrong” toy and when she takes her little darling back to exchange it she “begrudgingly paid the $2.50 to the Disney Store clerk to ‘upgrade’ my daughter’s gift from the rejected Sally plush to the Belle plush…” and she then realizes she “will probably never win the battle of Jill vs. the Disney Princesses.”

Ehrenreich surrenders, too, saying “Let’s face it, no parent can stand up against this alone…”

And truly, both the Ehrenreich piece and TFB piece are semi-satirical, but the underlying notion that we, as mothers, can’t control what our preschool children watch and do, at so young an age, is hugely problematic to me. It should be no surprise, I suppose, when so many preschool children spend their days in the care of someone other than their own mothers and have been in such a situation since infancy. Still, the women writing these articles are themselves smart and educated and vocal. If they can’t exert control, I mean, who can? What’s the problem? Is it laziness? Is it wanting to pass the buck to “society”…a “big corporation” like Disney? Is it just so they can have something “interesting” to complain about within the notions of what “feminism” should be?

I don’t know. But my experience shows different results and while I think some of it is attributable to my girl’s individual personality, some of it is attributable to my influence, as well. I myself am pretty “tomboyish.” I’m athletic. My girl is well aware of me going running. She knows this is one of the things I do when she is in preschool. She knows this is what I do on Saturday morning when she and Daddy go grocery shopping and play. I don’t wear (much) makeup or none unless I’m going somewhere beyond preschool drop-off or the grocery store. I don’t speak frivolously or act frivolously or put undue emphasis on things being “pretty” or “not pretty.” This isn’t really because I make a conscious effort here, it’s just how I am. I speak loudly and firmly to my husband when the situation requires it. I sweat, I dig in the dirt, I lift heavy things. My daughter sees all this and this is how women are to her, right now because to her, I am the archetypal woman.

And this is the key. A mother has to be her daughter’s strongest influence. Certainly at age 3! Hopefully much longer than that, although I do realize that it is healthy to be influenced by other people and things as they get older. I think far too little weight is given to appropriate bonding with children. This isn’t just making sure they are well-fed and feel loved. Bonding is about planting the seeds in a family that they belong to you, you belong to them, there are certain ways our family is, that is us. Very hard to do (though not entirely impossible) when a child spends most of their waking hours being cared for by someone else the first three or four years of their lives when they are so very impressionable.

My daughter is very attached to me, having had me as her primary companion and caregiver these few short years she’s been here. I nursed her for about 33 months. We co-slept and still do a kind of semi-co-sleeping arrangement now, as well, that is agreeable to all family members. She does get out into the world for playdates and preschool, although I did not leave her with anyone til she was 2 and a half. At preschool (3 half-days a week) she is exposed to other girls, girly-girls who do princessy things. My daughter does like to be pretty and recognizes things she likes and doesn’t like in terms of styles and colors, but she’s not obsessed about it or into any deep story lines.

At a get-together of some families of my daughter’s preschool class, we parents were talking about our girls. Many of the moms were going on about how their daughters were into the whole princess playing thing. One said that the girl talks of how she will get married someday and calls this certain boy she knows her “prince charming.” I smiled politely but inside this made me gag. Not even so much because of feminist reasons, but because it is so boring, predictable and dead-end in terms of imaginative play. And because these girls are ONLY three. I was so pleased that my daughter was over in another corner playing Play Doh with the only boy at the get together (someone’s 5 year-old sibling) while the little girls were doing their princess thing. Not that there’s anything “wrong” with it, my girl’s just not interested.

Does Disney really try to push these princess characters as role models and if so, are you buying? I can’t say whether they do because I am just not all that well-versed in them, but my sense is that they are just pretty, shiny things meant to sell toys and movie tickets. There is not any “agenda” behind them other than selling stuff (a whole other post). That said, isn’t it up to the adults in the house to use their “power of the purse” then and not buy things that don’t echo their family’s values, if, in fact, they find these princesses so very offensive? I mean put “crack cocaine” in place of the Disney princesses. Wouldn’t you think someone a little crazy if they said “But my girl loves crack cocaine and all her little friends are into it…its everywhere…there’s nothing I can do…”

Now, I’m not the one equating Disney with crack, but some feminists act like it’s pretty damn bad. Let’s go back to the one who said “Arguably one of the toughest things about being a woman today is living in the shadow of all these fictional women we have been brought up to idolize.” Really? That is the hardest thing about being a woman today? Not the fact that across the globe women and children are being trafficked? Not even that the economic climate of today dictates that many women feel they have to place their infants in daycare so they can feed and protect their families, while giving up the bonding and influence they know deep inside is so important? Not a pay gap? Not figuring out how to breastfeed while working full time away from your baby? And who has brought us up to idolize these fictional women? Our mothers? Not my mom. She stayed home and took care of me when I was very small and was a strong influence in my life.

I think real feminism and real strength is manifested in actually being there for our daughters, actually exerting the control over what they consume, especially at so young and age, and shaping how they view themselves in the world—not just throwing your hands up and acting like you can’t help things. Is that powerful? Nobody is taking your power in this area, moms, you seem to be giving it up freely. Now lots of commenters and the blogger on TFB do talk about how they are going to turn dangerous princess exposures into “teachable moments” and I agree that’s good and important. But I have to question why 2 and 3 year olds are watching feature-length films to begin with and why instead, if you must give them media you don’t give them something else at this point in their lives? That’s a personal decision, of course, just don’t act powerless and call yourself a feminist…and expect my respect.

Just believe in yourself as a mother and don’t give Disney or its evil princesses the power you don’t want them to have and be your daughter’s heroine.

Dreamy dreams

2010-11-25T08:21:00.006-05:00

Last night I had a dream that there was a movie out starring Sinead O'Connor as a lady who was turning into a robot because she was so negative. It had the Nick Lowe song, "What's so funny about peace, love and understanding" in it and that was the song that played on this movie's trailer. The movie poster looked something like the image I mocked up in about 10 minutes, above. I feel like this dream is a sign and a lesson. (Another good song to check related to this is "I do not want what I haven't got.")

Report card=FAIL

2010-11-23T08:30:00.008-05:00

So, as a follow up to my last post back in August about focusing on professional issues and eschewing "mommy" issues...well, that didn't happen. I just didn't write about it here, but I became more embroiled than ever in various discussions and arguments online about parenting topics. Why? I think one reason is that reading short articles and comments and then commenting myself, from the gut, is a quick and easy way to fill time, and filling time is really all I have for it. It's not like I am going to set aside a half hour for website reading and commenting. It's little blips. Blips while I wait for an application to open for something I'm working on. Sidetrack blips when I have to look up something else for work and drift off just to check a little website here or there to see what the latest thing to outrage (haha) me will be. Blips between playing with my kid or getting her a snack or wiping her ass or cleaning something. My comments are usually well thought out, although they do capture my "gut" response, as I mentioned. I often express my opinion in angry or combative ways. I feel an underlying sense of anger and combativeness and I know it's a problem and I certainly don't want to foster that in myself. It is so contrary to everything I want to be.

But the snark just flows.

I am also a little lonely. I will admit, as much as I love my kid, she is still just a kid and a young one at that. Sometimes if I say "I love you" or ask her any kind of question, she'll say something like "I'll be baby jaguar and you be a red-eyed tree frog"...totally missing the point, right? Well, that's normal! She's three! But, sometimes I need more engagement throughout these long days. Throwing comments out there, I get engagement. It seems like throwing provocative comments gets me better engagement, too. Or at least, more. Pathetic, I know. The thing is, sort of, at more core, I do think the things I post are right and what I really think, but I would never force these ideas on people in the real world and I don't alienate actual friends and acquaintances in real life with my bullshit. Also, often the more I get to know people the more I feel like, meh, it's OK if someone works and puts their baby in daycare...I mean, so and so seems caring and nice enough, right? Or, so and so just has to do it because they need the money. Even when I disagree with people's choices, when I actually get to know them as individuals, the difference in our choices serves more as a point of interest, a curiosity, something to talk to my husband about or ponder, etc. But, when I am just dealing with words on a screen, it's like I'm not really dealing with an actual person. And, I think this goes the other way, too.

So, what to do? I have tried, although admittedly not very earnestly, to curb and cut off my reading of parenting sites and blogs. Should I just write about my reactions here, on this blog, instead of engaging in the barbs in the comments sections? Should I just try harder to swear it all off? I think in some ways it might be beneficial for me to explore my feelings and think more about why I behave the way I do online. I have actually had some revelations on this lately.

For example, I get mad and resentful at people that have lots of kids and lots can mean anything from two to five to more. I know two is not really lots, three is just barely lots, so I guess my anger is proportionate to the number of "extra" kids people have. On one hand, I often see and hear (online) kids being slightly neglected when there seems to be more than the parent(s) can really adequately handle. I see and hear about bad behavior in the kids, lack of parental control, financial stresses, moms needing medication, parents not being able to pay for college...and I think, why the hell do these people bring this on themselves and why do they expect anyone to help them out? Haven't they heard of birth control...blah blah blah. I also think of how crowded the world often seems. I think of our waning resources. It can get scary, the mental trajectory. But, then I heard a baby crying in the grocery store the other day (my child was in preschool) and I had to hold back my tears. When I got to the car, I broke down and I cried. I missed having a baby. I only have one child. Why? I could have another baby? Why do all these people get to have babies, babies, babies, and I don't? It hit me, part of my anger against these multi-child people was a little jealousy. Not all, but part.

What a horrible revelation about myself! What an asshole I am, right? So, I need to lay off that. Still, when I move past the cuddly babies and the primal, probably hormonal urges to procreate (even at my age?) I realize that it is really best for us to have just one.

Another thing that gets on my nerves is stuff online about how women have to work and how there should be government-subsidized childcare to help them do so. Mommy-war type arguments aside about whether little kids are best off with their own moms, I don't really like the idea of having the government take on yet more of people's private family issues. I know, I know, the government subsidizes corporations and wars, so why not families? Well, the government gives tax breaks to families already—for each kid, there's a deduction, right? And there's some kind of earned income credit or something for daycare, right? (I don't know the details, part-time preschool doesn't really qualify.) I just bristle at the notion that we should be taxed more so that someone can get their personal fulfillment from working since they can't manage to find it with their young kids, or, in hobbies or something. People seriously in need should get help, sure, but alot of these discussions deteriorate to women saying they just need to work for their sanity, or, to hedge their bets against their marriage failing and them being single moms. And to those points, I say, that is their problem and the whole country does not need to pay for it.

I guess I am angry because, yes, it is challenging at times to be home with a kid all day, or most of the time when they are not in preschool, in the case of this work-at-home mom. It's challenging, but its not without its rewards and value to my personal growth. And, I am doing it all on my own, I should say, we, as a family, are doing it all on our own. We don't have family in town to help. We live day in and day out, working, caring for our child. We make it happen. I know it would be harder with more kids, which is why we don't have more. So, when these people with lots of kids get online and go on about the help they need, I just think they need to take responsibility for and control of their own lives!

I know, of course, that these thoughts are not friendly or charitable. I really do want to be kind and I want to be compassionate, but at this point I think the best I can do for these types is to try to be indifferent and not get embroiled in debates in comments sections. I think I will just try to sort it out here in my own writing space...

A horrible mommy blog day!

2010-11-09T07:42:00.000-05:00

This post is in honor of all the mommy blogs out there that post the most mundane, “what I did today” drivel that somehow entertains people. I am soooo mommy’d out and so tired of the upper-middle class political crap surrounding motherhood. My internal struggles in my brain get much uglier than any of that. Here is a made-for-primetime version of a bad day in my world.

The table-top fountain doesn’t work. I am devastated. I sob at the kitchen sink as I wash the few dishes leftover from our breadmaking this morning. We got the fountain at Walgreens today after “lunch” when I went in to see if they still sold ipecac syrup in drugstores. Apparently they don’t. At least I couldn’t find it and I was too afraid to ask. I asked where it was once as a teen and they gave me trouble. I figured the pharmacist would think I was some crazy eating disorder lady and I didn’t want to go down that road of proving I wasn’t. Yes, I wanted it to make myself throw up, but no I am not bulimic. I just had a regrettable lunch.

After a frustrating morning that started with a routine enough check of a client’s website, the matter snowballed into an hour with technical support. A bad way to start one’s day when one is having trouble being centered, balanced and focused in their days generally (lately). I’d been dealing with the technical issue on and off since last Thursday and I won’t go into the gory details, but emotionally, I felt like a beat up valise that had been to Bangalore, Phoenix and back (the various support specialists locations, no small coincidence). I take my work very seriously.

What makes it sadder is that today I planned on being a big “focus on my kid” day. We were going to draw alot. We used to draw all the time, but lately it’s been all play doh and blocks and draping scraps of cloth on plastic animals as “costumes”. But, she was doing some good drawing last night in the tub with her bathtub crayons and it made be think, yeah, we need to draw. We did manage to get a little drawing in, and, as previously mentioned, baked homemade bread. How’s that? Work on client website issue, draw with child, make homemade bread with child. Not a bad day, actually. But I feel broken in pieces, somehow.

I figured I’d treat us to lunch over at the Austin Grill. Kids eat free on Tuesdays. I vowed before I’d never eat there again after lame service and feeling gross from the food. But, this wouldn’t be the first vow I’d broken. So we went. Shrimp fajitas sounded good. A margarita…maybe. But, it was not good. My kid didn’t really eat much of hers. Mine tasted alright but not good enough to to make up for the guilt I felt for consuming probably 1000 calories for lunch. Guess I’ll skip dinner. The service was stupid and slow I had to ask for A, B and C twice. What they hell is wrong with people. We were like, one of two or three tables in the place. I used to waitress. I know when it’s hard. Anyway, I left feeling unsatisfied, dirty and gross and my hands smelled horrible from the drippy fajita juices.

“Let me just pop into Walgreens real quick,” I told my kid and we did. I trolled around the healthcare aisles but no ipecac readily available. Should I ask, should I not ask? No. Don’t ask. Then, on an endcap I saw these cheesy little fountains. The label said “Wow! Just $5″ I thought, aw, that’s a cute thing we can use with our animal and block set-ups. My kid would probably think the water running from the little spout into the cauldron and making the whirry flowing sound is really cool. “That looks…relaxing…” the teenage checkout guy said, like he knew it was a terrible, old-lady trinket, awful purchase. A plastic, made-in-China fountain. But it would delight my kid. I knew it would. “She’ll get a kick out of it,” I told him, motioning in my kid’s direction.

But now, I am back home with a bloated belly and a broken fountain (did it ever work?) but a beautiful kid, thank jah. After the bloat fades I am going to do some cardio to try to sweat out my frustration and start fresh tomorrow.

Being the best mom I can be, by focusing on other things

2010-08-07T00:01:00.007-04:00

Following up on my recent posts where I've been trying to figure out what to do, who to be, I am again creating a point of closure here, which I hopefully can live up to, adhere to, in order to make room to do the things I need to do.

The best idea for achieving a work-life balance, for me, will be to work for myself and continue to build my business. So, to that end, I am re-dedicating myself to my design career. This means not wasting time debating SAHM vs working on the web, not wasting time worrying about what the feminists are saying or doing, this means spending my time working or figuring out how to work better, nourishing my creativity, building my skills.

I have felt a rising level of anxiety for some time. There is no specific crisis or nothing so majorly big in my life that I can pinpoint. Just a general sense of concern. Part of it now may be being in a funk for missing my man and having anxiety about what the future holds for me as a working mom who wants a good life balance and who will not make my child number two on the list of priorities. OK, well, maybe I am on to a little something there, and maybe that ties into a bigger matter of anxiety. I have felt a lot of anxiety lately of womens issues and things on TV, the web, the news. I don't want to get into it here, I don't want to take the time, I just feel like the best thing for me to do is focus on making my life the best it can be. If I was to dig in and focus on these bigger, world-wide issues, I would feel so overwhelmed and horrible. That's not to say I don't care (about the plight of women in other countries, about how our own Western society seems in decline as we place everything—money—above children and family) but I have to just be as good a mother as I can be and find ways within my own realm to show kindness and be a good person.

So, what can I really dig into and hang onto that's material and that can actually help me be a better mom by empowering me to have a good work-life balance? Bolster my skills so that I can build my business.

I am less angry.

Transitioning: Not supermom

2010-08-06T23:13:00.005-04:00

I have to say I am changing my tune about the whole “mommy wars” thing. While I have said time and again that I think it’s best to stay home with a baby, I fully intend to be working more when my child is in school. I'm faced with having to contrast that with those mothers who decide to be full-on stay-at-home moms, forever, and then homeschool, too…well, I can’t "compete" with that. I used to think I was doing the greatest thing for my kid, staying home before she was school age—oh, the dedication, oh, the love—but here’s this person who is clearly going to do so. much. more….but something I could never do. I am beginning to understand the inferiority moms feel when they use daycare and others blast them for doing so, and then the feeling of picking yourself up and saying, no, I am just doing what’s right for my family…and so, everyone has their own journey and their own threshold of what they can do and what they can give…that's what I'm going to do, albeit on a different time table.

I believe that if you give your baby and young child a firm foundation, you gradually let them go over the years, and to me, this means sending them to school when they're school age (I am not against homeschooling and I think it's cool for many, but it is not for me, and my husband would definitely not be on board, first and foremost). It's funny now, because I have so much pride (not haughty pride, like when the Bible talks about it as a sin, but healthy pride, if you can believe in that) in staying home with my kid as a baby and young child, and now I wonder, am I going to be ashamed or feel some weird competition that I'm not doing enough if I don't stay home FOREVER. At the same time, having only one child and having them in school the better part of the day, it doesn't make sense for me NOT to work when she is older. My goal is to achieve a good work-life balance so that I can be there for her after school, not make her go to the after school programs at least til she is older and into the school groove for a few years, not as a kindergartner or first grader...but I do think I need to do some kind of work for money as she gets older (at least what I do now, very likely more). Anyway, I am now beginning to feel some of the defensiveness of moms who send their babies to daycare when I compare myself with other moms who are never going to work at all. BUT, the key, really, will be the work-life balance. Making it real, not just some vague catch phrase.

Transitioning: Erudio Interruptus

2010-08-05T22:08:00.002-04:00

A while back I wrote about transitioning to working from home. While I've worked part-time from home ever since my child was born over three years ago, I've always felt like a "stay-at-home-mom" anyway. I know, though, that my days as a SAHM are numbered. It won't end next month or even next year, but in upcoming years—kindergarten, first grade (?) my child is going to be in school several hours a day and it just doesn't make sense for me not to work. Besides, my husband thinks we need the money. He is less of a "living with less" scrabbler than I am, on one hand, even though he is, in reality more frugal than me, I know, if I had to, I could cut back. He is more concerned about retirement, nice vacations, paying for our kid's college. I guess I am on board with those needs for money, too. But, after all, we are dealing with all those things now, even on my more limited salary, and so I feel less urgency to give more of myself over to earning wages. Not because I am lazy, but because I want to be a good mom.

This leads to my big quandary to be faced when it comes time to ramp up. How can I hold a job that brings in the money I "deserve" (so to speak) that utilizes my skills, but that is not so demanding that I cannot make my kid my priority? I don't want her to go to afterschool programs (if she doesn't want to, and certainly not in kindergarten). I don't want her to have to go to day camp all day in the summer (if she doesn't want to...maybe she will want to?). But, I do want to work for money.

The Radical Homemakers ethos appeals to me. Cut back. Be frugal. Grown your own veggies. Put them up. Live on less. Don't be a slave to the extractive economy. However, I do enjoy graphic design and communications quite a bit and it is a good wage-earning career. And I'm crunchy and non-materialistic, but I don't know how ready I am to go that far off the grid. My husband is a good barometer of sensibility and I don't know how on board he'd be with that, either. Balance, is important to me, too. I guess the very word "radical" moves away from the idea of "balance" on one hand, but on the other, maybe the way the world is is so off balance that we need something radical to put it back in balance. Anyway, I'll do my part, but I still am going to have to work.

One idea I have is to continue to work as an independent consultant–a freelancer. I worry about what would happen if I lost by biggest client. I guess I would get more clients. I wonder if I could get enough to make enough. It's nice that I have the safety net of my husband's steady job, that's true. But, I want to be solid, as well. It's possible to do this on my own, as a consultant. Or, maybe, by then, there will be a turning in the culture of work and it will be possible to get a job that's, say, 30 hours a week or something. I just don't want to be like the so many middle class people I hear about who are scrambling around juggling hectic schedules and having their kids fall through the cracks.

My concern about this of late even got me to considering, for like a day, getting a Master's in Education and becoming a teacher. I figured the hours would be great for a mom. Most of the information I got from those in the field who I polled said otherwise. My brother said, "If, as you admitted, your interest in becoming a professional early childhood, elementary, or secondary educator is to improve or seek a 'work-life balance' that appeals to someone wanting more flexibility in their family life, your motives are at great risk of resulting in disappointment. While the "value to society" motive is a driving force, it sometimes—make that often times—has become a divisive element in my home. I do not have any free time."

My husband, who was a teacher in his past life said, "You say it would be good as a mother, but I completely disagree. It's a profession that goes way beyond the hours of 9-5, and dealing with kids all day may zap you of the energy and enthusiasm you need to share with you onw in the evening. When I was teaching, I always said I didn't think I could deal with kids all day, then have to go home and deal with my own...that I'd either have to quit teaching, or never have kids. But that's me...Sorry for throwing in my two cents, but it's a topic that I have very strong feelings about...not that I'm trying to control you, but rather from my very own experiences in teaching that made me a very, very unhappy person for quite some time."

A friend said, "The idea of being a positive influence in kids lives is pretty uplifting...but in actuality, i'm with your husband. I personally don't like it. I also think it depends on what you want to teach. I think that elementary vs. high school is something to consider. I was an elementary (young-2/3rd grades) and it's very draining. He's right, you don't have much free time, and even when you're not in school working, you feel like you should be. I imagine High School is very different in the day to day teaching, but the same outside of school...always feeling like you should be grading papers, lesson planning, etc. It can also be very frustrating, as there are many demands put on you outside of your actual 'job' of teaching...paper work and such."

Another said, "I'm still struggling to find that work-life balance. I haven't been too successful as of yet, but I am still a relatively new teacher, so I'm hoping this year will calm down a little more for me. I work 12 or more hour days most days. For me, the balance has come in the summer and in the plentiful vacation time that I get. Yes, I am off by 3:00 every day, but there are papers, lesson plans, paperwork, bulletin boards, tests, phone calls, etc etc to do. You are never done. There are some teachers who manage to walk out the door at 3:02, but honestly, they are not the type of teacher you would probably want to be. The first two years are hell."

OK. So. Not gonna do it.

The problem of motherhood being politicized

2010-07-27T08:24:00.009-04:00

I work for clients, for money, and you could say I run my own business as an independent consultant, so I may not be the one feminists criticize when they criticize stay-at-home moms or "housewives." But although I bring in 25-30% of our household income (not an insignificant portion), I do identify as a SAHM and, to some extent, a housewife. I'm not sure why I identify as such, especially given that when my child is school age I intend to work more in pursuits outside of the home, for money. I think part of it may be the way that I was raised—by a SAHM, as well as the value I put on a mother being highly involved in the earliest years of a child's life that necessitates, at least for a period of time, the prioritizing of home and children over career. So, even if I did not have this golden opportunity to work part time from home while raising my child in her early years, I would choose to be at home and take the financial and ego and career hit because I do think the kid is more important and there's no substitute suitable for my child, for whom I want the best.

It angers me, then, to read the views of Nancy J. Hirschman, and fellow feminists, who, in various ways, over-complicate some things that I feel are pretty common sense and basic: First, that many (if not most) women would want to nurture their small children and build a home, if they could afford not to go to work when the child is very young—unless they, of course, have been brainwashed by feminism to think that this is a non-progressive choice and actually care about such things more than the welfare of their children. Second, that a young child is truly best cared for in a home setting, with a parent (their parent, preferably, and in my opinion, their mother, as the top preference, certainly for those under a year who should be breastfeeding) providing their care and nurturing. Third, that life is long and a woman can choose to take a 3-5 year "sabbatical" to care for her young child and get him or her off to a strong start, then jump back in and build, or rebuild her career or a new vocation/profession.

(For those women who would choose to have more than one or two children, I'd say they would really have to be able to carve more time than the 3-5 years out, then, and a career might not be as realistic for a while, or forever, if you're going to do right by your kids, as more children require more of your time and attention, naturally. Further, in today's ecological climate I bristle a bit at those who choose to have several children. I wonder about their environmental awareness, their awareness of the level of attention children need and their hubris in thinking they are either so great they can handle it or they are so great that it is somehow their right to overpopulate the world with their wonderful seed. But, that is another post, and I digress...and I must be careful not to judge—too harshly—and I realize that last bit was pretty judgmental).

The staunches of these essayists call for "true feminists" to put their babies in daycare so they can carry the torch for the sisterhood. Equal pay, workplace rights, etc. etc. are more important than their children, who can easily be cared for by a low-wage daycare worker or nanny or whatever. Especially the well-educated should do this. They should not squander their education. Thing is, why work if you don't have to? Moreover, why work if you don't want to (and don't need to)? This post is going to run out of steam because I'm already on to other things, but I felt like I needed to sort of get this one out and get it posted so if anyone was interested they could see the link and read the essays.

There is a good one up there by Shannon Hayes, author of Radical Homemakers, a book I read recently, coincidentally, that has all kinds of inspirational stuff about breaking away from the work-a-day world of the extractive economy and instead doing work that builds up the "Earth Community." In her essay, she says "The Real Battle is Elsewhere" and this really resonates with me. She says, "Worrying about the fight for equality in an extractive economy is like attempting to save a sinking ship by mending a sail. Neither sex is winning the fight. "

And, she says, "The race to see who can bring home more of them has left us bereft as a nation. We lead the world in reckless consumption, we are in the midst of a depression epidemic, we are no longer one of the healthiest populations, we work more hours than residents of most other industrialized countries, and we have one of the highest school dropout rates in the industrialized world.

The sad irony is that as we worry about who gets to climb higher and earn more money, income disparity grows larger, and, for most, the bottom line never seems to improve. Household net worth dropped dramatically in recent years, and Americans’ personal savings rates currently hover at just above a paltry 3 percent.

I agree with Hirschmann that negotiation for shared domestic responsibility is important. But it seems that the scorekeepers are always authorities external to ourselves—especially employers who stand to gain from our struggles to prove who will be the more loyal slave."

The problem is when you politicize something like motherhood and take it beyond the individual relationships and try to make it a weapon in some wage war for equality, you destroy individuals' rights to do what they want to do. Isn't feminism about women doing what they want to do and not being forced to do something else? Children and mothers shouldn't be victims (again) in labor wars. It seems many in America (who are actually working) are overworked and are compelled either by some intrinsic competitive pathology or by fear of unemployment to be squeezed by employers. That, and they work too many hours because American corporate culture is highly wasteful (another digression, another post, a great conversation among experts on this on the NYT website).

For my part, I feel like I am lucky, during my kid's early years, to have a husband who makes most of the money, allowing me to have a more laid-back job from home, but who is still is very hands-on with our kid when he is home. When she is older, I will ramp back up with the outside earnings (we often joke, too, about me being a VP—because I am to some extent ambitious—and him staying a steadfast civil servant with lots of vacation time to spend with her).

Again, one of the things that bothers me so much about some of the feminist rhetoric is that it ignores that there are seasons to life and that staying home with a small child does not necessarily mean a woman is finished with pursuing any kind of career forever. In fact, I think the difficulty of jumping back in is often over-stated by hard-core feminists (either that, or I am just not aiming for that high-level of a career when I do go back, actually).

Going back to work has been on my mind alot, lately, which I'll address in another post. But, for now, I cherish my time at home and know I am doing a wonderful thing for my daughter.

What does yoga mean to me?

2010-07-25T21:33:00.007-04:00

I came across an article in the NYT that showed a side of yoga I don't really know. I mean, it's not that hard for me to see that this side would be out there, that it would exist, but I guess it's just not on my radar. It makes sense that anything people enjoy could also become a source for business and enterprise, but it's just not what yoga means to me.

The article opens saying "There is so much going on in John Friend’s life right now that an assistant once teased him about waking just before dawn and calling to ask for coffee, only to be reminded that he, Friend, was in Quito, Munich or Seoul, while the assistant was back at home base in the Woodlands, a cushy suburb north of Houston."

That's funny. Too busy, too crazy, scattered. The exact opposite of what yoga is supposed to be. To me.

I do yoga in any old comfortable clothes, in my house, with a DVD, while my kids plays around me. It brings me peace. It gets my blood flowing. It cleanses me, centers me, balances me. I need this. Alot.

I don't get the expensive classes, retreats and gear. Yoga is almost like brushing my teeth, but more special. Maybe it's like a religion, too. People go on religious retreats, I guess. But, for me, it's just a part of my day I really love that I need to use to keep me on track, mentally, physically and spiritually.

On the other hand...

2010-04-12T10:00:00.002-04:00

You know what...at first I was more of a free-market mind about this and critical of it. Why should businesses have to toe a line, etc. etc. etc? But after reading comments on other articles covering the story and in the same reading session seeing news of child brides in the Middle East and other countries who die or are abused, it really hit me that...WE NEED THIS (breastfeeding legislation). I wish we didn't need it. I wish people naturally treated women (humans in general) with decency because it was the right and humane thing to do. I wish people automatically treated breastfeeding women with dignity and didn't go out of their way to make them feel awkward and ashamed, but after reading women's experiences expressed in comments and reading some of the snide and nasty things the public has to say about breastfeeding, it is clear that, yes, we do need legislation to force people to behave decently. The child-bride thing comes in because, it seems to me, that women's lowly place in these cultures and the corresponding economic dependency plays a big role in creating a society that condones these young girls to live unfulfilled lives of sadness (and in many cases abuse) with old, lecherous men....so, I've changed my tune to some extent.

Breastfeeding: Don't try this at home

2010-04-10T12:12:00.011-04:00

Be careful what you wish for.

In my view, this sentence sums up much of what feminism has brought society in the past 30-40 years. Women can now hold jobs next to men and the majority do. But, all these women in the workforce have contributed to an economy that, for many families, demands that they work, along with their husbands, just to keep a middle-class household afloat, unless they can do some very good planning, serious budgeting or things fall into place just so. Yes, now we women can play with the big boys. We can do anything we want. Great. But, equal opportunity does not mean equal expression or equal execution.

The latest "victory" is a stipulation in the health care bill requiring companies with more than 50 employees to provide a space for nursing mothers of children less than a year old to pump their milk. The space has to meet certain requirements: 4x6 feet, electrical outlet, sink, private, etc. One on hand, I like that it will be easier for women to get breast milk to their babies, but on the other hand, I lament that many women are away from their babies during the first year of the babies' lives and I question the repercussions the legislation will have on business and employees.

How did it ever come to this? A woman, her new baby in another room somewhere, being looked after by some other person, sits attached to a machine that pumps milk out of her body. She then stores it in bottles that will later be used to feed the baby. Now she can get back to work. Does this strike anyone else as kind of inhumane and weird?

I never took to pumping. I admire women who do it, to some extent, because I find it so offputting and I know I am very fortunate to have been able to not be separated from my baby in a way that would necessitate pumping. I was offered an extra pump by a friend with the suggestion that it would give me freedom. I could get away for a few hours more than I would without the pump. Something just didn't appeal to me about it. I never looked back. It was going to be just me and my baby. Together. On demand. That was what I was meant to do for this first year or so of her life. I later tried a hand-held manual pump when she transitioned to solid foods, thinking that I could mix some in with food for her and make breastmilk creations...but that didn't take off for us either.

Breastmilk has been shown to have many health benefits for babies, but I have to wonder, is it just the milk? It strikes me as unnatural and strange that we now think it is a great idea to suck the milk out of a woman with a machine and have someone else feed it to her baby from a bottle. We finally have our freedom. We don't have to be tied to our babies, at home. But, it's like the mom doesn't even matter. We just need to get the milk out of her. Well, I like to think that I matter to my baby, now my child, that it's not just a matter of her getting the milk. Call me narcissistic.

So much ambivalance

2010-03-27T08:45:00.001-04:00

I work from home doing consulting, so I guess my story is a little different. And my husband has pretty extreme job security. And, we saved big time for several years before having a kid so could live off our savings for over a year if we had to…yeah, unique in this economy, I suppose, but at the same time, nothing a little planning couldn’t provide many people. I think it’s a little over-stated the myth of how far back you’ll be staying home for a few years…if you can work part time from home, or you can read up/study/keep in the loop in your profession (which you should) maybe do some pro bono or volunteer work that relates to your field, you will be alright. No, you haven’t been on the climb those years you’re out, but you still have a foot in the game. Of course, there are myriad different situations people have and I’m in no position to justify or give advice to all of them, I just think that in this day and age too many people *assume* they have to do the childcare thing when, if they thought things through, they really may not have to. Also, I’m not one to hedge bets on my marriage failing (another big argument the feminists have). In my life, I “go all in”. I go all in to my marriage, I go all in with my kid. I don’t hedge my bets.

So I was thinking about my last post and rereading and realize that maybe I am a big a-hole. It does sound like I live a pretty charmed and easy life. So I am going to just shut up. Maybe other people don’t have it so easy (much of which I think they may bring upon themselves…but I don’t know and I should not judge). So, OK, work if you want, formula feed, whatever, sleep train. It’s not for me, but I’m not you…

Why is talk of our children 'taboo' in the business world?

2010-03-27T08:33:00.006-04:00

I'm a "work at home" mom to a young one now, but someday, when my kid's a little older I will probably go back to being a salary slave to someone else's operation, unless I decide to grow my business and continue working for myself. So, I really enjoyed these musings in the Wash Post about "one of the deep cultural rifts of our time"...where the write notes that "the business of raising humans is an inextricable part of our daily world, whether we're parents or not. And, too often, we shun writing or even talking about it because our workplace culture doesn't want to hear that every coin has two sides." I'm beginning to see things in new ways myself...

Yeah.

Is motherhood a form of oppression?

2010-03-25T12:16:00.005-04:00

OK...so I just had to resurface to address this latest blip on the madness meter:

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/article7070165.ece

First let me answer: NO

I felt like I had to at least acknowledge and express my eye rolling displeasure at this, especially having hinted at the notion that maybe the French have some better insights on life than we Americans. And my always reverential recollection of Paul Krugman's column from a few years ago espousing 'French Family Values'...I am now doubting this...but should we really generalize, anyway?

I think this old bat, Elisabeth Badinter is full of 'merde'. Maybe me being German and Lithuanian predisposes me to the die mutter/earth mother archetype, but it's what makes me happy.

What's oppressive is an economy that makes it "necessary" for two adults to work full time to run a middle-class household...I blame bad policy making and I blame feminism to some extent.

No Western women are oppressed by motherhood! What a joke. You want to go back to work, you go. You want to formula-feed, or combo-feed or whatever, fine. Disposable diapers are still on the shelves and easily had. What's the problem? People do exactly what they want to do.

I am one of the crunchy types who finds great happiness in having breastfed my kid past two years old, never used a pump, just brought her everywhere in my cool sling til I was comfortable leaving her with a sitter, worked from home part time, co-slept (in her bed, separate from the bed I share with my husband) and who switched to cloth diapers after getting acclimated to the baby first. It's all been no big deal. Some women just whine about everything. Challenging at times, sure, but I enjoyed my beer and wine once she was a couple months old (wasn't sure about drinking while breastfeeding a newborn) and have always had an active sex life w my husband (thank you natural birth/no episiotomy/quick recovery).

I think Madame Badinter has a very outdated view of motherhood! Feminism, man-hating and baby-hating is so ugly!

What is most troubling to me, and I have to say, a little surprising, is all the comments on various U.S. websites that are sympathetic to what she is saying, other than the smoking, of course, and feel so oppressed by the crunchy/AP-leaning parenting "culture". I don't understand why people would feel oppressed by what is a minority movement at best. Furthermore, I don't understand what is so hard about these things, anyway. Not every day is a picnic, but why are women always so put upon. Lighten the fuck up!

You want to get heavy about something, take a look at places where women are truly oppressed...like, kept from going to school, raped by militias when they're going to get water for their families, where the legal system makes is OK for their families to kill them if they're dishonored. These Western feminists should be ashamed.

Really clearing out the clutter

2010-03-14T19:00:00.004-04:00

I thought after wrapping up my auction responsibilities I'd feel a weight lifted off my shoulders, but it wasn't that simple. I had lingering anxieties the rest of the day after dropping the goods off, and they lingered into the weekend, just not feeling that well. Now, of course I don't attribute all of that (or much at this point) to the auction. But I have to cut it away and move on, and with this, I will finish up this blog.

"Mommy Blogs" were featured in a recent New York Times piece on its Motherlode blog and it was neat to read, sort of; sort of depressing, too. I don't feel like I gained any sense of community from my blogging and it really only took time away from me being with my child, earning money or doing other things IRL (that's "in real life" for those few who may still be unfamiliar with the parlance). At times, maybe it's been therapeutic, at times, it's just been an exercise in me spouting forth my oh-so-superior opinion, cushioned gently with the occasional lament that I know nothing.

Well, enough! My kid is almost three. I like doing actual stuff with her. And when I'm not doing stuff with her I need to be either working out or working toward building my business or professional skills so I can ramp up in a couple years when she's in kindergarten. And if not those activities, I need to be all namaste and stuff, working on loving my fellow (wo)man. Being absorbed in the mommy blogosphere does not lend itself to these pursuits, for me. On top of that, it actually is bad for me, I think. I feel isolated and embarrassed (before whom, I don't know) of my obsession to always check to see if there are any hot issues being discussed about which I might insert my wonderful opinion. And where does it get me? More often that not people complain that my opinion is too harsh or too strong or I express it the wrong way or whatever.

The places I frequent online seem like they're just filled with women who want their weaknesses validated and they don't want any real discourse on issues. People just want everyone to be nice. It's not OK to think that moms, if at all possible, should breastfeed from their breast, as long as possible. It's not OK to think that moms, if at all possible, should stay home with their pre-school age children. Everyone is all about validating everyone's choices. Well, to me, that's BORING. So I am done. I'm going to try and nurture some friendships close to home for me and my daughter, with the few people left around here who are actually home during the day. (Many of my friends work, bless them, because they have to...but that does leave me kinda lonely and I am a little pissed for that.)

I went for a long, long run yesterday, mostly in the rain. It was like 18 miles or so. I was supposed to do 20, but my feet ended up being completely wet and they were starting to hurt in a blistery kind of way. I kept thinking while I was running that I need to let the rain wash away my sense of something-not-quite-right, anxiety or whatever it was I was feeling. It sort of did, but now I have to take a definitive step on my own. And, really, it's mostly for me, because, if there's one thing I can guess after seeing the myriad mommy blogs posted in the comments of the NYT story it's that nobody cares. But, that's cool.

So now for a few last thoughts:

1) Yesterday, I started reading a book that's now a couple years old called "The Maternal is Political." I want to try and understand other women more, but so far it's just made me angry. The second chapter, I think, was a DC professional who'd hired a nanny from Bolivia and she was going on about how immigration is a mothers' issue and how it's turned her, a white suburban girl into an activist. She said she needed this Bolivian nanny as much as the nanny needed her. She told of how this nanny had left her country and her own child so she could come to the U.S. and try to cobble together a better life for them. The nanny had left an abusive husband and left her daughter with her grandparents. Now, I hesitate to judge that nanny. She had a desperate situation and she did the best she could, I suppose. But the thing that struck me about it was this DC professional who'd said in her essay that the nanny was doing all this very important stuff for her child. It's the nanny who "...rocks her to sleep, calms her fears and swings her high in the air"...has instilled in her the joy of a good belly laugh, the abandon of dancing the salsa, the knowledge of how to ride the bus across town, the thrilling terror of a new adventure..." It's the nanny who "...taught [her] the pledge of allegiance...rehearsed with [her] the name of our president, the colors of our flag..." All this makes me feel sad and weird. Both women felt that they had something more important to do than raise their own children. And this is something I simply do not understand. And I can't write about it anymore because I sound cruel, and I'm not a cruel person. But I just don't understand it. So I need to move away from it.

2) I am lonely. I am mad that there aren't more stay at home moms/work at home moms for me to connect with. But, I blame myself for not finding them, so I am turning my efforts toward that and away from the internet.

3) I am cured of any "depression" or mental issues I may have been bothered by in the past few years. I think that maybe it was all part of becoming a mom and also that it's often pretty challenging to have a baby and care for a baby. I'm not foolish enough to think that my parenting and/or life challenges are over, but to anyone still reading this, who may be going through craziness with a, say, 1.5 to 2.5 year old...I'd say, it gets alot easier. Well, at least for me it did! And now, I am going to go enjoy it.

Clearing out the clutter: UPDATE

2010-03-10T10:55:00.004-05:00

Well, here is a picture of my work over the last couple of hours (and some more yesterday putting together the crazy box and arranging the stuff...and moving the baby car seat and bench seat in our car to make sure the damn thing will fit).

I have to say I am a little bit proud and feel kind of tender toward it. Maybe some people like stuff like this and will enjoy it. OK. I am not really a crafty person. I like to work on computers, not with poster board and glue and all that it took to make this look like it does. And, it's not that great...it's a little amateurish. But, I think it will go over well. So, maybe I should just have a nicer attitude about it all. I even had some chances to engage my kid while I worked on it, thank goodness.

Clearing out the clutter

2010-03-10T08:32:00.011-05:00

In my living room right now is a 63 gallon deck storage box filled with a bunch of plastic toys and other junk. All this stuff was donated by parents of my kid's preschool class for a fund-raising auction I have been gradually roped into doing more and more tasks for. Soon, it will be gone from my living room, and I can't wait—but first I have to decorate it.

Now, as I blogged about before, I am all for getting involved in the kids' schools and lending a helping hand. And, really, at the end of the day, having all this crap in my house for a week or so, schlepping to the store for supplies to round it out and schlepping it to the country club (gag!) to drop it off is really not that big of a deal. But, I have to admit, the focus on all the stuff is rubbing me the wrong way, and I question whether the results are everything I would hope for.

I wrote in my past post about how participating in these school activities builds community, but I guess I am a little disappointed in how that's been working out this time around. I was left off a key e-mail about an early meeting and then brought in at the last minute. And, a couple times when I've seen these moms who are in charge of this at school, who know each other better than me, they still continue to talk amongst themselves without making an effort to give me an entreé into the conversation. One just barrels around blabbing on her cell phone and gives a nod. OK. Now I know I am sounding like one of those overly sensitive women that annoy me so much, but I'm just sayin'.

I got involved in this thing in the first place because one of my friends/acquaintances in the neighborhood mentioned that they needed someone to do graphic design for save-the-date postcards and the auction catalog. I thought it would be a fun way to get involved and help and also give some exposure to my business. I would also agree to try and get the materials printed for free or deeply discounted through my business contacts.

At the first meeting I went to, red flags went off in my head as I sat through an explanation of how committee members are supposed to go forth into the community and solicit donations. Not my thing. They said you could ask for donations at all the places you usually went shopping, or where you got your hair cut or massages, etc. They mentioned you could give things away that you might have two of. For example one lady got her parents a GPS for Christmas, but it turned out they already had one so maybe she would donate this $150 GPS. (I get my hair cut about three times a year and a massage maybe once or twice a year, maybe. And I don't buy my parents $150 gifts and if I had an extra one, I'd return it and get my money back. Who are these people, I wondered. What kind of wild-spending bourgeois crowd am I posing in?) They also said on the day of the auction they all hire babysitters (often their husbands take the day off work, they say...seriously????) so they can set up. I knew right then and there that that level of involvement would not be for me, but I still wanted to help with the graphics. I said as much, very politely, but somehow I got cajoled into soliciting donations and coordinating the aforementioned class "basket" of plastic junk, as well. No problem, whatev. But, I am not doing set up day of. I have paid client work I need to do! Once I get rid of this box and deliver the catalogs I coordinated, I am done. I am superwoman and can always find time to do my part. Many of these ladies are doing so much more. But, I say, each person makes a choice of what they want to do, each person should be able to give of their time and talents as they see appropriate. So, I will not be doing anything other than the graphics next year, if asked, and I will stand firm.

Now, back to the stuff. This is my real philosophical problem with the whole event. Like I said, I can deal with the stupid busy-work and things that aren't really me or my style. But, the attainment and exchange of all this junk just bugs me like crazy. Does anyone really need $200 worth of random plastic yard toys, balls, bubbles, chintzy glassware, drink mix, and more plastic, plastic, plastic stuff in their lives? (And that's just one class basket, there is so much more!) I guess they do because those involved seem stoked about this, unless they are just faking it like me. The whole notion of shopping as entertainment, which is what an auction of this sort is about, also is something I don't like. It's like a bunch of people with too much wealth are just shuffling their wealth back and forth. If the school needs money, aren't there other things we can do that are more satisfying? Or, maybe they could just raise the tuition a little and we could do other activities together as moms that would be more edifying—maybe like simple things, like volunteering in a way that could involve our kids more and teach them and all of us about other people who might actually need stuff?

A final thing about this that's gotten on my nerves is that its taken time away from me spending it with my child. And, after all, that's the most important thing to me.

I'm probably just being bitchy. But that's me, and I'm entitled. I am also entitled after this learning experience of participation this year, to clear the clutter from my life—both literally and metaphorically—and opt not to do it next year.

Yoga mats won't solve your stress issues—but actually DOING yoga might

2010-03-08T08:10:00.011-05:00

I came across a post on Slate's Double X blog the other day that was a great intersection of some of my most keen interests—work-life balance, feminism and yoga! The headline was "Yoga Mats Won't Solve Your Stress Issues" and the HTML title to the web page was "Buying things won't keep you from stressing out"; both intriguing titles that may misrepresent the point the poster was trying to make, but that play nicely into a point I would make.

First, about the post: It springboards from a recent New York Times Magazine piece, "Depression’s Upside," arguing that the contemporary norm of alleviating the discomfort of depression through drugs short-cuts the important problem-solving process we need to go through to attack why we’re sad. The post asks "Could the same be said about stress?" And points to an article in Feminism & Psychology that makes a similar case—that efforts to stamp out women's stress ignores the very real problems that are stressing us out, namely working for a living while running a household. What's more, when mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy, so women's stress also can have deleterious effects on the kids and husbands in our lives.

Double X's post says "She’s got to remain calm at all costs. Thus, responsible women are on a perpetual quest for so-called 'balance,' which, of course, is impossible to achieve." And, according to the Fem/Psych piece, society is telling women they can resolve work-family tensions by fixing themselves. “As long as women are increasingly helped to view stress—and their own emotional reactions to it—as the enemy to be vanquished, possibilities for widespread social critique and social action will be effaced.” Double X says, "Women see their stress as a personal problem and not a structural one, such as lack of family friendly workplace policies or affordable housing... it would be nice if the few things that busy women did for themselves [to relieve their stress] weren’t regarded as a new category of 'work.'"

Now, I agree that women, working moms in particular, are stressed. Who could deny that? Recent pieces/blogs in the Washington Post and New York Times dealt with this, and I became fully absorbed in them, almost like watching a horror movie, reading about these tales of endless days, endless chores and no light at the end of the tunnel. A big feature in the Washington Post magazine really delved into the harried lives of working moms, with one woman's personal account of where her time goes. Especially troubling was the Washington Post piece talking about how some people actually lose money by working, by the time they are done paying for childcare. Ouch! Thing is, I am one of the lucky ones, as I am not particularly stressed, anymore.

How did I become un-stressed? I have to credit yoga. It could be something else, too, but I do think yoga has so much to do with it and its the biggest, most clear change I've made. Ever since January of this year, I've been doing about a half hour of yoga 5-6 mornings a week (basically just skipping the day I go running for 2-3 hours, because I just feel too selfish doing all that). It makes alot of difference in my mood. You may remember, I had some rough times with stress previously then finally recognized that things were getting really bad late last year (although I approached that post mostly with good humor). I started out doing yoga as a tool for my weight loss efforts because I thought that doing something to focus my mind and my intentions for the day before mindlessly stuffing random food into my mouth for breakfast would help me make better food choices. Also, it would be a way to start the day with at least a little exercise that would be OK if it was interrupted by my small child (unlike cardio and such, where you need to keep your heart rate up, etc.) And, maybe, just maybe by kid would join with me in some of the poses or at least the spirit of it, and it would be a togetherness thing. It all worked out just like I hoped.

Of course, my child sometimes interrupts me when I'm doing yoga, but as a general rule, I don't stop what I'm doing unless it's an emergency or it's during a transitional pose or something really quick. I do talk to her, if she talks to me, responding to her chatter and such, but it's all very pleasant and I still feel that I reap the benefits of doing yoga. I still am moving my body in a deliberate, yet flowing, way, that stretches me physically, emotionally and mentally and makes me feel so good. I still am paying attention to my breath. I still know I am doing something with a centuries-old, sacred tradition and that if I am going to be mean or bitchy or petty that that is dishonoring this tradition. The tradition of yoga reminds me, with its opening and closing greeting or wish "namaste" that I am part of the universe and all of the universe is within me, and so I better be nice and not hate because what I am hating is in me, too. But I don't think of all this consciously at the surface, it's just kind of there, deep within. And no, I am not perfect. I still lose my temper with my kid sometimes and I still bitch at my husband, but I do it much less and I feel I am on a gentle ramp up to more peace and acceptance as each day goes along.

It took me a long time to like yoga. I tried it many times in various forms and it never really took completely til recently. I think its because this was when my life needed it most, and, because I found a really good, capsulized routine that worked for me. I had the DVD for a few years and tried it now and then, but only recently did it click. For me, it's the perfect routine because it's simple enough for me to lose myself in the breaths and the flow, but it's athletic enough for me to actually feel things and the poses aren't held too long to the point of boredom or discomfort. That, and the fact that it's only about 40 minutes, and there are decent breaks in the flow at 20 minutes, 25 minutes and 30 and 35 minutes, if you have less time. The DVD is the Crunch Perfect Yoga Workout and I do the "Fat Burning" one. Seriously. I love it.

Doing something specific for yourself that takes you out of your usual mode and that you know if good for you can do wonders for your attitude and can give you alot of hope. For me, this is yoga. For someone who doesn't run already, it could be running. (I already ran and so I needed something else, and something with a more spiritual side, although I can find alot of peace in running, too.) I would argue that every person, no matter how busy, can find a half hour a day if they want to.

As to the idea that yoga or other earnest forms of stress-relief are just a band-aid and don't solve the real social problems that are at the core of why women are so stressed, I'd say that you still have to make it through the day. And frankly, when I dwell too much on the large problems of the world, that gets me down and I feel helpless. Let's face it, some of these things are just too big, too complicated, and we have to make it through the day and try to do it with some joy and grace, right? We do need to take care of ourselves first, and at the same time we need to be tuned in to the fact that if we are, honestly, stressed out all the time, that it's just not sustainable. I do believe in working toward bigger social goals that we may be interested in, like gentler workplace policies (for all people, not just families, everyone needs work-life balance) but in the mean time, we do need to take care of ourselves. And, perhaps dropping out a little from the rat race, whenever and wherever possible, instead of this madness of always striving for more and keeping up with the Joneses, is a way of passive resistance that can, over time, effect social change. Maybe doing yoga or participating in some other kind of mindful practice that has nothing to do with paying the bills or keeping up in society would provide the mental cleanse women needed to empower themselves further. Just think, if all these stressed out working moms just said NO, all at once, to being over-extended, what would happen?

Full disclosure: To many, I may not qualify as a woman who would be stressed out, so my reflections may be discounted. On the other hand, my situation may also be viewed as an example of what might be, if one so chose. I do not work full time outside the home at this point in my life. I have a pre-school age child and I work part-time from home. I do not outsource childcare, but she does attend a low-key neighborhood preschool 8 hours a week. I work on average 15 hours a week, sometimes up to 20. For this, I recognize, I am pretty lucky. At the same time, I worked to set the situation up, and, we live a little differently than some peers who have two full-time incomes. On the other hand, in this economy, we are also better off than many who are scrambling to get by on two full-time incomes. It's not for me to solve all the complicated issues at play in the world, just for me to do the best I can within my own framework and approach others with compassion and understanding.

Some things never change, but maybe they should

2010-03-03T22:01:00.008-05:00

It's been a while since I've blogged here. I have been working hard on work-work and weight loss and other things. Even though I previously said here I was no longer trying to lose weight (of course, at that time, I was about 15 lbs less than when I reached my most dreadful weight, just shy of my full-term pregnancy poundage, in November 2009) I came into it again with new fervor and have actually lost almost 20 lbs. since the end of 2009. I want to lose about 10-12 more and am on track to do so. It just took some brain-changing, mathematics and work. More on that later.

Now, back to why I want to blog again about mom stuff: I think I'm good at it.

I went back to read some of my posts after being reminded of the harder days of child raising—the period between 1 and 2 years old—by some other posts on Babble.com, mostly about Attachment Parenting (AP) and co-sleeping vs. sleep training. The poster was questioning her adherence to AP because she was having trouble with her 1 year old, and I knew what she meant, although I never really set out to criticize AP in my posts. Maybe because I was never a strict believer or adherent to "the faith." I've always been a mish-masher, take what you like from things, discard the rest kind of person, and its no different with my parenting style. I've made some mistakes, sure, but overall, I'm happy with the outcome so far. My daughter is pretty damn delightful, and a healthy mix of bright and exploratory with obedient when it really comes down to it.

But, that's another digression. Gotta get back in the practice of a focus, see. Anyway, this post is really just to say that I think I may start posting again. The reason I quit was because I was getting too worked up and embroiled in online discussions of stuff and then wanting to formulate essays springboarding from that and it was taking alot of energy and making me feel weird. Well, since quitting, I've still been getting embroiled in the discussions, but just have not taken the time to develop my own well-thought-out pieces on them. So it's been alot of unsatisfying wheel-spinning. I also thought I'd be spending more time blogging about the arts or design, but, there's not that much to say that interests me. I guess a thinking mom is what I've really become.

I do wonder why I am so opinionated about things. Why am I compelled to post on discussions about things. I mean, do I really care what someone else does? Maybe it's just a competition thing. I think my way is best, so you're gonna hear about it! Maybe it's trying to be evangelical about my way? But, really, part of me likes the fact that not everyone is going to be doing things the same way, so that we can have different outcomes and different people at the end of the day. And, so much of what I write I would never say to people. I guess that's pretty weak. What does it all mean?

As part of my changing, I've taken up yoga pretty earnestly. I do about a half hour 5-6 days a week. It has totally helped me be calmer, more thoughtful, more mindful of what's going on with me, so I can make better decisions about health issues (not shoveling food in my face) and how I treat my family. The family part has come more slowly, but I think I have improved. Now, I need to take it to the next level and be compassionate toward the strangers on the web, even as I still express my opinion.

My gradual descent and saving myself from it

2009-12-30T12:51:00.005-05:00

I noticed today while packing up the Christmas tree and decorations that my day-to-day life has become way too housewifey. Somehow, I was cooler when my kid was a tiny baby. Somehow, I've gotten dragged into a situation where I am doing an awful lot of cleaning and picking up, reorganizing of the house—and too, too many trips to the grocery store and Target.

Enough!

I hereby declare, with 2010 upon us, that I will return to my bohemianism and get in touch with myself. And myself is not a housewife.

Not that there's anything wrong with it.

No, I chose to quit my job after maternity leave to stay home with my little one. I chose to take the salary cut and the cut from connection with lots of grown-up people each day to work from home in my spare time. But, somewhere along the line I started doing more housework, and this, I do not like. I don't know if its because housework is one of the few things that is relatively easy to do when you have a toddler/preschooler around, because they either like to help, or they think that you are playing, OR if its because there is more of a need for it with all the messes that toddlers/preschoolers make, but it has taken over my life. And housework makes me want to drink...and get high...because, it is boring! Even playing with a toddler/preschooler, to me, is probably less boring than housework, but it is sometimes less gratifying, or, maybe I am just compelled to do the work because I see this mess building around me all the time and I am obsessive/compulsive like that. But, I often feel like I have spent the whole day picking up stuff and cleaning and thinking, man, if only I didn't have to pick up and clean so much I'd be able to spend more time actually playing with my kid.

This is what it's come down to? I lament the fact that I do too much housework to play with my kid? What happened to learning guitar and Portuguese? (These things I mentioned to a friend I would do in my "spare" time during my sabbatical from work, staying home with my kid, of course, while I freelanced, too...WTF was I thinking?!?)

The worse parts of all this are that I have gotten too fat and I have turned into a bitch. Being around here all day, making countless mini meals for someone who doesn't seem to like anything but yogurt and cookies (OK, I am exaggerating) and eating and drinking out of boredom and frustration has added up. As for being a bitch, without a decent release, without good breaks or good mental maintenance, I blame my husband for my discontent. If he would only pick up his shit...if he would only this...only that....I hate myself for all this. It's not his fault I'm a nut.

I kind of feel like I've turned a corner just by making these observations, but, what to do next? What direction can I take, now that I have saved myself by seeing the problem state that I've arrived at? I'll have to think about that. I will probably blog a bit about some things I've been wrestling with over the past couple weeks of the holidaze, and then usher in the New Year with some kinda fresh attitude I hope will last.

Revelations from everyday entertainment

2009-12-29T08:52:00.005-05:00

Last night we watched 5oo Days of Summer and it dawned on me...I actually love my husband!

Of course, this is something I should already know, but, I am often highly annoyed with him (probably my problem, not him) and I often (in the past, before my recent decade-end epiphanies) have felt at my wit's end. BUT, now that I have seen this movie, I know I love him.

First of all, I will say, the movie was cute, not the greatest movie, not the worst. The leading man vacillated between mildly cute and wholly unappealing. It almost made me dislike Zooey Deschanel until I reminded myself she was just playing a role. (Because I have to like her, as a frequent collaborator with musical fave M. Ward.) But, at the end, I was like...damn, I guess I do love my husband.

Because, when they were showing the parts where the guy was rethinking their relationship and remembered her irked smirk when he showed her a Ringo Starr record (she had told him Ringo was her favorite Beatle) and when she was like, I am tired, I just want to go be by myself....I thought, I never would feel that way about my guy. Even when I am totally pissed at him, I am never repulsed...and she looked repulsed...like she wanted him gone. Even when I am sooooo very annoyed, I still want to snuggle. He still is...my life. It is so weird! He would never gross me out. And watching this movie, I could see why Zooey Deschanel would be grossed out by this guy. He is so needy and so adoring of her when he doesn't even seem to really get her. My husband on the other hand is attractively detached. At times, I may feel like he does not know, care about or respect the real me...but he's not cloying about a me he doesn't know.

Weird. I know. Must be chemistry. It seems, he will never gross me out. Ever.

Going Underground

2009-12-27T09:59:00.005-05:00

Regular visitors to this blog (all three of you—ha!) may notice a change in our banner. We are going underground and going anonymous! So...you don't know me. Shhh.

I am going to lay it all out now and use this blog for therapy—I need it. There are some things I need to sort out and things I need to say and hash out that might even provide content for future, more-developed pieces. At first, some of it may be ugly...but I think, eventually, it will help me be a better person. I just need to get some of that stuff out before I move on. Like cleaning house. And my poor husband has heard so much of it that he has become numb to it. And it doesn't really matter to me who hears it...it's just that I need to get it out and the semi-anonymous format of a blog is what fits me right now, I like to type and be on the computer more than writing in notebooks, for one thing.

So, here goes...

Update

2009-12-22T13:48:00.004-05:00

I think I am in one of my lulls again. So much to say, but then again, not so much.

I won a $10 Starbucks card for my cupcakes—one of the very cards I went and purchased for prizes for the event, but my cupcakes were chosen anonymously for the prize. Nobody knew whose they were.

I was going to write about how I feel like an outsider amongst the suburbanites who have money and are into decor and other bourgeois stuff...but that doesn't sound quite right.

I am in a phase where I am wanting to be more inside myself and live a more private life, so may have another lull for a while.

Having your cake and eating it, too

2009-11-13T16:12:00.008-05:00

I'm always coming across little things on Babble.com that annoy...I guess the subjects of Motherlode and Judith Warner's Domestic Disturbances on the New York Times' site are just too serious, or frustrating (I don't think not using federal funds for abortions is a symptom of widespread misogyny, sorry!), for me to synthesize responses to. And, in keeping with my pledge to blog more about things that are actually close to home (my life), it was timely to see this post on Babble where some fake career woman wrote in a letter about not wanting to make stuff for the school bake sale.

I say "fake" because it was one of those advice column things and she was asking if she should "raise a stink" or not about being asked to bake something, because, the men weren't asked (how sexist!) and she was so busy with work (how very important she must be).

I guess there are two kinds of people in the world, whether feminist or not, moms or not, men or women—those who like to bake and those who do not like to bake. Me, I like to bake. I love to bake. And I love having the opportunity to bake something and not have to eat the whole damn thing myself or worse, throw it away in three days when it dries out. So, I was very happy to sign up to make something to donate to my daughter's preschool for the "cake walk" at a little "fun fair" they are having tonight. For a couple tickets, the kids can participate in a musical-chairs kind of thing where they walk around colored pictures and when the music stops, if they are on a certain square, they win a cake (or cupcakes, as the case may be...my "Constellation Cupcakes" are pictured here...the event had an outer space theme).

Of course, I, too, am busy. I have a toddler who only goes to preschool a couple days a week. I have a freelance design practice with deadlines and such. Whatever. Even when I worked full time outside of the home I enjoyed making holiday cookies to bring into the office.

The point is, I believe we can all find time to do something nice that will delight and make people smile. Maybe baking is not her thing (this woman who wrote in). That's fine. Why not just say so and ask if there was some other way she could help. Maybe they need signs or something? Maybe they need someone to sit at the bake sale table for an hour. She wanted to just write a check and be done with it and that's fine, too. But, then she shouldn't complain about being an "outsider" among parents and feeling shunned—although I suspect that many people who feel this way are just projecting.

These silly things like bake sales and school activities where everyone pitches in with some hokey active contribution help build community. I got involved early because I want to be in the mix for my daughter. It's very likely I will have only one child, so I want to plant the seeds early of connections with other parents, families and kids so that she will feel part of a community. Parts of the process of being involved in the fun fair (I helped with other aspects than just making cupcakes) were a little annoying for a type-A, e-mail addict like me—with multiple-day lags in communication, trails of unanswered questions and a very, uhm...organic...work flow process. BUT, it was good for me to be forced to be part of something kind of amorphous and more laid back that I am used to, and something that I am not in charge of...and to see it all work out, with happy kids and families having a fun time together (hopefully, we will see how it pans out tonight).

For those parents who are too busy to lend a little hand to their kids' schools, and yet feel like outsiders, I say, you can't have your cake and eat it, too, if you can't even be bothered to make a cake. But of course, it doesn't have to be cake. Find a way you can be part of things—even if its small, make it meaningful and make it more than throwing money at the school. Make an impression. Be part of the community.

Why I don't want my child to be "gifted"

2009-11-06T13:13:00.007-05:00

A couple posts I saw on Babble this week have got me thinking about "gifted" kids, learning, and society. And, I'm convinced, I want my child to do well, but I'm not so sure about being "gifted."

That's such an odd term. Like "well-endowed" or something. It makes me laugh and wince a little bit at the same time. Especially when I think of the range that could cover, like the "idiot savant" (whatever that is) or the Rainman types or the autistic kids who can play Chopin flawlessly. I just kind of want my kid to be normal. Smart, but normal. See, I was what people might have thought of as "gifted". I seem to recall testing at a 150 IQ when I was 8 or so and they skipped me out of 3rd grade at the beginning of the schoolyear into 4th grade (it's called being double-promoted). It was just weird. I liked getting away from my old classmates who made fun of me a lot and into a new class where they were nicer. But, I still never felt like I belonged. And, in the end, when it took me 10 years to finish a Bachelor's degree, that one year advantage ended up not really counting at all.

So, I look at my girl now and I see she is definitely smart. She's very verbal, she is curious, she makes interesting connections and likes to explore. She was an early walker. She's precocious, and yet shy around new people. We talk about letters and numbers and things, but casually. It's not like I'm teaching her anything. We're just living life, and life involves letters and numbers and things and making connections. I have magnetic letters, bathtub letters, flashcards with letters, and we have them out sometimes, but even if I think I am going to go through and do some kind of organized lesson, it always turns into something else. It's very organic. It's very "2-year-old" and it is so appropriate. I love it! We have an abacus. We count sometimes, but whenever it approaches being forced, it backfires. I think this is something I love about toddlers, these 2-year-olds, specifically. They are so free, so in-the-moment and so cool and open about the connections they make and they way they want to do things. Who am I to impose some false sense of order on the scene? I can set the stage, but if she wants to take it somewhere else, then I should see where it goes rather than hold her in. There will be a developmental stage where ordering things is part of what she wants. To some degree, there already is, it's just a different kind of order than what my mind would have. I have to sit back and learn as she learns, and respect the mind of the 2-year-old, and try to plant the seeds to remind myself to do this throughout her whole life. And let her be who she is.

So, getting back to being "gifted" versus being just regular. I am never going to hold anybody back and I am going to do all I can to nurture my girl's talents. But, I am not going to freakishly push her to be something out of touch with everybody else. I have always felt like an outsider and I don't know that I think that is so great. I want my girl to feel like she belongs, if she wants to. A person can excel and make something of themselves without being so above and beyond and different. Sometimes the sense of connectedness with peers can contribute to a person's wellbeing and achievement, too. And, with the strong likelihood that she will be an only child, I want to carefully guard against her being the lone, freak genius who nobody really knows or gets.

She already talks about her friends at preschool. When we go somewhere with kids playing, she often says, I love these kids. She wants to be part of something. Yet, when we are on the playground or in a playgroup, she often is on the sidelines or playing independently. Already. That might just be an age/development thing, though. I guess the bottom line is that my philosophy on the health of my child is to not nurture the "giftedness" to a the point that separates them from their peers or a healthy, social and cultural sense of community and belonging. I know they don't have to be mutually exclusive, but they often are. And, as much as being "misunderstood" can provide material for the artist or excuses for the genius, it can be a very lonely, sad place.

Pride cometh before a fall

2009-11-06T12:33:00.006-05:00

OK, not pride, exactly, but, acknowledgment of happiness?

That seems to be what's going on. Immediately after my post about how great my life is, things start to get ugly with my girl. I guess it's not so bad, even ugly with this angel is not all that bad, but still. I am nursing a Belgian trippel to get through this day of no gym, no preschool, all toddler, all the time. I fear at the end of the day it will only make me tired and cranky—like her? Well, then, at least I will be able to empathize.

It seemed to start on Monday when I had the bright idea of an outing downtown to museums. She likes trains, yay! We rode the Metro, but she insisted on getting out, like a million stops before our destination. I thought I'd let her self-direct a little and play things by ear. Big mistake. We ended getting out at Foggy Bottom when we needed to get out way over by Judiciary Square or Gallery Place. I thought we'd go to Starbucks, hang out a little, then get back on a train to the museums then lunch with Dad. But, of course, at Starbucks she wanted to have her Vivianno outside. It was cold and too breezy and none of the tables outside were set up (for good reason). To make a long story short, we wandered around climbing on curbs, looking in flower boxes and otherwise wasting time til I couldn't take it any more. Then we finally got to the Navy Memorial where the relief scultpures kept her busy long enough to get us to lunch time. At lunch, she didn't eat much (another thing driving me crazy about her lately) but just wanted to climb around. After lunch, we finally made it to the Building Museum and she played a little. Sigh of relief. But the whole thing was so exhausting and not what I expected. Play date with preschool people Tuesday. Gym and random stuff Wednesday. Preschool Thursday—thank god!

Something is wrong with her today, since yesterday afternoon. She's not terribly sick. No fever. At least, she didn't have a fever when I checked yesterday, with the rectal thermometer, much to her protest. Just last spring she didn't care about such things, but she has already grown to know that butts are private and people shouldn't stick things in them against your will, and so it feels really awkward to try and cajole her into allowing this. She's too young, of course, to hold it under her tongue. I should probably get one of those quicky ear ones, but not now. She doesn't feel feverish. I was sick and didn't have a fever, just a cold. So, I think she has what I had. She keeps whining, and whining, and whining, except for when she's running around playing. I can't figure her out. She whines that she has to go poo poo. I think she is having some kind of tummy troubles. I can't say she's constipated because she did go yesterday. Once she goes today, things will be better, I know. I give her all the things that are supposed to make you poop and help your tummy...fiber...yogurt...and the things that make her happy and stop her whining, temporarily at least.

She's been asking to nurse like crazy. I obliged a couple days but I have to cut back. Not at this age. It's too damn much. It's got to be only for naps and going to bed. And then, even that has to go within the next six months or so. I am not going to be nursing a 3-year-old for god sakes!

When I went to the gyno yesterday, the doc practically laughed at me when I mentioned I was still nursing, when discussing birth control options. I was sick of the damn mini-pill, with its long, frequent and irregular periods and was ready to go on the regular pill with the no-period-for-three-months schedule. I am one of those sporty, sex-interested women who cannot STAND being held down by something like a period, which, before pregnancy lasted about 3 days for me, but now, lasts the full 5 days and is a royal pain-in-the-ass. She told me it was fine to go on the regular pill but it would decrease my milk supply. I was curious about how much, because, I said, I want to help boost my girl's immunity through the winter. And the doc was like, you've done all you can do for her immunity already! Like, give it up, woman. And, maybe she's right. Maybe she's wrong. But, whatever comes of it, that's fine. I do need to wean.

Anyway, I hope, once she wakes up from her nap, she will eat something, take a shit and be in a good mood. My mother in law is coming tomorrow and I don't want her to see us like this.

A rarefied life, right now

2009-10-26T21:41:00.011-04:00

Reading The Women's Room, fiction from 1977 that paints a really ugly picture of women's lives in the 50s and 60s, I am struck with what a very easy and pleasant life I have. My mom suggested we read the book; one of her friends is reading it as part of a reading group. So far, so good, if not a little much. Nobody's happy. I suppose there are moments of happiness, or at least of relief, but overall, the women seem so unfulfilled, oppressed, and, well, sad. In addition to this novel feeding my obsession for mid-century American socio-realist entertainment, I have become a big fan of the popular Mad Men series, watching every new episode and catching up on the old ones on DVD. The women of Mad Men do a litttle better than those in The Women's Room, but there's still much to bristle at.

I want to know, was it really like this? My mom was a hippie artist type in the 70s, married to my dad, a long-haired pot-smoking guitar god who worshipped her as his "primordial woman," and this stuff was actually before her time. She told me she didn't think it was quite like this for all women, reminiscing about her own mother, who would've been living this life during the period covered in the book, and thinking of her own mother-in-law. Both worked outside the home (one in a canning factory, sad, the other as a milliner and in retail, something she liked) neither were sexually repressed, and both had nice husbands—my grandpas. My mom said she thought maybe it was a New England upper middle class thing, these tortured women. She said our Eastern European people in the working classes in the city were different. I don't know, but, boy is life different for me now than what's described in The Women's Room and what I see on Mad Men.

I live like a queen.

I don't have to keep a particularly sparkling clean home. Although I keep it orderly, basically clean, and bug-free, my husband doesn't really have any expectations of me in this area. Or, maybe I just haven't tested him, but why would I want to? I have a certain standard for my own surroundings, of course. I get to go to the gym, go shopping (I'm not a big shopper, so by this, I mainly mean grocery or house supply shopping or toys), hang out with my adorable one girl child. It's a dream! I also get to work a little bit, earn some money, stimulate my brain and interact with serious adults just enough to keep myself "sharp" with a foot into the door of the "real world." We're not wealthy, but I don't worry about money when I go on my daily stops to Whole Foods for a snack, Starbucks for a smoothie for A and a coffee for me, Walgreens for some fresh playdough or new markers, or Macys for an occasional Clinique treat for myself, or books, books, books from Amazon. Oh, and my husband is not selfish or brutish in the bedroom, either! We have so much and we are so very happy.

Women back then were expected to keep a spotless home (or so it seems) and had fewer modern technologies to help them do so. The "exotic" foods that light up my days (sushi, kombucha tea, chips and salsa, dark chocolates, microbrews...) weren't readily available. I mean, in Mad Men, even cosmopolitan Don Draper admits he's never had Mexican food! Most women had more than one child, increasing the work load and decreasing the magic significantly, in my opinion (but that's fodder for a whole other post, and purely a matter of individual choice). Women didn't get to choose whether to get pregnant, at least not as easily as we do today, with so many birth control options available to us on one hand, and fertility help on the other. Women didn't get to choose whether they were going to work or not, what they would do for work, or when, either.

I realize that even today many women don't have that choice about work. Some need to and don't want to. Others want to and can't get it. And then there are the very lucky, very blessed women like me, who have the rarefied experience of doing just enough satisfying work, on their own terms, and I get to do this while enjoying the cool experience of raising a "perfect" daughter in her early pre-school years from the comfort of home.

I gush about my girl because she is so gorgeous, so smart and so good. She is a genuine pleasure to be around. I actually enjoy hanging out with her, going to the coffee shop, doing art at home, going on outings to farms, playgrounds, museums and such. Sometimes I think a mom who really likes her child is rare, too, and I don't know whether that's just them or their lousy circumstances that detract from the pleasures of parenting.

Anyway, so often I find myself thinking how good I have it and that maybe its not so common to have it so good. Other times, I get into slumps, feeling a little bit of that spoiled, suburban ennui that seems so shameful. I get testy with my husband, thinking he doesn't help enough around here, etc. etc. etc. But, when I look at the whole picture of the world around me, and history falling off behind me, I am struck by what a glorious time in my life these years are, spent basically just chilling out and enjoying life with my small child at home.

Someday, I will have to either go back to work for someone else or build my business. My girl will get older and will want friends other than me. Maybe the fact that these golden years of my daughter's babyhood are but a short stage of my whole life adds to their fun and beauty, and tolerability—knowing I don't have to stay home, forever, with a gaggle of children and do housework, the lifestyle that seemed to ruin so many women back in the day. (But, maybe I would even have liked that, who knows?)

Everything changes. And, I do worry, just for a minute here and there, about what if this all got taken away from me. What if I lost my contract or my husband lost his job? Things would be harder. We'd be OK, but the ease of it all would vanish and I'd have to readjust a few things, for sure. I don't even venture into the territory of worrying about if something happened to my child. That's too scary.

I'm sure I will find plenty of happiness in my future, but damn, are things great for me now, and I just want to look back and remember it in this post.

You don't have to have an opinion about everything

2009-10-16T07:20:00.008-04:00

Preamble: I took a long break from this blog because it was making me tired. I was caught in a weird cycle of looking for things that pissed me off online, mostly surrounding children, parenting and "womens" issues, and coming up with some kind of retort. It may not have been reflected in my posts, which, at the end, sort of moved away from that, on purpose, as I tried to have a more gentle outlook.

While I stopped blogging, for a little while, my opinion-spewing continued in the form of comments on other sites, and, in some ways, that was even more exhausting. But, I'm happy to say, I've wound that down alot, too, and have been reaping the benefits of not being so caught up in all this—more time for more productive pursuits and a calmer mind. There were plenty of opportunities to get worked up, on a couple of my favorite online places—Babble and The New Yorks Times' Motherlode had posts on disciplining children, breastfeeding, and the ever-popular "to work or stay-at-home" question, with its many hooks...but I remained on the sidelines for the most part, just taking in all the comments and sighing a breath of relief that I was not compelled to enter the fray. In reading all the comments, it really hit me that most of this stuff is really just a matter of opinion—to which everyone is entitled.

Premise: I've never liked the old saying "Opinions are like assholes—everybody's got one." It's kind of disgusting in what it brings to mind, first of all. Second of all, it's kind of obvious. Yes, we all have opinions. And that is fine. Good, even. It keeps us thinking, it keeps us from being stupid, boring people. But, do we all have to have an opinion about everything?

Case in point: Bill Maher. Much has been made lately about his comments concerning the swine flu vaccine. He basically poo-pooed the need for the vaccine and said that people who get it are idiots, blurting out a bunch on unscientific nonsense along the way. In following the trail of Mr. Maher's latest opining about something he seems to know little about, I came across his previous comments on public breastfeeding.

OK, so why would a guy with no wife or kids who apparently loves titties and thinks America is too puritanical (he's dated a string of models and hangs out at the Playboy mansion, bully for him, I've got no problem with that, it's none of my business) even have an opinion on public breastfeeding, much less take the time on his show to rail against it? Maybe it offends his sensibilities that breasts are for showy sexual pleasure...only? My only other guess is he thinks that "lactivists" somehow downgrade activism overall (for more....important things). In the segment, he says that the lactivist cause shows how "activism has become narcissism" and is "why Al Gore can't get people to focus on global warming unless there's a rock concert." He goes on to say "its why there'll be no end to this dumb war until there's a draft, because at the end of the day Iraq is someone else's problem." So, women who want to be able to feed their infants when the babies are hungry are responsible for the war not ending. Mmmmkay, Bill. He shouldn't even have treaded in this territory. I mean, really, why?

Digression: I'm not big on "lactivism," personally. I mean, I definitely think that women should breastfeed wherever and whenever they want. For me, it was never a problem, except one time in Nice a security guard at the Chagall museum told me to take it outside. Another guard later defended me and said the other fellow was "a very sick man." Go figure. Anyway, I never needed to be a "lactivist", it was just something I did. Breastfeed my baby. Now that she's nearly two-and-a-half, and we are still at it a few times a day, I won't do it in public because she is so big and it is a little strange for people to see this, and because I'm gradually weaning her anway. But, I think its cool if other women want to be "lactivists." What's wrong with tooting about something you believe in that's important to you? Why not? Why should I care if they do this?

Back to the point: I was never a big fan Mr. Maher, nothing is ever progressive enough for him, right? And he's ugly, too. He makes this big deal about "reason" in his movie, "Religiosity." But, his stance on swine flu and breastfeeding pretty much display an utter lack of reason, in my opinion. Sometimes you need to just shut up and focus on your own area of interest or expertise, or you risk looking like a big, inconsistent fool. So, I may be back on the blog, but I am going to try and be mindful of this whole "opinion on everything" trend that blogging seems to beget, and stick to what I know, or what I can offer a truly valuable perspective on.

Finding things in common

2009-07-12T08:49:00.004-04:00

My daughter loves to do the Yoga Kids DVD and especially perks up when they sing the Namaste song.

I am you and you are me
I am part of all I see
Namaste, namaste, namaste, namaste
I am the light and the light is me
Namaste, namaste, namaste, namaste
I am part of all I see...

It's very sweet and touching to see her spring into action and doing the bows and saying "Namaste" and so I am forced to think about what this means, again.

And what I think of is how I constantly fall short of recognizing the truth of the word in my life. I often recognize ways I am so different from everybody else. (How teenage of me!) But, isn't the idea of Namaste to recognize ways we are similar to other people? We are all part of the universe and the universe is all of us, right?

Instead of always gravitating to thoughts of how my way is better than someone else's way, but, bless their hearts, they are doing the best they can, I should see ways that we are the same. We both love our kids. We both feel awkward sometimes. We both like a fresh breeze in the summer at a playground. We both like to relax with a cold drink at the end of the day. We both like ice cream. We both hope our husbands love us. We both worry about what our lives will be like when our kids grow up. And on and on. Does it matter who works outside the home, who doesn't, how many kids someone has, whether they let their toddler watch Hannah Montana, whether they breastfeed. All the kiddoes need love. All the people need love. We all make mistakes. We all have victories...and defeats.

Watching my daughter's purity and simplicity and pure joy teaches me every day.

Namaste.

On mothering and blogging

2009-06-27T10:20:00.005-04:00

Well, I've been off and on with this blog about since the time I had my daughter and my opinions and ideas about things have kind of ebbed and flowed in different directions over this time. When I first started I was unaware of all the mommy blogging going on out there because, of course, I didn't follow such things before having a kid. How boring!

Over the past couple of years, I've learned all about mommy culture, mommy wars, mommy this, mommy that, and tried to put my voice out into the ether on this blog and various comment sections of other (far more widely read) blogs in some meaningful way. But, I have pretty much come to the conclusion now that I am bored and/or frustrated with the exercise. I have come across few posters or bloggers who share my ideas/values/style and I go from feeling disdain to pity to indifference to most of them.

I don't care to complain about my child or my husband, because when I sit back and think about my life, it is pretty damn good and I don't care that I have to do a little more housework than my husband or that I work harder in general. That's who I am an I am happy that way. I mean, there is actually a blog out there called "Angry Mamas". Now, I may have expressed passing irritation from time to time in my posts, but I would never want to characterize myself as, in general, angry. My child is healthy, I am well-fed, I have a roof over my head. I vacation—in Europe. I am middle class (not rich). What the hell have I got to be angry about? I suspect that many of these "angry mamas" are probably also doing pretty well for themselves. Those that aren't, who are struggling to make ends meet, have sick kids or jerky husbands, etc. I feel for them. Seriously. This is why I am cutting the blogging about working vs. staying at home and all the other "who's better" kind of stuff (breastfeeding vs formula, etc.).

I am speed-reading Ayelet Waldman's Bad Mother (because it is so good, she is such a good writer and so easy to ready) where she shares her experiences, springboarding off the notion that women are so judged (by other women) and feel so much pressure to be perfect (from society?) that it's just too much and we need to let go of all that. I try to search myself and honestly, I would say that I don't really feel this pressure. I tend to insulate myself a bit and I always sort of do things my own way. I think because I am staying home with my kid and breastfeeding and co-sleep, etc. that I banked alot of personal good will that makes me feel like I am such a good mother. But, if Waldman's memoir is the barometer, then I am a "Bad Mother" too. And she never even mentioned hitting her kids. (I have, I regret it and vow to not do it again. It's wrong.) I bet alot of moms who put their kids in daycare never hit them. So now, who's the better mom?

We all have our shortcomings and our failures and I have many. I guess I just don't think of mothers as good or bad unless they are seriously really bad. Most of us are just trying to get by and my best is different from your best or someone else's best. And our bests differ on different days. So...if this blog is to continue, I think I will shift the focus of the posts to other things. I don't want to be one of the judgers for those women who are a little weaker and feel judged or insecure. (Not that I have hordes of readers, anyway.)

The past is gone...literally.

2009-06-03T13:18:00.007-04:00

On my 37th birthday, two days ago, I did something I'd been thinking of on and off for a while. I threw out my old journals. That's probably nearly 20 years of my life's ramblings now in a dump somewhere. Good. Whenever I went back and re-read them, I never thought how cool or creative or interesting I was...I just ended up thinking how pitiful I was. Maybe I was not that pitiful. Who knows? But, I didn't see any value in keeping those reminders of angst-ridden, sad years of trying to figure out life through a boy, art or drugs around anymore.

My life is pretty "settled" now, and I actually haven't written regularly in journals like I used to for...hmm...longer than I have been married, which is six years. I have still felt angst, recently, actually, but am ready to be rid of it. I know what I need to do so now I am just going to do it. The angst may still be there, the uncertainty will be, too, but I can find some peace by embracing spirituality in the universe and my place in that, rather than the self, self, self that I was so absorbed in for so many years.

***

I look at my daughter's face and into her eyes. She is so beautiful. There is such a cleanness and purity to her and I am struck with the notion that she is very special. She will be something important. She will do great things. And I wonder if my mother thought this of me and whether all parents think this of their young ones...and I think of how much of a "nothing" I actually am now as an adult. And it gives me pause. I am not pure. I am not clean. My skin in blemished, burnt, wrinkled. My body has fat and sags in places. My teeth are yellow. My hair is dry. I have done bad things. I have hurt people. My brain is scrambled. I strive. I fail. I grasp. I lose. How far have I fallen from the perfection of my babyhood when my mother must have gazed at me in wonder? Yet, she is not disappointed. I know this because I know my mother and because she tells me she is not disappointed. In fact, she tells me how wonderful I am, and special. Still. Amazing. Of course, we are all our own worst critics. Perhaps that's how it should be. So, I know, that in order to "save myself" in order for me to go forth in my life, getting older, getting further from the purity and perfection, in order for me to maybe, maybe have a chance at something good, something important, I have to give up my notion of what is good and what is important. I have to give up my ideas about gain and the self. Because that stuff does not matter. I have to savor the here and now.

***

Breathing in, I calm my body.
Breathing out, I smile.
Dwelling in the present moment,
I know this is a wonderful moment.

***

And life is just a string of moments, no?

Of babies and bathwater

2009-05-20T07:05:00.014-04:00

OK, so this is one example of the kind of annoying voices of feminism out there that I reference in my last post. It seems so petty and so desperately clawing to "save one's identity".

Katie Roiphe writes on the new Double X website from Slate about why women shouldn't use their kid(s)' image as their Facebook avatars. She writes:

What, some future historian may very well ask, do all of these babies on our Facebook pages say about the construction of women’s identity at this particular moment in time?

Sigh.

I know these writers have to come up with new ideas for articles all the time, but this is why I have to STOP reading these things. They are just so ridiculous.

Maybe the women are just proud of their kids. Maybe they are fat and ugly and not comfortable with their own picture. Or maybe they are beautiful and still not comfortable with their own picture. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

One of my Facebook friends actually had a picture of her nieces and nephews instead of herself. So? Maybe she thinks they are cute.

What about people like me who have a picture of me with my kid? Where's my husband? Uhm, he was the man behind the camera.

What about those people who don't bother to upload a picture at all, but keep the Facebook blue and white head silhouette? Do they have no identity?

Who cares!

Like so many of the commenters said, it's just Facebook. Some of my favorite other comments:

To me it sounds like someone is trying to invent ways to be even more superior to her equally-educated female peers....

I don't know who this writer is but I have to say that I take offence at the idea that wearing sneakers every day and forgetting to get your hair cut makes a woman dowdy and invisible. To be honest I would feel at lot more dowdy and invisible having to stick to the ancient "etiqutte" rules that say a woman has to wear neat court shoes, have a neat manageable haircut and a pretty frock to be someone. I thought feminism was all about having freedom to express yourself even in the way you look or don't look. It strikes me that this writer has a very narrow view of what women should and should not do. It's like going back to the 1950s for god's sake...

...my problem isn't with people who do or do not use whatever picture they choose, or how they express their identity. It's that the article reinforces the notion that they 1)pick the kid's picture because they value being a parent above something else and 2) that this is wrong. If (the hypothetical) she had posted a picture of her dissertation would we be having this discussion? No. WHY? That's what you keep jumping away from. The why of how we view certain accomplishments as more valid, specifically because they are traditionally male accomplishments.

But, alongside all her petty annoying bullshit, Roiphe made some interesting points about how parents may have become a little too doting or child-centric:

Our parents, I can’t help thinking, would never have tolerated the squeaky sneakers, or conversations revolving entirely around children. They loved us as much as we love our children, but they had their own lives, as I remember it, and we played around the margins. They did not plan weekend days solely around children’s concerts and art lessons and piano lessons and birthday parties. Why, many of us wonder, don’t our children play on their own? Why do they lack the inner resources that we seem to remember, dimly, from our own childhoods? The answer seems clear: because with all good intentions we have over-devoted ourselves to our children’s education and entertainment and general formation. Because we have chipped away at the idea of independent adult life, of letting children dream up a place for themselves, in their rooms, on the carpets, in our gardens, on their own.

I would argue with her last sentence a bit, though, and wonder if people weren't trying to overcompensate for a day-to-day lack of involvement in their kids' lives. If they choose to, or are forced to, leave them with caregivers all day, or for more hours than they are comfortable with, perhaps they are compelled to "make it up to them" in other ways. (I am not judging whether they should feel this way or not, just making an observation that they might.) As a work-at-home mom who is basically on 24-7, I don't have so much guilt and so much drive to do so much for my toddler. I feel like I deserve the break and the treat. Because I do! From my perspective, kids do need to be allowed—trained even— to play on their own and spend time cultivating independence. Sadly, this more interesting discussion gets lost in Roiphe's petty Facebook/identity blurb.

If a problem has no name, is it really a problem?

2009-05-19T07:25:00.004-04:00

Lately, I've been mentally bogged down by a morbid interest in feminism—what it is, what it isn't, what it means to me. I've come to the conclusion that I can't care anymore. I often feel angry and bored, but it's not because of any patriarchal agenda or oppressive system. It's because it is a real challenge to deal all day long with a little person who is learning what free will and independence is (while at the same time being clingy). It's damn hard. My husband says he understands, but he doesn't have to live it. It's not his fault that he doesn't have to do it and I do. I chose to stay home with my kid during her early years. I could have put her in daycare after my 16 weeks of leave (DC FMLA is relatively long). But, I didn't. We didn't need the money and it seemed like the right thing to do. More than seemed like it. I have, still, strong convictions that it is the right thing to do. But, it is damn hard.

I think this thing of staying at home with a kid drew me into reading about feminist issues because of all the "mommy war" debates about working vs. staying home, how long to breastfeed, etc. etc. etc. Somehow feminism creeps into all these things. I think maybe those women who can't take it, can't take the staying home with the young kids might sometimes use the high-minded concepts of feminism to justify their working. They are doing what's important for womankind, for their identities and all that. They are not throwing away all the years of hard work of the women who have gone before, like Betty Friedan who famously examined the housewife's ennui and yearning for something more—a "problem that has no name." Of course, many other women have to work for financial reasons (or believe they do).

But, back to this problem that has no name. I got to thinking, if you can't name the problem, is it really a problem? Is the boredom or sense of being adrift just a symptom of being "spoiled" or part of the disease of our contemporary consumer culture? It sounds like alot of what Betty Friedan describes in her first chapter of The Feminine Mystique is related to having things too easy and too tied into material goods and status. She writes about a change that occured in the mid-20th century, from a time in the earlier part of the century, the 20s, where more women actually went to college and a century earlier had fought for the right to higher education. So what happened? A war. Commercialism. Why did women let it happen? Why did they let things be taken away from them? Everyday men were just pawns in the game like women. All this seems so far removed from my reality now. I sit and wonder whether there was really a single problem that united women, or rather just a bunch of individual problems.

When can we ever rest? When will it be enough? I read so much online that claims to be "feminist" which says nothing to me about my life. And I am a woman. The voices that call for this policy or that policy, that complain about not enough of this or that, always uttering some kind of discontent, some slight, they sound so...tired. And they make me tired trying to keep up with them all and formulate my opinion. Meanwhile, my child is growing up and I'm missing it. My husband is living a parallel life alongside me and I've drifted from engagement with him because my mind has been embroiled in all...this.

It was made worse when I watched Revolutionary Road on the plane from Barcelona and was so moved and impressed by it. I was ashamed to identify ways in which I saw I was similar to the crazy lead woman, April Wheeler. Til she got progressively more crazed, then I breathed a sigh of relief. I found myself feeling sorry for her husband, who did cheat on her, but who seemed desperately to just want their little life to be OK. She wanted more. But, couldn't she find happiness in her children or her husband, or reading books, or making gourmet meals, or painting, or masturbating, or martinis? I mean, what you don't allow yourself to enjoy in your own private life has little to do with cultural mores and more to do with your own hangups or pathological discontent, doesn't it? Now I am reading the book. It doesn't have to be about just feminism, although that aspect of it can't be denied. A Huffington Post blogger says, "Revolutionary Road shows what life was like for women before feminism. It's an important history lesson from the not too distant past. Watch it and read The Feminine Mystique and be thankful that there was a feminist movement or who knows what life would be like now." Still, I have my doubts about the degree to which feminism was part of Richard Yates' intended message. There's the whole ball of wax about what matters in life and what doesn't, transcending suburbia, holding on to the idea that you're meant for something more—and all of these things can be felt by both men and women.

My answer is a spiritual one. The only way I can survive is to break into meditation in the things I do. Of course, on the surface it may be mind-numbing to do housework or play with a toddler. (I do have my consulting work to "escape" to, and countless books and websites, too...but still...) When you can see beyond the surface of a "task" or activity—the pattern of the rug you're cleaning, the beauty of the wood grain you're polishing, the leaves dancing on the trees outside, the blue, blue sky, the sparkle in the toddler's eyes as she proudly identifies orange, red, blue, green, her voice as it now forms sentences, the sweet creaminess of homemade salt caramels, the bold zestiness of homemade salsa—you can groove on these "mundane"' things and they can make a life. The longing for your husband's scruffy kiss after his day away...I could go on and on. It doesn't have to be all bad. It doesn't have to be a problem.

Of course, I am living in the 21st century and I have the world handed to me on a platter, practically. It must have been different for women before. I have to live my life in the here and now, though. We don't have tons of money. We probably aren't rich by American standards at all, and yet I want for nothing material. My life is pretty good, actually, and feminism is, frankly, a buzzkill.

What did I learn?

2009-05-18T05:28:00.018-04:00

Since I didn't relax much on my vacation, I'd like to think I came away from the week-long trial having learned something. I have a handful of happy memories, yes, but I have many sad ones, too.

I think this time in Barcelona was even more difficult than last year's French drama/disaster. Maybe it is because I thought this time would be different. I thought I'd be able to hold it together better. I thought it would be easier. It was only a week, versus 15 days, for one thing. I envisioned hanging out in parks, strolling the Ramblas and the wide avenues of the Eixample, some beach time. We did all these things, but I must have somehow forgotten that this is a bustling city. These things did not bring me the happiness I thought they would. The stress of traveling got the best of me, again. And the European service industry (at least in my experience in Spain, France and Italy), though just friendly enough, can be awfully lackadaisical to a degree I cannot comprehend. (Maybe I should have re-read last summer's post before this trip, but I forgot!)

I could also blame my troubles on the challenges of traveling with a toddler (demanding, flighty, bossy, insane) or on my husband's personality of being a little spacey and self-focused, but, bottom line, how I react to things is my own problem and must be under my own control. Problem is, I did not keep it under control. I lashed out in frustrated stress and rage at both husband and child on countless occasions. I am ashamed of my reactions to their petty annoying actions (of which there are many) and although I could go into descriptions of what went down on the trip, all the things I had to endure that I could say drove me to my anger—many might understand why I'd get upset—I am not going to because to do so would suggest that I am making excuses or looking for sympathy. I didn't get alot of sympathy from my husband on the trip when I tried to make my troubles known, it was more like, this is the way it is, this is what you've chosen, what we've chosen. And, you know what? He is right. I chose him, with his personality as it is, and here we are. I chose to certain ways of parenting my daughter, and here we are. So I will have to skillfully act in ways that will best gently shift things in the way I need them to go, and I must start with myself.

I guess that's what I learned. And it seems that its a lesson I am forced to learn over and over and over again: that the only thing I can change is me. It is just too tiring and frustrating to try and change other people. And, if my own reactions make me feel worse than the perceived offenses of others against me, I have to find other ways to react, or not react at all.

***

I was thinking alot of getting a tattoo as a ritual experience to help me remember these life lessons (since I keep forgetting them in the moments of stress). In addition to the experience, I would then have the mark as a reminder. I'm having problems with following through on the permanence of a tattoo, though. I'm also afraid of the pain, although I understand this would add to the ritual experience of it. My husband doesn't want me to get it on my wrist, which is where I want to get it. He is worried about potential job interviews! So, I started "trying one on" by drawing the design I wanted (Sanskrit script of the word "namaste") with a Sharpie. It looks good and I am thinking that maybe drawing it on each day (or filling in where it is inevitably fading) could be a ritual/meditative process (it only takes a couple minutes) and might even be better than getting a permanent tattoo, since I would have to do it regularly and that would help remind me of the purpose and the message I am trying to give myself (basically, be nice and try to be understanding of and compassionate to others).

***

It's definitely a process, though. At the present moment I have locked myself in the bathroom to finish my post and my toddler is literally banging on the door wailing...mama!!!!!!!! I've played with her already. I've made her breakfast. She said she wanted to wash her hands and made a big deal about it, totally out of the blue. We go to wash her hands and now she doesn't want to, so now what? I am done. Seriously, what am I supposed to do when I can't get a moment to myself or finish a thought? I simply refuse to CONSTANTLY play with a child. I should not have to. I refuse to constantly give a child my attention. I am confident that I give her enough attention. She is just very demanding. She is a good girl, very smart, extremely cute, but she is very demanding and I've got to curb that. There is a difference between instilling self-esteem in a child and nurturing them versus letting them think they rule the world. I am at the point right now where it is extremely frustrating to me. I mean EXTREMELY. At the moment, I feel a tad bit betrayed by attachment parenting and extended nursing. What have I gotten myself into? We have never used a babysitter except my parents, once, when we were visiting. I am resentful that I don't get much alone time with my husband and that I am almost always "on" with nearly no breaks. (Yes, I go to the gym for an hour and a half or so, but that's not enough). This is not a sustainable way of living. All I can do is try to hold on and know that kids grow up, or at least turn three, right? That's when the madness is supposed to end, I hear. I know I have seriously digressed, but this needs to be said. Maybe others can take some comfort in the fact that other good moms feel anger and frustration? Whatever. I need to get it out. The post didn't start this way, but it is going to end this way. I will collect myself and go face her and try to be kind. I learned during the vacation that it doesn't work to vocalize my anger to my husband or my daughter, it somehow just ignites it and it explodes. Whereas, as I have been doing all weekend since I've drawn on my tattoo, I can just get mad quietly within myself and let it diffuse inside and vanish, and nobody gets hurt.

***

OK. Out of the bathroom. Gave her some attention and she is fine. Fine. I am trying to teach myself that it is alright to let a toddler have their tantrum. I used to respond quickly and actively to all her cries when she was a baby. My nature is that I can't stand the sound of a baby crying (not my baby, anyway) and think that I must be doing something wrong and need to take care of it right away. I guess evolutionarily that is a good thing. I am programmed to protect and care. But, as a baby becomes a toddler and a child, I have to let go and understand that she is going to need to freak out and not get what she wants when she wants it all the time...and I don't need to get mad or be resentful, it's just part of her growing—and mine.

Why I am not trying to lose weight anymore

2009-05-03T13:09:00.003-04:00

I'm not going to try and lose weight anymore. Almost two years after the birth of my daughter I still weight about 15 lbs. more than I did before my pregnancy. I've weighed less than I do now since giving birth, by about 5 lbs., only to gain it back. I've been appropriately active, going to the gym usually 5 days a week and running also on a 6th. My activity at the gym has varying degrees of intensity. Some weeks, when I was feeling tired, I would mostly ride the stationary bike for 45 minutes or so at a time while reading. Other times, I'd do what I feel are some pretty intense and fast runs of about 3 miles on the treadmill followed by decent weight training both with free weights and on the machines. I used to take classes, but felt out of place with the mostly 50-somethings and the moves were either too easy or sometimes too hard and the music was rarely just right. I even tried a stint with a trainer. Nothing seems to be working for me right now, though, and I think it's because maybe I am just not fat enough—and therefore not motivated enough.

You see, I think I look pretty good. Sure, about 75 percent of my clothes don't fit anymore, but I don't really go that many places where I need to wear size 6 trousers anymore. My stretchy size 8 Banana dark wash jeans work fine, as do my many pairs of yoga pants and various flowy skirts. I don't feel that bad because many of my old tops don't fit anymore either, so, its not just my gut and butt that are bigger, but my breasts, too. Yay, right? And I think the breast thing has much to do with my inability to shed the final 5-10...uh, 15 lbs. I am still breastfeeding. Everyone I hear says that once you stop breastfeeding, you typically lose that last 10 lbs. Well, I hope so. That would be cool. But, I am done worrying about it.

I know why I am not losing weight. It's because I eat like a maniac. Seriously. For whatever reason, being home all day with a toddler, for me, lends itself to wild eating binges. It's part boredom, part frustration and part because food is just so damn tasty. I will say I don't eat alot of "junk" food. I don't eat store-bought cookies or chips. I do make my own cookies, muffins and chips. I eat chips with salsa, chips with cheese sauce on occasion, chips with avocado. Lots of avocado. I eat banana pecan muffins and zucchini chocolate chip muffins. I eat breakfast burritos. I eat the baby's leftovers. I eat trail mix. I eat chocolate. I swig swigs of skim milk. I eat fruit. I eat the fruit the baby left behind. I eat carrots and hummus. Lots of hummus. I drink beer. Flavorful, heavy beer. I drink wine. I eat pasta. I eat fish. I eat salad. I eat cheese. I eat yogurt. I eat fries. I eat black beans. I eat pinto beans. I eat pizza. I eat the baby's goldfish crakcers. I eat air-popped popcorn. With butter.I eat it all. I just basically eat too much. Luckily, I have a good metabolism and I work out faithfully, so I am not obese and I look alright.

I know this can't go on forever, though. My metabolism is going to get slower as I get older, even with weight training. My threshold for pleasure is going to get higher. It always does unless you somehow check it. I think I am getting to the point where the eating has become a little manic. Like, oh, this is so good! How much can I really eat before I do get really fat? Or, I am not going to be penned into some anti-feminist skinny box and toe someone else's line of what looks good on a woman. Or, I like being a little bigger, and strong. Or, after watching The Pianist a few weeks ago, what if there is a war and I have to go without food, or live on very little food, for weeks or months? Wouldn't it be better if I was a little overweight, as an insurance policy? Then I could suffer the scarcity better. Uhm, okay, sure.

I know I have to somehow get a mature grip on my eating. I eat like a 16-year-old quarterback. I have to start eating like the late-30-something woman that I am. I recently read Naturally Thin by the NYC Real Housewife Bethenny Frankel and thought she made some really good points. She also advocates scooping out bread from bagels and throwing it away. She seems to do alot of "portion control" (read, "throwing food away"), as in eating "1/3 of an omelet". Come on, now? Am I going to eat 1/3 of an omelet? No. I am going to eat the damn omelet.

Still, I like what she says about quieting down the food noise. So many women think eating something is "bad" and not eating is being "good". Other examples of the food noise is how we are always thinking of food. I am like this. I go to bed looking forward to what I am going to eat when I wake up. Will it be one of those banana pecan muffins, warmed with pats of butter melting on them, or will it be a breakfast burrito? Mmmm. I like what she says about really savoring ones food, taking mindful bites. I like what she says about waiting til you really know what you want to eat before you start shoveling food into your face. I like her rule that says "You can have it all, just not all at once." But, we have different interpretations of this. For example, she says, you can have an egg with the yolk, or, if you want egg with cheese, you've got to throw away the yolk and have just the egg white with cheese. Now, I am not going to throw away a perfectly good egg yolk. That's just wrong. I even avoid recipes that call for using just whites or just yolks, although I did make some really good homemade pudding last year with just yolks (later found a use for the whites).

Of course, it's hard to savor food slowly when you are working on borrowed time with a toddler at the table and you want to try and have "family meals". But, I will try and do that more. And, I could use a healthy dose of increased mindfulness in everything I do, including eating. Also, it's hard not to eat leftovers of what you're feeding your toddler if it's something you like, such as avocado or macaroni and cheese or fries. But, more and more, I have been just giving her a portion of what I am eating instead of making her something separate, so that might help me in this area.

I called my mom the other night very upset about some stresses I was having with my kid. Something about "discipline", nursing, weaning. She talked me down and told me to make sure I do something for myself each day, no matter how small. Even if it is just enjoying a piece of chocolate or something. Ha ha. I told her, that's why I never lose weight. Food is about the only way I treat myself these days. She observed that weight loss will just have to wait then, that my mental health is more important. She understood that treating myself in other ways would require more free time, and that was just not something I had. So, that night, late, after my husband went to bed, I made myself the one mini frozen lava cake from Trader Joe's that we had left over from his mom's birthday celebration (they wanted store-bought) and savored it slowly, on my own, with a glass of skim milk. Next day, as I mentioned in another post, my child and I made chocolate chip cookies. A big batch. It was pure pleasure and I ate ALOT of them. That said, I think I may be getting this conspicuous consumption of food out of my system. It's just not thrilling me that much anymore because of my excesses. It just may be part of my journey on the path to balance.

The old cliché goes that if you want to find love, stop looking...so maybe the same applies to weight loss. So, I am going to just stop trying.

Oh yeah! Parallel play is the thought of the day...

2009-05-01T14:56:00.009-04:00

Little one napping, me waiting for next round of newsletter edits, checks NYT Motherlode blog to find this.

Amen! My style is validated. Hurray.

And a good post from a blog referenced in the Motherlode post...

I have to say that today I played a good strategy (although admittedly the day is not yet over and I still have a couple hours of work ahead of me). I invested into my daughter's attention bank this morning while waiting for some work items to come in. We read about a million books, went to the park, went to the library where they have huge human-sized stuffed bears and a book sale (lots of kids book), came home made chocolate chip cookies, watched a couple DVDs mostly together, had lunch...and she wasn't a huge pain in the ass. She went to sleep fairly easily for her nap and is sleeping well. I am thinking the attention investment allowed me the time to break away from time to time in the morning when we were home to answer e-mails, write a quick late-breaking story, post a press release, and that following this guide will allow me to finish my work this afternoon. Although, I do have the ace-in-the-hole of my husband coming home at 4:30 to relieve me so I can focus, if need be.

Weaning baby from the breast and me from the web

2009-05-01T07:50:00.013-04:00

I realized last week on my daughter's 22 month "birthday"—that weaning has got to be imminent for us. I was laying there, trying to put her to sleep. She was fidgeting around, nibbling at my nipple in a grating way. This happens most of the time now. During the past week, my feelings have only intensified. At first, I had mixed feelings. I am really into breastfeeding. Maybe I should say I was really into breastfeeding, but Ava is almost two and I am questioning whether the breastfeeding is holding back our relationship in other ways. Also, I am just kind of getting tired of it. I know that sounds horrible and it makes me feel like I'm on a slippery slope toward Hanna Rosin territory (not really), but after almost two years of it, part of me feels like I have done my time. All good things must come to an end, and all that.

I used to really, really love it. It was cozy and tender. I literally felt a wave of relaxation come over me when she latched on as the hormones started a-flowin'. Now, I still feel that from time-to-time, but mostly, I feel a 31 lb. toddler crawling all over me and switching from breast to breast every minute. Oh, and she usually likes to be grabbing the one she's not sucking on, just to make sure it's still there. It is really maddening. I feel almost used and abused by the way she goes about it. I resent it. Deep inside, I know I will miss nursing. I will miss the closeness and the tenderness of it. But, Ava's helping with that pain since there's not much of that cuddliness happening right now.

All this negativity is telling me it's time to wean. But I still want to do it kindly and gently. We leave for a week's vacation overseas next week, and we have a weekend in New York later this month, so I have to take a very slow and measured approach—not only because it is the right thing to do for Ava's feelings, but because it is the convenient thing to do for me. I have found that nursing is a great tool to have when traveling to help keep a child calm, satisfied and more manageable in unusual situations. With a toddler at the height of her headstrong and demanding phase, I need all the help I can get to avoid major scenes.

I've already technically started the weaning process by not breastfeeding "on demand" and instead trying to divert her attention, talk her out of it, tell her the milk is "not ready" and, once in a while, putting some vinegar on my boobs along with saying they're not ready in order to really give myself a break.

Sadly, I think I understand why she may have been so needy lately (now that she's over being sick, which was why she was so needy before) and its probably a combination of boredom and wanting more attention. I had some challenges work-wise this past week with my computer hard drive crashing and I had to spent time getting a new one, purchasing, installing and setting up software, re-doing work I'd lost, and doing more work I had due for a deadline this week. Admittedly, I was probably not as attuned to her as I should have been.

So, a big strategy of our weaning process—which will kick into high gear once we are back from Spain, then really, really high gear after New York—will be for me to make sure I give her alot of attention and love, and keep her busy and not bored. This is easier said than done, of course, because when I try to play with her, she still interrupts the play and grabs at my boobs, pulls on my shirt and says, "milkies! milkies!" And then I get frustrated and skulk off to lock myself in the bathroom with my laptop for a few minutes just to get some distance.

And, the laptop—that brings me to another issue about why it will be a new challenge to keep her busy and not bored which is related to keeping me not bored. I have, in the past, always kept the laptop at arm's reach and bounced back and forth between playing and doing stuff with her and doing stuff on the laptop. But, the balance has gotten a little off. It really hit home when my machine died Sunday morning and I was without a laptop til the following morning when I went out and bought a new one that I am close to being a web addict. (I still had access to my husband's PC and posted on Facebook, checked my e-mail, etc. still during this period of being "without" a computer.) But, I was so, so uneasy without my machine. It was an awful feeling. Like withdrawal.

Now, I am not as bad as some of the moms I read about in a recent article on internet addiction, where they don't clean the house or they take drugs to stay up late so they can be online more. I don't think I neglect my kid. After all, she is not even two years old yet and she already knows her colors—red, blue, yellow, orange, brown, black, pink—and we are working on numbers and letters, too, a little, but those seem a little ways off. Still, I think that by cutting down on my non-essential screen time (like I keep saying I am going to do) that will aid in the weaning process. It might also clear my head a little, too. It will help shake me out of the funk I am in and help jump start a new phase for my girl.

I'm glad to be getting away for a week, I have to say, I need something to shake things up in my life. I rarely go online when I am overseas, there's just too many other fun things to do, I don't bring a laptop so would be relegated to internet cafés or public machines in the hotel, so that will be helpful in weaning me from the web—just a little bit. Vacations always change me a little, change my perspective, help me shift gears. I really need that right about now. Then, I can help my child shift gears a bit, too.

What kind of mother paints her toddler's toenails?

2009-04-28T16:59:00.003-04:00

Me!

Moving on from foolish debates to a more useful focus

2009-04-25T16:13:00.008-04:00

I still have alot of good posts in me, but I think for a little while at least I have to move on to other pursuits, those that are more likely to position me to be where I want to be in coming years. Maybe I can post once a month on current mothering/feminist issues and such, but in my day to day, I need to focus back on my career—graphic design.

See, the reason I was well-positioned enough to be able to live out my ideals of staying home with my daughter til she was in school is because I was doing what I should be doing when I should be doing it. In my case, that was working and saving before the baby came. Now that I am home and working part time, I need to use more of my free time to beef up my skills, keep my creativity fresh and maybe even do some networking. There is so much information on the web available to me to enhance my skills and knowledge base with regard to graphic design (this includes web design and related stuff, in my definition) that it really is too much of a waste of time to get embroiled in debates over idiotic questions like is breastfeeding better than formula.

I know I said something like this a last week in my Noise post, but I keep getting roped in!

And, it seems like that crazy beyotch Hanna Rosin is not going to quit. She's like a dog with a bone—as evidenced by her most recent post on Slate: Breastfeed more, earn less. Here she again overinterprets, or misinterprets, a single random (not randomized, or even peer-reviewed as far as one can tell) "study" that tends to conclude that women who breastfeed longer earn less money. That's a shocker.

My unscientific guess is that women who breastfeed longer earn less because they choose to shift their priorities during their child's earliest years. From my perspective, that's just what they should do, ideally. From Rosin's perspective, earning power is the top metric of women's success, apparently. To her, this study "...means that breast-feeding now loses its free pass into the feminist cause." I say, breastfeeding doesn't need a "free pass" into anything. It's how our bodies are programmed to work under normal conditions, as mammals. It is the norm. Secondly, nature and appropriately feeding a baby come before feminism and if they fit in great, if not, then feminism must change. Why expect that biology should be altered or denied in order to "fit in" to some narrow idea of what's best for women?

This discourse is tired and I am not going to give the bitter shrew any more of my attention. Check out the rest of my day's web play on my other blog: Logo My Life. Other than that, I am going to research some new CSS tricks and spend my time building my business so I can maybe continue to work from home even after my kid's in school. The Hana Rosins and other narrow-minded feminists of her ilk can continue the futile (and in my opinion anti-feminist) pursuit of making women's biology fit into man's (the universal sense) constructed constraints of the marketplace. I, on the other hand, am going to figure out how to make the marketplace work for me on my terms.

Dirty diaper secret

2009-04-25T08:12:00.004-04:00

Diaper rash!

Until last week I could proudly claim that my 21-month-old daughter had never had a diaper rash. For what that's worth. Whether that was attributable to my astuteness about changing her diapers, the fact that we'd switched to cloth, or just the kind of skin she had, I don't know. But, when she did get her first rash last week, I was horrified. I remembered hearing somewhere that antibiotics could cause diaper rash, so I quickly looked into that possibility and sure enough, it was true. Phew! OK. That probably explained the rash of rash. My kid was on a nine-day course of antibiotics to combat her pneumonia. Now, what to do?

Because of the kind of fabric her cloth diapers—Fuzzi Bunz— are made of, it's a no-no to use any kind of cream or ointment with them. But, I deemed some good, old-fashioned, creamy Desitin, with the zinc-oxide and cod liver oil was necessary to protect her skin and fight the rash, so, I decided we'd temporarily go back to disposables til the rash cleared up. And slather on copius amounts of ointment.

At the grocery store, the child immediately spots some old friends in the baby aisle—Elmo, Bert and Ernie! We grab the pack of Pampers Cruisers (our preferred brand before switching to cloth at 9 months) size 5. Unlike with her cloth diapers, she is very excited about these. The diapers themselves are decorated with pictures of Elmo, Grover, Ernie, and other Sesame Street characters. She now asks for her diaper to be changed instead of running around the room and making me chase her with a Fuzzi Bunz in hand. She'll go over to the linen closet where I've been keeping the temporary supply of disposables and cry out "Elmo! Elmo!" or she will say "Diaper need! Diaper need!" (She probably got this last bit from a song I sing for her where I say "I am here for your diapering needs!" which sprung from a dialogue we used to have with a stuffed rabbit, Clifford, who was there "for all of your diapering needs.") She'll look at the diaper and say "coot" (cute).

So the rash is clearing up and I'm now wondering whether I should just ride out the rest of her diaper-wearing days with disposables. I've kind of enjoyed the lessened laundry load and not having to do battle every time she needs a diaper change. It could be a coincidence that she has found a new awareness and desire to be diapered at the same time we were using disposables, but that's not so likely. I'm about to buy a potty anyway and start heading in that direction, so I'm guessing within a few months she may be out of diapers anyway.

I love the Fuzzi Bunz and am happy to do my part for the environment, however, I'm not super-committed to it. As I mentioned, we used disposables for my kid's first 9 months. My thinking was that I'd be busy enough as a new mom and I didn't want to deal with laundering diapers. I thought cloth diapering was crazy. I figured, since we were only having one child and used limited energy, were otherwise not putting a big drain on the environment, this could be our "pass", our allowed transgression. Then, at 9 months, my little one's thighs had gotten pretty chunked out and the disposables were cutting into them and leaving marks. This, I could not tolerate, so I started researching cloth and fell in love with the cute styles and accoutrements of cloth diapering. It was fun. Like with so many things, though, the fun wears off. I don't mind the laundry that much, and if she showed no preference, I'd probably go back to cloth once the rash was all cleared, but now, I just don't know...

My crunchy credentials may be tarnishing!

Noise

2009-04-17T16:00:00.006-04:00

I am fairly sensitive to noise and I have really good hearing. So, when there was some unidentified droning coming from...where...the other night when my husband and I were trying to have sex, I found it very distracting. I kept getting up and having a look around, going to different windows to see if I could determine where it was coming from. I gave up and came to the conclusion that the neighbor was playing a saxophone or something and with that thought was able to get back to what I was doing.

Later that night, when I went to check on the baby who'd woken up and lay down with her for a while, I couldn't relax and sleep because I heard another droning sound. It was different from the first one. It had odd pitch changes and was really driving me crazy. I remembered once that a lightly running sink downstairs made a noise that got on my nerves before, so I went down there to check it and discovered that the noise was coming from a clock radio that was blasting pretty loudly in the extra bedroom. When I was dusting earlier that day, I must have moved the knobs on the clock radio from "off" to "alarm" or something. What could it mean that that noise I thought was coming from somewhere else was actually originating from inside my own house—from a radio I had unwittingly turned on?

When I was laying there with the baby, before I identified what it was, I was really disturbed by the strange sound and not knowing what it was. This same night, my daughter wouldn't sleep for almost 4 hours, about 9:30 pm til after 1 am. She kept tossing and turning, getting off and on the breast. I have to admit she really upset me and I got mad. Previously she acted really bratty at dinner and I had really had enough. After a little over 3 hours trying to help her sleep, I ended up having to leave her room and make her fall asleep on her own, crying her eyes out, wailing, til she finally slept. It took about 45 minutes of crying. I had tried to lay with her, tried to nurse her. I even tried the reset button, turning on the lights, reading her a couple stories, to do the bedtime process all over again. But she was just too restless.

I didn't realize til going over my utter frustration the next day that maybe the weird sound had gotten to her. I wonder if it had anything to do with her problems going to sleep. I mean, she probably had heard the sounds and maybe her unruly behavior persisted even after I turned the radio off because she didn't know, like I did, where it came from and that it was over? I know she has very sensitive ears, like I do.

That night, amidst all the aggravation and sadness, and the day after, I was also thinking of the virtual "noise" I've been exposing myself to lately in the form of my near obsessive searching out and reading bits on the web about babies, children and parenting. The more controversial the better. Bottle or breast. Homebirth or C-section. Who hits their kids? Who's doing AP? How to get toddlers to do what you want. How to love them unconditionally. Parents are too lenient today. We coddle them too much, are too focused on their self-esteem. If you don't discipline them now, they will sour forever. Blah blah blah. What can get me riled up? What can stir me to expound my opinion about something? Why was I so into all that?

Then, there was my own "noise"—from within my own house, just like that radio. I had to really listen and look inside my own realm to find out where the truly annoying droning was coming from. I felt like such a loser and a hypocrite because I didn't really like the negative feelings I had about my daughter that day, nor did I like the way I acted or the way I treated her.

In my "talk", I had vowed to eschew authoritarian parenting, yelling, hitting, etc., but in my "walk", I was being brutish and not at all the strategic, gently guiding force in her life that I wanted to be. I decided I needed a serious break from the noise and that I myself would not add to it for at least a little while til I found time to get my heart right and my head right about my kid.

Hopefully when I come back I will be less confrontational and snarky, have a more positive outlook and can be more honest.

Maternal Desire

2009-04-16T12:57:00.002-04:00

I’ve been reading Maternal Desire by Daphne de Marneffe, a book that looks at motherhood as something worthy of desire, that brings pleasure, rather than an obligation. I often ask myself why I stay home with my child. I do believe in my choice as being better for very small babies, and probably to some extent better for her even at this age, but there’s so much more to it. I do it for me. I like it. It’s hard. There are lots of challenges and long days. I do think working outside of the home in an office is definitely easier. But, I would not give this up. A phrase in the book describes one small part of it, saying “many mothers endorse the value of intensive mothering in part as an explicit protest against the dehumanizing aspects of the marketplace.” And yes, I do stay home partially because I believe a family should be able to make it on one salary. (The fact that many can’t being more a problem with U.S. policy and programs than with the people struggling on two incomes to raise families.) However, I have to be honest and say that when my child is a little older…4, 5? who knows…I will go back to working full time.

The book has some other interesting information about how even though we Americans feel like we have a time famine, we actually have reduced work hours and gained free time in the last 30 years. (OK, this seems unbelievable to me, but I will go with it.) The researchers, Robinson and Godbey, looked into what people actually do moment to moment with their time, and as it turns out, they watch alot of TV. Yeah, me, too. And then there’s the Internet. Double the time suck because online you can take it in as well as dish it out. So, I am going to try and cut down (this means TV, unnecessary and excessive checking of e-mails and Facebook and other stuff, no more watching the Dow plummet all day, etc.)

One more excerpt from the book before I go. It talks about how our culture has become one of having rather than being. “We consume not only material goods, but also information, education, and experiences, and we define ourselves by what we consume,” it says. The book provides a lovely example of the being mode as illustrated by a children’s book, which I found heartwarming and charming.

In the book, Peek-a-Boo, “a baby plays peek-a-boo with his family throughout the day—when he wakes up, at breakfast, during chores, at the park, at supper, at bath and at bedtime. What charms me as a reader is how messy the house is. The mother and father in every fram are tending to the tasks of life—washing the windows, ironing, cooking, feeding children, bathing the baby—with no illusion of completion; around them are a jumble of children’s toys and shoes, heaps of dirty laundry, open drawers, and sponges soaking in the sink. The pictures burst with the process of living, with the thousand undone jobs that betoken the priority of responsiveness over efficiency that makes for a happy family.” De Marneffe adds, “A starker contrast to the pristine, lifeless tableaux of Martha Stewart Living could not be found. Though Martha’s surfaces seduce, you need no more than a nanosecond to determine which emotional world you’d rather live in.”

All this, I find very encouraging!

Probably not going to go out for a beer with Dr. Laura, but...

2009-04-10T13:17:00.015-04:00

Ugh. The latest taking head in the, ahem, discourse, between working moms and stay-at-home moms, Dr. Laura Schlessinger, is making the rounds on daytime TV and in print interviews promoting her new book, "In Praise of Stay-at-Home Moms." In the book, she "unapologetically urges mothers to remain at home instead of juggle a career and motherhood." O.K...but...

Anyone who knows me or has read my blog knows that I have made the choice to work at home so I can be with my daughter. I know this is a fairly uncommon arrangement, and that some women need to work full time to support their families. That said, I do think it is best for a child UNDER THREE to be with his or her mom all the time, just like Dr. Laura says. Because I am lucky and we've done some planning, I think I will be able to extend this period to age five. Beyond that age, I don't really agree as strongly with Dr. Laura about the necessity or importance of a mom being at home all the time.

Here's what she says, from a Wall Street Journal interview:

WSJ: At what point do you advise mothers to go back to work?

Dr. Schlessinger: The answer is never. One woman asked me the other day when I think mothers should be home, and I told her, "Whenever your kid is at home." When [my son] Deryk started kindergarten, it was from 8 to 3. So I arranged to be on the air from 11 to 2. That was it. He always had a mom. Quite frankly, my mom was one of the least warm mommies out there. Nonetheless, when I came home from school, she was always there and it made me feel safe.

I'm happy for her that she was able to work just when her kid was in school and that's something that I am going to try and do, too, to some extent. I might continue to pursue building my independent consulting, taking on more hours gradually as my daughter gets older. Or, if I do work for someone else, outside the home, my husband and I have discussed doing slightly staggered work schedules so he might go in for a 7-3:30 and I might go for a 9-5:30 or something like that. Still, we may have to take advantage of at least part of the hours of an after school program. I honestly think school-age kids enjoy such programs and benefit from being able to bond more with their friends outside the structure of classrooms during the school day. I think maybe the kids that aren't in the after school programs could be left out, even. I don't really know, but what I do know is that I want to be able to send my daughter to a good college. I want to be able to take her abroad on vacations. Maybe even buy her a (modest) car (don't tell Dad I said that). We're really more into experiences than things, but sometimes experiences cost, too. And, in reality, I am not sure we could really afford even an average life without me working more, for like 18 years! In addition, I want my daughter to see her mom working at things other than "the home". And, I like to work! I like to make money and I like for people to notice me for the work I do. There, I said it.

That's not to say that raising a child is not important work. Or, that, if we were totally rich, I wouldn't NOT work. I think I would not work for money, maybe, but would do more artsy things, you know, fine art instead of design. Or do charity work. Or I'd start a restaurant or something. I like to do stuff. I think kids like when their parents do stuff, you know, have lives. That's why the path I've take is the perfect solution—for me anyway. But, I would highly recommend it to others, if they can make it happen: the three to five year "sabbatical". Be close to your babies when they're babies, then ramp up. Of course, this is not for everyone, and I am well aware that not everyone has been so fortunate to have the luxury to make the choices I, or ol' Dr. Laura, have made. That's why I bristle a little to hear her talk. And she, too, talks of sacrifice, a concept I have become very wary of.

The editorial notes for her book say that by reading it one will learn, among other things, "to realize that the sacrifices you endure now will make for lasting bonds and a stronger family, in addition to a more cohesive community." What's with the sacrifice? I hate that word when it comes to women's choices and their families. I am doing exactly what I want to do. It's no sacrifice. It's a luxury, as I said before. For her to act like people just aren't willing to make the sacrifice is mean, and naiive, I think. And some women just aren't cut out to be home with their kids all day. One might argue that perhaps they should not have had kids, but that's a whole other discussion and one that I don't want to get into.

Bottom line, people need to do what they want and what works for them. Women should, though, look deeply into their hearts—and minds—and budgets, and if they can afford it, consider being with their babies when they're babies. At the very least for one year! I wish this country would give us just that, one year of paid or highly-subsidized maternity leave. Beyond subsidizing maternity leaves, I would observe that many Americans have probably become a little too materialistic. However, I'm not sure Dr. Laura does as good a job as she should in differentiating those who would have both parents working 50, 60, 70, 80 hours a week in order to afford Hummers, designer clothes and Cristal from those who have to each hold down a job just in order to make rent or student loan payments. She says her heart aches for the moms who want to stay home but can't, but...what about the suggestions for policy change? I keep asking, when did it become necessary for two adults to work full time (or more) in order to maintain an average middle class home? And why do we tolerate it? That's another post, I guess.

Dr. Laura did make some interesting comments on the Mike and Juliet Show, which I saw while on the treadmill this morning. She was asking, how low does a woman's confidence about herself as a mother have to be for her to think that hired help could give her child as much love as she could? That struck a chord with me, as I wondered how much the confidence question comes in to play with some moms today who choose to go to work very early in their child's life. I had the example of a stay-at-home mom (who later when on to get a Masters and is now a speech pathologist). Many women did not. A friend of mine confided that she was glad to go back to work because, frankly, she just didn't know what to do with the baby all day—this was at, like fourth months!

One reason I have chosen to stay at home during my daughter's youngest years is that I really believe nobody could do a better job with her than I can, right now. To me, there is just something very primal, animalistic and intimate about mothers and babies, much linked to the nursing relationship. And I want the chance to get her attached to me, to build that trust and to give her the balls to know who she is so that when she does go out into the world for kindergarten, she is strong, knows where she comes from, who's got her back (me!) and won't take crap from anybody. As far as teaching her math, how to get along with her peers, chemistry and all that stuff, I will leave that to the schoolteachers and to her and the other kids, when that time comes, supporting her with homework help—although Dad will most likely deal with the calculus. I will be there for her in the morning and at the end of the day to give her what I can in the way of love, support, advice, companionship, direction, and will go out into the world (or reach out to clients in the world) during the day while she is at school to be a good example in that regard. And, I will always be a cell phone call away. (My husband and I had a good argument about phones before she was even born, and I insisted, no matter what the school rules are, my daughter will carry a phone so she can get me if she needs to. As a former teacher, he is big on school rules, I am not.)

So, odd as is may be, this progressive, bohemian hipster has a few things in common with ol' Dr. Laura. That's a little scary, but at the same time, it's cool. I'm not a big fan of her style, though, and so I don't think we will become BFFs any time soon, though.