But quickly that conversation turned one-sided as she told me about a spat she had had with her mother over the number of hours she was working. I sat in stunned silence as she told me that she was working really hard to make sure that her kids had everything they needed, and she even said that her own childhood would have been so different if her mother had worked at least part time.
I agree, it would have been different. But I think she and I see that difference in completely opposite ways.
In actuality, this woman isn't working to give her kids everything they need, because her husband is perfectly capable of doing that. She is working to give them everything she didn't have when she was a kid.
Listening to her go on, I felt like a bug being squished beneath the shoe of a superior bully. She was knocking everything that I have spent my life happily sacrificing for.
I am a mother who has not worked a day outside the home since my first child was born. Sometimes my kids do go without certain things that they might like because we just don't have $160 extra dollars a month for the older two to take karate lessons, or a spare $300 to make sure they each have a new wardrobe for every season.
We have to be careful with money, but my kids have never, NEVER, had to go without anything that they needed. And if you ask me, they get plenty of things that are simply for fun. We have season passes to an amusement park, we take them fishing, camping, to the park, we go to the theater, they play the sports they want to, they get birthday and Christmas gifts, we buy them ice cream for no reason, we make memories together. My kids are not deprived.
I was angry during this phone call because this woman, who I continue to love, caused me to feel like I was being a bad mom for not providing my kids with the things she deemed necessary. Essentially, she was saying that her kids would have a better childhood than mine because her kids would have THINGS.
I steamed about this call for about a half hour before I came to my senses. I understand now that she and I just have different beliefs.
(And here is the part where I will most definitely introduce controversy and force people to bring out their claws. I accept that because I feel so strongly about this.)
I believe that, with very few exceptions, mothers who have a working husband should be home with their kids.
I believe that putting my kids in daycare, whether provided by family or otherwise, is a bad idea. No one can love my kids like I do, and my kids deserve to be raised by the parents who love them more than anyone else does. And what's more - our kids WANT to be near us, not dropped off to someone else. I know that any child who was given a choice would choose to spend their days with their mom, not a babysitter.
I believe that most, (not all), women who are working could find ways to stay home with their kids if they really wanted to. It takes guts and sacrifice, but when I consider who my husband and I are sacrificing for, there is no doubt that it is the right thing to do. No one can convince me that a high paying career or a boat or anything else is more important or rewarding than a sticky kiss or "I love you, Mommy" from a toddler who is growing faster than I want him to.
I believe that spending time with my kids is far more valuable to them than spending money on them. We could provide all the toys, clothes, vacations, and lessons that we want, but if I am not around to read to them, play games with them, answer their questions about life, teach them at every turn, praise their good deeds, see them grow, and discipline the way I believe is right, then I am doing them a disservice. If I'm not doing those things, someone else is. Only so much life happens after working hours.
I DO NOT believe that "Mother" is a title one receives by giving birth, but rather, is a badge of honor that is earned outside of the delivery room.
I believe that it is important for a mother to be there for every milestone and learning opportunity in the early years. It is a mother's place, her right, to see the first steps, to teach right and wrong, to shape and mold her children.
I believe that the later years are just as important. Kids need to come home from school to a welcoming mother, not an empty house. Kids need to talk about their day, they need support, they need to feel like Mom is always there to talk to. They need to know that there is someone checking up on them, keeping them on the right path. Choices are good and all, and I hope that my husband and I have taught our kids well enough that they make good ones for themselves when we're not around, but kids can only handle so much temptation and responsibility. Teenagers are notorious for making bad choices - it's their job. The parents job is to keep them out of as much trouble as they can.
I DO NOT believe that a woman can "have it all". She can certainly try to be a mom, a wife, run a house, and have a career, but she will almost always fall short in some area. It's the kids, and often the husband, who suffer for the selfishness of the mother who wants success or fulfillment for herself as well as a picture-perfect family life. It is an illusion. It is stressful. It is not worth it.
Could I be a good mom if I worked? Absolutely. But I am most definitely a better mom for devoting my entire self to it, and don't my kids deserve my best? Not to mention my husband who prefers a wife who isn't run ragged and completely spent at the end of every day from trying to do it all.
Does being a stay-at-home mom automatically make me a good mom? Not at all. It completely depends on what I do with my time every day, the example I am to my kids, and what I teach them.
So after listening to this other woman state her purpose, I realized that I am the lucky one. I am choosing to be a full-time mom to my kids and to build a peaceful and happy home for my whole family. I am putting time with my kids before stuff for my kids. I have a husband who strongly supports this decision. I have not missed a minute of their growing up.
I think this other woman just doesn't yet see all the wonderful, irreplaceable things her mother gave her by staying home and raising her. One day, she'll realize.
Time with my kids is precious and fleeting. I know that I am right where I am supposed to be, and I'm loving every minute of it.
My husband and I do not fight. There just isn't much to fight about. We do, on occasion, argue about whether or not Adam Sandler movies can be considered classics, or why he will never play Rock, Paper, Scissors with me to determine who should change a soiled diaper. But that's about it.
Except for that one thing. The one thing that has caused yelling matches on at least three separate occasions. The one thing that neither of us can see a middle ground on. The thing that makes my head feel like it's going to explode from unquenchable exasperation.
This thing:
Andrew's 1963 Volkswagen piece. of. crap.
Andrew bought this gem back in 2003 and it has been a functioning mode of transportation for us for a total of about seven months, four hours, and twelve minutes since then. But not all at once.
You see, the cause of our disagreement over this "car" is that we put five or six hundred dollars into it, and it runs for about three months, and then we put another five hundred into it and it runs for another two weeks, and then Andrew has his buddy come over and look at it and they decide that it needs an entirely new, much bigger, much faster engine in it. Three years later, Andrew confesses that the problem was simply that a nut had come lose on the engine, and tightening it down fixed the problem, but a new motor sounded like so much more fun!
And then it breaks down again.
Andrew reminds me that we have no payment on this car, so five hundred dollars every few months shouldn't be a huge deal. Well, we also don't have a car with this car, so I call bull, and we end up pulling hair and throwing punches and biting until we're too exhausted to go on.
Ok, not really, but I think that after "discussing" the VW, we both feel like decking each other. For real.
The most recent "discussion" on this topic happened about a month ago when Andrew and I were budgeting our tax return. I saw no point in throwing away another chunk of money, and he couldn't understand how I classified that money as being "thrown away". I asked him if there was an end in sight? When will the madness end? If he has to pay $2K to get it running again and it only lasts for six months, THEN can we call it quits? Please??
He called an end to the discussion.
And finally, after all these years, I can say that I am the one who has decided to admit defeat. It's as if a light has been turned on inside my head and I can now see that Andrew will never be able to see this rationally. He is beyond reason, beyond help, just beyond. And if it's that important to him, then I have to give. I have to let it be, let it go and make peace with it. And I have. I know that I will have to live with this car for the rest of my life, and I ought to quit letting it take years off of that life.
But there is one area that I am not willing to give in. Despite how it looks in the above picture, that Bug is PURPLE. Not blue. It is metallic purple, and anyone who has seen it in person would agree with me. Except for Andrew, who insists that it is blue. Well, yeah, but only at certain angles. That car is purple.
My husband loves his purple car. And I love my husband enough to force my brain into it's happy place whenever we have to talk about it.
*This shall be an open discussion. I invite anyone on either side of the fence to state their views. also, I'm trying to spare feelings as best I can by discussing a certain behavior, not any certain persons.*
I was shopping at Winco a while back and I knew that I was facing a weekend with nothing to read and the library closed for a holiday, so I checked out what books they might have for me to buy. That's right, I said buy. As in purchase. Last time I did that - I don't even remember the last time I bought a book.
Aside from Danielle Steele, which isn't really my thing seeing as I get plenty turned on without having to read about other people doing it, the only thing they had that didn't involve religious stigmata, (also not my thing), was Twilight. I've read it before, of course, as have most females in America. It would be an easy read, finished quickly, just enough to get me through the weekend, so I bought it. But my feelings have not changed since I wrote this tidbit about freaks and are there really such things?
About a week after I finished reading Twilight, I saw a piece on an entertainment show late one night that reaffirmed my opinion that a huge portion of Twilight fans have taken their passion too far. There was a group of middle-aged women sitting on a couch, and they were telling an interviewer why they loved the series by Stephanie Meyer so much. One woman said, "It just makes you feel so...Happy!", and then she giggled like a 12 year-old. My thought was, "Her husband is a huge failure."
I could go off on a tangent right here about the possible reasons why more women are on anti-depressants in Utah than in any other state, but I shall refrain. Because I know a couple of people who are on them legitimately, as far as I know. I'm no doctor.
I understand the appeal of the book, to some extent. It is a good story. What I don't understand is public reaction to it. Everyone expects obsessive behavior from teenagers, but the Twilight series has become a major social fixation for women of more mature ages. Is it just the book? Is it the movie? Is it both? I've seen decals on people's car windows proclaiming love for Edward Cullen, I've seen women with teenage daughters of their own wearing t-shirts stating which team they are on; Edward or Jacob. I've heard of women who have vampire posters in their cubicles at work. And the list goes on... Is this type of feeling towards a book/movie healthy? Maybe there's nothing wrong with it?
When I was 16 or 17 I had a thing for Chris O'Donnell. I loved the Batman Forever movie so much that I talked my little brother into letting me have his Robin action figure, and I hung the plastic replica of my daydreams from the rear-view mirror in my Ford Aspire. He became a little soft and melty in the sun, but he spent a good three months in that sculpted pectoral shrine before he had shriveled like a metallic prune. So I'm not saying that I've never been a party to the behavior we're discussing, but I was much younger then. Currently, I do have a conceivably unhealthy affection for Willy Wonka . Both the wisdom of his imaginary person and his candy products. But for the most part, I keep it to myself and only think of it when I'm trying to decide between Nerds and Twizzlers at the grocery store.
For another example, the Harry Potter series also created a flurry of crazed fans...but it's not the same thing, I suppose. Is it because Harry Potter doesn't contain much romance? What exactly is the difference? Are there more examples of this kind of social phenomenon?
What I really want to know is this: Why is there so much hysteria over this book series? Yeah, it's an entertaining story, but what is the deal beyond that? Is it lust for the characters? Is it a secret wish that a reader could switch lives with the fictional heroine? An escape from real life that one is reluctant to leave? There are lots of amazing books out in the world, but I don't know of anyone so flustered and passionate about Shakespeare or Tolstoy pieces that it consumes a piece of their identity. I find myself perplexed by this behavior.
Theories? Thoughts?
