This Reminds Me

Archive for May 29th, 2007

Some days, I despair of my kids ever getting along.  It’ll start with a filched hair brush or a changed TV channel or a muttered insult, and quickly escalate into full-fledged warfare.  I find the ugly words and wasted energy difficult to observe and exhuasting to stop.

Finally I will shout, “Girls!  Stop it!  Show Jesus to your sister!”  They generally stop for a moment, then begin afresh until I separate them.  They are each a master at hurling the vicious insults that hurt worse than any punch or poke.

Adult women can act the same.  Julia and I were waiting in line at HEB on Memorial Day, picking up those last minute items before friends came for dinner.  The woman behind me was trying to corral two smaller, squirmy kiddos.  We got to talking while I unloaded my cart and Julia skated around us on her Heelys….yeah, I got the cheap Pepsi, too…..those melons did look fresh…..don’t you love that HEB Buddy Buck machine……oh, how nice to have this holiday with my husband cleaning out the garage…  She asked, “So where does your husband work?”  To which I replied, “We both work for AT&T.”

A slight pause, and her response, “Oh.  I thought you were a real mom.”

Hmmmmm.   A real mom.

Friends at work were quick to send gifts for Julia, including these capris from Sharon.  Two friends made at work – Vicki and Mary Ann – each stayed with Rachel, Lois and Hannah a week so we could meet Julia and bring her home.

Every working-outside-the-home mother I know struggles with what’s “best” for her family.  It is true – being a two-career family has interfered with things my kids have wanted to do.  As best I can remember, Keith and/or I have made every single evening play, science fair, math night, choir performance, Reflections display, teacher conference, etc. – but there have been events during the day that we simply could not attend.

Hannah accompanied me the office one day in August, 2004, when I edited product content for www.sbc.com.   When my friend Vicki called her at my desk, Hannah explained, “My mom doesn’t really work.  She just types and talks on the phone.”

I’ve noticed growing schisms among women, and those bother me.  Mothers who stay home and those who also work outside the home (we all work in the home.)  Women who home school, women who insist on private school and those of us that use public schools.  (I could never home school because I’m pro-life.)  Women who breast feed vs. bottle feed.   Women who try to defer on every point and women who try to make informed decisions.  Differences are always there, but the schisms grow when we insist there’s one right way for every family.

My mom worked until Judy started school, then returned to work when I was 12.  I am not an ax murderer.  I’ve never ingested a street drug.  I’ve never been arrested.  I’ve had a full-time job and paid plenty’o'taxes since the day after I graduated from high school, including my five years in college.  I was baptized at age 18 and acknowledge Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior.  Am I perfect?  No way, Jose.  But I cannot blame my faults, flaws and falls on my working mom.   One day, I hope my girls look back and say the same.

Friends from work lined up (literally) when Lois-the-Preemie and I needed blood.

I read a thought-provoking Wall Street Journal piece when Rachel was just a baby that greatly influenced me.  Basically, a huge study of two-career homes proved that kids from them were just as happy and productive as one-career homes provided two conditions were met.  (1)  Mom had to be happy.  Dad could be unhappy and Mom could make up for it at home, but if Mom was unhappy, wasn’t nobody happy.  (2)  Mom and Dad needed to find out what was most important to their kids and do those things.  They couldn’t do everything, so find out what was most important and concentrate on that stuff and don’t stress about the rest.

And that is how Keith and I try to live.  We try to make each other happy and we do the things that are most important to our kids.

Baby Rachel and my dear friend Diane Konen at the 1992 Pioneer Picnic.  My kids attended many happy events in Houston, courtesy of my job.  Rachel still talks about my pulling her out of school early in second grade so we could go check out Southwestern Bell’s sponsorship of Space Center Houston.  Now they tolerate my chatting it up with the AT&T U-verse sales people at the HEB.  Hey, AT&T U-verse pays my salary which makes a trip to the grocery store possible.  So go get us some bananas while I talk to this guy, okay?

I know many women feel biblically called to stay home.   I understand that.  But…. I also admire Rahab – in the lineage of Jesus – who hid Joshua and Caleb in the flax drying on her roof which she undoubtedly plan to weave and sell.  And Lydia, the weaver of purple, one of Paul’s commended converts.  Thes psalmist tells us “…(a worthy woman) considers a field and buys it from her earnings.” And Jesus himself accepted the perfumed, souful gift of a working girl.

So to the woman behind me in line at HEB, I smiled and said, “I am a real mom.”

And to any other women who feed the schisms instead of acknowledging the differences, I say:

“Girls.  Stop it.  Show Jesus to your sister.”