“Occupation: Housewife”, it said on my grandmother’s passport, next to her face. It almost made me cry.
To see such a great woman described by such a mundane word felt like gross injustice. I looked at her and said: “Housewife?”. She didn’t have much of a reaction to it. Generations of women have not had much of a reaction to anything used to describe them, because sexism and misogyny is so prevalent that we’re like fish in water. I thought about what words I would prefer. “Homemaker” was an improvement – she had made a home for her children and her grandchildren and that was no easy task. But even that didn’t fully capture it. There is no word or phrase that fully captures the value of the thankless tasks carried out by people who weren’t/aren’t out in the workplace, or were/are in the workplace part-time.
“Being a parent is the hardest thing I’ve ever done” said one of my female friends. She is one of the smartest people I know, a genius whose academic prowess at University always used to impress me. I believe her totally.
Full-time work is so glorified in our society that anyone who is doing less than is made to feel like they aren’t really a “heavy-hitter” or ambitious or contributing to society. This, of course, is a load of BS. Many people who are not working full-time are contributing more to society than people who spend 12 hours in an office attending meetings, pea-cocking in presentations and pushing paper and creating the illusion of adding value.
I am now convinced – any successful household needs significant excess “bandwidth” to function, thrive and enjoy life. I want to draw a distinction here: it’s not that people who are working like crazy are bad people and people who aren’t are good. Disentangling behavior and identity is key. It’s quite simply that work takes up bandwidth. When you work 60+ hours a week, you lose task bandwidth and emotional bandwidth to deal with other issues. The people who are not working full-time are the ones who have the bandwidth to be present to listen to your problems, to solve your problems, to fix things around the house, to change that light-bulb, to remind you when a bill is due, to fix healthy meals, and most importantly to CARE. You can outsource a ton of tasks in your life if you have money, such as cleaning, cooking, personal admin, but you can’t yet outsource the tasks of caring and loving. I’m not sure you ever could because of the authenticity required for the completion of these tasks.
A household where no one has any bandwidth to do these tasks is an incomplete household. A person who has no bandwidth to care or love is an incomplete person. This is the type of person I could have become pretty easily with no formally assigned familial responsibilities and an intense job, and sometimes when I zone out mid-conversation with a family member or friend to think about my to-do list or concerns, I feel like I am behaving like this person.
But for the most part in my 20s, I consciously chose to not become that person. When I had time off, I chose to come home and spend time with family rather than travel the world. When I had the option of more time off, I took it off to spend it with family. I know the storyline of “I messed up my 20s and I’m now a transformed phoenix” is more appealing, but I’m not one for easy storylines, and I am cautiously proud – I actually did a lot of things right in my 20s. I focused on doing a lot of things that didn’t “count” on my resume, my Facebook, or my outwardly status in society – but they counted a lot to my relationships with my family and my friends.
As I go into my 30s though, I feel more fearful about maintaining this balance. My parents are getting older and I expect and want my career to grow. I can’t even imagine adding children to the mix. I find it hard to balance my desire to make change in the world which requires focused hard work, and to be a person who can be a source of positive energy and attention for my family and friends. How do you do it people? or rather – do you do it at all?
As I think about it all and what “success” means to me in the next decade, I want to keep a quote in mind:
“Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.” – Albert Einstein
My grandmother has tirelessly performed the tasks of caring and loving for 84 years of her life, with no explicit thank you from anyone for a lifetime of more full-time work than any high-powered executive or CEO. It doesn’t “count” on her passport, it counts a million stars worth to me.
Stiletto Muse 