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Posted by on Monday, May 5, 2008 at 11:54 AM (PST)
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HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ME!
As I may have mentioned in previous blogs, my mother didn’t work. Well, that’s not exactly fair to say, since being a full-time, stay-at-home mom is about the toughest, most all-consuming work on the planet, but while she’d worked before having children (she had an art gallery in NYC’s SOHO), she didn’t have an out-of-the-house, paying job once she became a mom.
For me, there were pros & cons in that my mother didn’t have a career. On the one hand, she was always around for us … which was GREAT. On the other hand, she was always around for us … which was, well, stifling, at times. Especially once we became teenagers.
My children are a long way away from their teenage years (thank goodness I have time before crossing into the strange, new land of moodiness and autonomy!), but every day I feel both the pros & the cons of being a working mother. On the one hand, I can’t be present for my kids every moment of every day … which is really difficult on all of us. We miss each other, and both the kids & I have a constant sense of sadness (mine mingled with a good, strong dose of GUILT) when I miss important milestones or painful boo-boos. On the other hand, I feel good about what it is I’m doing when I’m not with them … which alleviates some of my guilt (some of the time, anyway) & with any luck, makes me something of a role model for them.
One of the things I regard with equal measures of apprehension & assurance is that question (usually asked in a shaky voice through a veil of tears), “but Mommy, I don’t want you to leave! Why do you have to go to work?!”
Straightforward as this question may seem, it’s a tricky one to explain to children aged 2 & 3 years-old. The whole “that’s just what grown-ups have to do” usually won’t cut it. (In fact, pretty much any answer to any question is met with an immediate follow-up, “but why?!”) It’s a challenge to make little children understand the concept of working for a living. First there’s the whole idea of making money in return for putting out effort. I try my best to equate that to our own rewards system within our household (ie: if you clean up your mess, then you’ll get to go to the carousel). That seems to work fairly well, at least with my 3-year-old. But conveying the notion of ‘feeling good about what you spend your time & energy on’ is a little more complicated.
I desperately want my children to know that when I’m not with them, I’m doing something I think is important – in fact, I need them to know it. Honestly, it’s the only way I can face leaving the house every morning & frequently getting on an airplane for an out-of-town business trip. It’s not just that we’re looking for a way to make a living with Tastybaby (trust me, if that were the only goal, Shannan & I could find plenty of things to do that involved way fewer headaches!). It’s that we truly believe we’re bringing something of quality and significance to the marketplace. We feel good about what we’re doing & how we’re going about it & I dearly hope that my children will agree!
I try to tell them that “Mommy & Shannan are busy making wonderful, healthy food for little babies so they can grow strong like both of you.” (I’ll start weaving in our commitment to responsible & “green” business practices in the near future!) Whenever I see my daughter proudly wearing a “Tasty” t-shirt or toting one of our bags, I have to think I’m getting through. With my son, who’s probably too young to grasp the bigger concepts at-hand, my reward is the way he gobbles up our Bangos & Peas on Earth with such enthusiasm.
So, this Mother’s Day, my gift will be taking a break from the guilt (oh, it’ll be back on Monday morning, you can be sure of it!) & basking in the knowledge that what makes me feel less-than-thrilled about the times I’m away from my family is something that I – and they – can feel pretty good about … whether they know it yet, or not!
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