"Do you work?"

I follow a few irreverent motherbloggers from Chicago who, I shit you not, swear more than I do.  They are Baby Sideburns and People I Want to Punch in the Throat, as well I Just Want to Pee Alone.

Baby Sideburns has a blog up this morning that re-hashes the notion of what a stay-at-home mom would be paid, should she perform her duties with pay.  You can read it here.

Now, I do not think that I should be paid to be at home with my child.  I do think we should get some hella good tax breaks and whatnot, but not necessary a paycheck.  There's a point I do agree with, and it is the following:

"Do you work?"  I know, I know, a common complaint, I'm not the first and I'm not the last, but this is a standard question asked by just about everyone.  It comes right after the, "So, what do you do?" standard new-meeting-interview question.  The "do you work?" riposte always comes right after the statement, "I help my husband with his home-based business and am at home with my kid, and I am heavily involved as an official in an amateur sport."  This answer just isn't enough for people; they just need more than that because society has taught them that the SAHM (stay at home mom) is not enough, not a contributor, not a moverandashaker - they aren't satisfied with this image and therefore neither should I.  There's an soupçon of 'is that all?' that spreads across their faces and tones that inevitably comes with the added spices of total incomprehension, some disgust, and quite frankly, total, utter disinterest.  The sign I see stretched across their foreheads reads BORING and NOTWORTHMYTIME.  The standard follow-up 'do you work' is often presented more as a second chance to redeem myself, as though one could not possibly just stay at home with a child and be happy and/or interesting.  The more insensitive and brash worker drones actually ask the question with a different phrasing : they say, "But...  you work, right?".   Of course, I don't really encourage further conversation with the brainwashed automatons by issuing my standard answer, to whit: "No, the TV watches my kid while the cabana boy serves me margaritas by the pool all day long."  But quite frankly, most of these people don't hear the answer because their chins are already turning to the next person, someone who is actually interesting and not a waste of time to talk to.

I understand this attitude from some men.  I can also understand this to a certain extent coming from women who don't have children.  Until some people actually work with children or have some of their own, they imagine being at home with a child being this bliss-filled life of book clubs, pleasurable shopping and scrap-booking - or whatever other shit I have no time for and no interest in - because caring for kids is easy : you feed 'em, you supply them toys and DVDs and you're set.  No alarm clocks, no commute, no traffic, no boss...  You read your book-club novel on a park bench while your child plays blissfully on the playground. (Disclaimer : as a former educator, I always referred to SAHMs as women who do not work outside the home.)

I don't forgive women who treat me this way when they have children.  Because these women should know better, they should know that there's no peaceful sitting on park benches with a pre-schooler when nobody else is at the park on a weekday and even if there were, he needs you to intervene in a very hands-on manner because he doesn't want to share the slide with anyone and screams at them to get off, and needs you to tell him that sand is not for throwing, and needs you to check his pants 40 times in an hour because you're in the middle of potty-traning and there is no bathroom at the playground (which he would refuse to use anyway)...  See, I get that the childless professsional doesn't get that, but not other mothers.

Other mothers should know better.  Other mothers should know that while you are in the presence and responsible for a baby, toddler or preschooler, that child is the boss.  Not in the sense that the child orders you around and whatnot (not in my house anyway), but in the sense that your entire schedule, your entire day, revolves around this persons needs.  If your Little Person (LP) is going on his next snack or meal, all other plans go out the window and you have to stop and eat.  Period.  If the LP needs a nap, you are not dashing to the drug store that afternoon.  If your LP needs a nap and refuses to do so, you are SoL on pretty much EVERYTHING you needed to do that day, because the day is now devoted to taking care of a crabby, loud, floppy, teary, unmotivated and unreasonable shit-and-spit machine that does stuff like insist they cling onto you on the couch to watch Cars for the three thousandth time, but insists on keeping his hand on your face because he's decided that you aren't allowed to watch the movie and you must look at the wall.  Nor are you allowed to speak, comment, sneeze or go put a load of clothes into the machine.  So you sit there, getting nothing done except get more tears and snot on your shirt because you inadvertently glanced at the TV and set off the LP all over again... 

Oh, you could choose not to do any of these things and insist on making your LP conform to your schedule, but you quickly learn that only person you punish by doing this is yourself.  And you turn yourself into one of those annoying, whiny parents who complain that you have whiny, annoying children that you 'can't take anywhere'.  See, I can take my child anywhere, as long as I've otherwise respected his needs and schedule...  But I digress...

Yeah, other mothers should know better.  They should know better through the sigh of relief they let out once the door of the daycare closes behind them in the morning and through the brace-for-impact breath of air they take before stepping inside to pick them up at night.  They should know that when they get a report of a "bad day" and a bag full of vomity clothes that had they been at home, THEY would have dealt with the vomit puddle, the tears, the change of clothes, the laundry - everything from start to finish, which is what a SAHM does.  No respite.  No union breaks.   No window-shopping on your lunch hour and picking up a new shirt for that thing you're invited to on the weekend.  No stopping at the drug store (alone and unfettered) on your way to or from the daycare.  No sitting at your desk with a coffee while you quietly check your email.  No lunch at that new Thai place around the corner.  No adult conversations with other parents, trading tips or recipes.  No special donut day for somebody's birthday.  While you are doing all of that, I am absolutely not having a grand ol' time with Manuel the Cabana Boy.  And you know it.

Now, I understand that you don't want to hear the minute details of how I got my LP to sit on a potty and consistently produce pee all last week.  I know better, I won't do that to you.  I also understand that some people avoid the subject of my being at home with my LP because they would love to be able to it too, and can't, and therefore avoid the subject.

And I already listed the wonderful 'no' list in my life (no commute, no traffic, no worrying about being late) and so I don't want to harp on comparing my daily life to that of a work-outside-the-home mom (I do refuse to use the term 'working mom' however).  This post is all about how people lack respect, and I won't make my point by implying I don't respect the WOtH moms - I respect them so much that I don't know how they do it.

The point here is that I don't get the same respect back.  And all this is illustrated by a single exchange I had a few weeks ago.

In the course of my volunteer work, I've been on a federation committee for a few years - and often felt like a committee of 1 person until this year, when they asked a second official to be part of the committee as well.  Yay!  Some qualified help!  Especially appreciated for the yearly training seminar that I have been planning, organizing, powerpointing for and presented alone almost every year. 

Almost a month before the seminar, I contact this new committee member to see if she can do a part of the training.  She says she'll think about it and concoct an activity.

 Two weeks out, I still don't have any details or anything resembling a plan. 

One week before, I prompt again and get told that it will be a short, 15-minute activity.  So I pick up the slack, plan another activity to complete the training and the schedule. 

I wait until Tuesday to hand in and distribute the final schedule.  I work until late at night both Tuesday and Wednesday to complete everything (you remember how it's impossible to get something like that done while the LP is awake, right)?  So it's all about midnight powerpoint sessions (after I edit that letter hubby needs to send first thing tomorrow, you know, the kind of stuff that keeps money in the account and food on the table...)

Thursday afternoon, 24 hours before the seminar starts, I get somewhat giddy email saying that the 15-minute activity will now be more like 45, because the person really gets carried away once she gets started, haha, I hope that's ok!

Well, no it's not OK, because you basically are unreliable and wasted my precious (sleep) time, and have now messed up my fucking plan and schedule.  But all this is not the completely insulting and annoying part.

The insulting part is when I call another mom/official to kvetch about the total lack of respect for the seminar, my time and my efforts, this other WOtH mom tells me the following:

"I know it's annoying, but cut her some slack and accommodate her like you always end up doing with everyone, because you rock.  And after all, she has a job."

And that, folks, sums up my entire point.  It's okay if another mom shits all over my time and effort because she has a "job".  I have to respect her, but in return, I basically get dismissed.

Do I work?  Yeah, I fucking work and am on-duty 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (compounded by the hubby's home-based consulting business - and if you think that means he's home and therefore helping me with the kid, well...  I may have another blog post for you real soon...). 

I don't want to be paid for any of this. 

But a little goddam respect for my fucking time and efforts would certainly be appreciated.