It's Wednesday, and I'm bored. I have a five day off maximum. Girl is working and I'm here with the dogs and the TV and errands to run and laundry to do, and I'm basically bored out of my fucking mind. It was not an unproductive day - I bought another pair of pants and two shirts for my new job, and tomorrow will be a much better day because I have the distraction of roofers ripping the roof off my house and dogs going to the vet and such, but by noon today I remembered why I flunked SAHM-ing. I'm lousy at the SAH part. Even when I did stay home, most of the time between Boy's birth and Girl's 1st birthday, we were never actually AT home, we were at the mall or the park or the zoo or a theme park (it was much cheaper then) or somewhere, because three consecutive days in the house are all I can endure without snapping. I went back to college when Girl was 10 months old and back to work when she was 3, so it's not like I didn't have any SAHM experience, I did, and it wasn't for me. Somehow I did all the things they did - ran Scout troops and coached Odyssey of the Mind and raised puppies and threw birthday parties and such - and worked too.
My thoughts turned in this direction when I thought - for about the millionth time - how abysmally fucked I would be now if I had opted to stay home with the kids. I was a working mother by choice, my husband made enough money to do the house with the pool and new cars and such. I chose to pursue my own path, and had I not prepared myself to be on my own, damn, I would be breathtakingly screwed right now. Bankrupt screwed. Living with my parents screwed. A life pissed away screwed, no identity screwed, starting over in middle age with no serious skills and no resume screwed. Instead I'll be starting a new job Monday, making even more money, and I'm putting a new roof on a house I own. Whenever I worry about the debt I was left to deal with or how "haaarrrd..." my life is compared to other people, I remind myself that things are really okay, and I'm fine.
Tomorrow the roof starts. I signed the contract on Monday. I have the additional fundage from the Insurance Company Which Must Not Be Named and can deposit that in the bank tomorrow, so I can write a check for about $8k on Friday. But another looming issue will be done. Amen.
Working up the back of the Ribby Cardie and feeling all re-energized to knit like a mad thing, which would be a lot more fun if my wrist wasn't bothering me, and if it wasn't 97 in the shade every damn day. Where is all the rain we had in June?
My mother says the same thing. There were six kids, two were just out of the house when Dad died at the age of 44 (heart disease).
ReplyDeleteMom had always worked because, like you, she couldn't stand the SAHM thing; plus, Dad didn't earn a huge wage... and there were a lot of kids.
When Dad died, he left Mom with four kids at home, ages 16, 7, 6, and 4.
Mom was always thankful that she had always worked. Otherwise, as you say, we would have been royally screwed.
It's a good thing you're not retirement age yet! Retirement can be pretty boring if you don't have activities to do, places to go, people to see, etc. to use up some of the time. Of course, in the heat we've had here, just staying inside in the air conditioning with a good book is satisfying ... but I wouldn't want to do it all the time.
ReplyDeleteGreat post, dear.
ReplyDeleteSaid perfectly, as ALWAYS...
ReplyDeleteand um, I MIGHT have been watching a certain tivo'd
Daily Show when the list was written...sigh...
I'm just sayin'
(grin)
greta
I stumbled across your blog and really like it! I think often of how abysmally fucked I would be, too, if I hadn't gone back to work when my daughter was 3. My husband divorced me soon afterwards. That was 7 years ago and while I think SAHM's are saints, I also wanted to have a job.
ReplyDeleteSee, I'm about to speak heresy here - I don't think SAHMs are saints. I think they are women who made a choice. I don't think working mothers are the ruin of society as we know it, I think they are women who made a choice too. I'm at the end of the working mother road with two grown kids, and I don't regret my choice at all. The grass is always greener, etc. - but looking back, I can see how it all could have gone so differently and so very, very badly, and how I could be utterly lost right now. To me, being a SAHM for an extended period of time without designig a career re-entry program is doing a highwire act without a net. Or rather, with an imaginary net. But that's just my perspective and life experience talking.
ReplyDelete