Women's work doesn't stop at the office

As a parent, I want my boys to recognize that we live in a world when men and women have the potential to be anything they want to be, and my daughter should know that when she grows up, if she decides to have children, it isn’t a foregone conclusion that she must put aside her career and stay home with them. If that’s what she chooses, that’s fine, but what’s important is that she understands it’s a choice.

I never grew up thinking that the choice had to be one or the other, because I watched my mother.

She grew up in the 1950s and 1960s and married just weeks after high school. Widowed at a young age with two little girls, she and my dad got married when I was 2, and she’s my mom in every way that counts. Mom taught all three of us girls the importance of finding a job that’s enjoyable, learning it, doing it well, having a strong work ethic and knowing that if we had to, we could make it on our own. That’s because those are lessons she had to learn the hard way – pulling herself up by her bootstraps, heading back to school, training, opening her own business and later embarking on a career in small-business management.

I can’t say that I missed out on anything because both of my parents worked. Mom was involved with us at school. We ate dinner together every night until we were old enough that our part-time jobs and extracurricular activities pulled us in multiple directions. We had a lot of family time, including church activities and softball, with dad as the head coach and mom taking care of first base.

She was a Girl Scout leader, chauffeur, Sunday School teacher – I can’t really think of anything she didn’t do because of her work. My dad was an example in his own right, teaching sportsmanship on the softball field and proving that, although difficult, it is possible to earn a college degree at night while working a full-time job and helping raise kids.

Fast forward, and I’m a 21-year-old college student, married with a baby on the way.

I was about halfway through my studies to become a journalist, something I’d wanted to do for a very long time. The fact that I was becoming a mother served more as a motivator, because I knew that my degree would put me on a path to a brighter future. That, and the fact that my mentor, upon learning of my pregnancy, told me I couldn’t be a journalist and a mother. I can’t stand to be told I can’t do something!

By the time I finally got that coveted piece of paper from Missouri State University, we had two little boys. It might have been easier to stay home, and I probably would have enjoyed it, for a while, but I wanted to get out and use the degree it took me six long years to earn. So that’s what I did.

Now that our boys (ages 11 and 9) have been joined by a sister who’s 4, I really do understand the whole juggling act that many professional women talk about. Life is a balancing act, but like my parents, I make the time for my kids – PTA, soccer, baseball, school programs, class parties, church activities, you name it. Evenings and weekends are family time, and while I don’t always leave work at the office, if it comes home, it doesn’t get done until the rest of the crew is sleeping.

I should note that I’m lucky to have a husband who gets much of the credit for the system we have, whether he’s giving me encouragement when things get crazy, taking a turn cooking dinner or getting the kids ready for school.

We’ve always had an equal partnership, working together through things. We do have an agreement, though, that he does laundry and I tackle dishes, but it’s not so much a man-woman thing as it is that he’d rather jab a stick in his eye than wash dishes, and I’m not too efficient in the laundry room. I have a nasty habit of overstuffing the machine and throwing it off balance.

I think that we’re on the right track, setting an example of marriage as an equal partnership and proving that it is possible for a woman to have both a career and a family.

Alas, my work is not yet finished. During a family vacation this summer, with no plans other than getting the house in order for the beginning of school, my 9-year-old son informed me that he would help out with everything but dishes, because those are “women’s work.” I can understand why he might think dishes fall to women, since I’m in charge of them at our house, but I don’t know where he heard that phrase, which, by the way, I strongly dislike. I’ll give you one guess which kid pulled dish duty for the week! On the plus side, he conceded that dishes aren’t so bad, and agreed that anyone who dirties a dish is capable of cleaning it, too.

I’ll be patient. I know there are still people out there who think men should serve in some roles and women in others, but the best way I know to address that is to set an example for my children so they know that’s not the case. It’ll be interesting to see what lessons they take away from childhood.

Maria Hoover is features editor of Springfield Business Journal. She may be reached at mhoover@sbj.net.[[In-content Ad]]