Not Good Enough?

Please enjoy a 'throwback' entry from Motherhood: Take 1 Published Sat., June 16, 2007

When you were a child what did you want to be when you grew up? Only recently did the answer to the question come to me and it's funny because I'm living out my childhood dream. When I was young I wanted to be a "housewife" and writer. Although I am still working out the kinks in my writing, I'm on my way and I've been a homemaker for about four years now.

So why didn't I want to be a doctor, a lawyer, a firefighter? My dad suggested I become a corporate lawyer when I was about six or seven, I agreed because anything daddy thought was good for me surely had to be. But as I got older, like eight, I thought it was so comforting to have my aunt around much of the time I spent in Indiana over summer breaks. She baked, took us to the park, and talked to me while we sat in the car waiting for my cousin to finish piano lessons. That, I thought, was the life and I wanted that life for myself and my family.

But I find it funny that when a woman wants to be a mother and wife and take care of home, she's short-changing herself. What's so wrong with me being here to raise my kids all day every day? Well, I know what's wrong with it on those especially insane days. But women who work full-time seem to think it a waste for me to stay home with my kids. Ask most mothers what their most rewarding job has ever been and I'll bet you two shiny nickels they'll say it's motherhood. So isn't ironic that too many moms think I'm lazy or unmotivated when I tell them I'm an at-home mom. What the hell screams lazy or unmotivated about taking care of kids 24/7? Working moms work all day, then come home to care for the kids and the house...we both have a lot to do I just do your weekend and evening job ALL day every day!

So yes, when I was a child I wanted to grow up and take care of my family. And now, that's just what I'm doing. If a woman, a mother, can knock that...then knock on sister.