Three weeks ago, our family joined 11% of our fellow Americans on the Unemployment Bandwagon when my husband was, quite unexpectedly, laid off from his job. He was informed of said lay off around 9:00 a.m. on a Wednesday and was home with his box of personal effects by 3:00 p.m. that same day. Done with that chapter. Just like that. Amazing how quickly and efficiently your life can be upended.
We are most certainly not at risk for going hungry anytime soon, although I’m comforted that we all genuinely like rice and beans. Nevertheless, we are well aware that another job could elude us for months. We are, therefore, in a World War Two-worthy “ration” mode and are collecting as many resources as possible while we can to stretch over an unforeseeable future.
Since the birth of our daughter two and a half years ago, I have worked only two days per week at the same agency where I worked prior to her birth. My preference would be to stay at home full-time, but given our financial needs and my mother’s generosity in caring for Madelyn while I’m away, I happily work part-time outside of the home. This past week at my agency, an opportunity presented itself, quite unexpectedly, for me to work full-time for the next 4-8 weeks. The ration-focused part of my brain screamed “Wise decision! What a blessing! Take it!” which, of course, I did. But my heart has been quietly quivering ever since at the thought of being away from my daughter 40+ hours per week, even if it is only time limited. I just love my kid. I have been smitten with her since those first popcorn kicks inside my belly, and I am simply too selfish and too possessive to relinquish the majority of her care and early education to anyone other than myself. Furthermore, I am quite comfortable with my traditional gender-specific role. I like grocery shopping and preparing the evening meal. It matters to me that the curtains are gathered with turquoise ribbons every morning and that the house just feels cozier with a spiced pumpkin candle burning. Folding laundry gives me a genuine sense of accomplishment, and don’t even get me started on my standards for a clean bathroom.
I suppose, however, that it will be valuable for my husband and I to try each other’s shoes on for a bit. I arrived home last week after a ten-hour workday and genuinely felt that I deserved a half-hour or so of decompression time before launching myself into the craziness that is dinnertime and bedtime. My husband has never ever asked for a post-work decompression time, and he probably wouldn’t take it even if I offered it. But it was nevertheless enlightening for me to experience the sense of entitlement, as well as the ginormous amount of will power it took to muster up the energy to play-redirect-play-redirect the rest of the evening. Bonus admiration points to the husband for enthusiastically leaping into toddler-land the minute he steps through the door.
For his part, I think he’s learning just how wrapped up in your child’s world and well-being you become when you spend literally every waking moment with her. He gets disproportionately frustrated when she won’t fall asleep, he knows how many bites of food she has consumed in each meal, and he proudly reports every detail of the day as if they all were critically significant – all classic “me” behaviors. My favorite thus far was the fury of texts I received one morning while he and Madelyn were at our local indoor play park. I routinely take Maddie to activities within our community – parks, the library, the Children’s Museum – and I am quite accustomed to seeing styles of parenting that are very different from our own. Unless someone is beating on their kid, I typically just make an editorial comment or two inside my head, smile, and then ignore them so Maddie and I can continue our adventure. But I forget how glaringly ridiculous these encounters are if they are not a part of your typical weekly routine. “Crazy hippie parents!” came his first text. Oh dear. Evidently, another two-year-old at the play park (it speaks volumes that I knew exactly which one he was talking about) was loudly and incessantly tantruming in the middle of the room. Arms and legs were flapping about, and the wails were reverberating through the spacious gymnasium with the acoustic power of five or six screaming toddlers. The boho not-so-chic mom reluctantly sauntered over after a minute or two, hesitantly leaned over, and said, “Radio, what do you want, baby? What do you want?” over and over until the kid finally lost interest after ten minutes or so and commenced running (at least quietly) amuck. Believe me: I know how nerve-shattering those experiences are and how frustrating it is to have to explain to your own gawking, confused child why some children are permitted to behave in ways that are not permissible for her. But I was genuinely tickled by how incensed my husband was by this incident; like it was a personal affront to his fatherhood to witness such wimpy, permissive parenting. (Please note, dear reader, that my husband is actually a fan of hippies: he’s married to one. “Hippie” seems to be the default label for a few too many stereotypes in our culture. I vote that we establish a new label for the overly permissive parent... perhaps “Permie” or just “Perm...” That way those of us cloth diapering, knitting, organic buying “hippies” don’t have to be tangentially insulted.)
It will be a colorful few weeks in our household to be sure. We will both be relieved to return to our preferred roles, but in the meantime, it is touching to see my daughter bond with her daddy in a way that not many children have an opportunity to do. Hopefully I can just remind myself of that the first time she reaches for him instead of me – he will undoubtedly have earned it :)
We are most certainly not at risk for going hungry anytime soon, although I’m comforted that we all genuinely like rice and beans. Nevertheless, we are well aware that another job could elude us for months. We are, therefore, in a World War Two-worthy “ration” mode and are collecting as many resources as possible while we can to stretch over an unforeseeable future.
Since the birth of our daughter two and a half years ago, I have worked only two days per week at the same agency where I worked prior to her birth. My preference would be to stay at home full-time, but given our financial needs and my mother’s generosity in caring for Madelyn while I’m away, I happily work part-time outside of the home. This past week at my agency, an opportunity presented itself, quite unexpectedly, for me to work full-time for the next 4-8 weeks. The ration-focused part of my brain screamed “Wise decision! What a blessing! Take it!” which, of course, I did. But my heart has been quietly quivering ever since at the thought of being away from my daughter 40+ hours per week, even if it is only time limited. I just love my kid. I have been smitten with her since those first popcorn kicks inside my belly, and I am simply too selfish and too possessive to relinquish the majority of her care and early education to anyone other than myself. Furthermore, I am quite comfortable with my traditional gender-specific role. I like grocery shopping and preparing the evening meal. It matters to me that the curtains are gathered with turquoise ribbons every morning and that the house just feels cozier with a spiced pumpkin candle burning. Folding laundry gives me a genuine sense of accomplishment, and don’t even get me started on my standards for a clean bathroom.
I suppose, however, that it will be valuable for my husband and I to try each other’s shoes on for a bit. I arrived home last week after a ten-hour workday and genuinely felt that I deserved a half-hour or so of decompression time before launching myself into the craziness that is dinnertime and bedtime. My husband has never ever asked for a post-work decompression time, and he probably wouldn’t take it even if I offered it. But it was nevertheless enlightening for me to experience the sense of entitlement, as well as the ginormous amount of will power it took to muster up the energy to play-redirect-play-redirect the rest of the evening. Bonus admiration points to the husband for enthusiastically leaping into toddler-land the minute he steps through the door.
For his part, I think he’s learning just how wrapped up in your child’s world and well-being you become when you spend literally every waking moment with her. He gets disproportionately frustrated when she won’t fall asleep, he knows how many bites of food she has consumed in each meal, and he proudly reports every detail of the day as if they all were critically significant – all classic “me” behaviors. My favorite thus far was the fury of texts I received one morning while he and Madelyn were at our local indoor play park. I routinely take Maddie to activities within our community – parks, the library, the Children’s Museum – and I am quite accustomed to seeing styles of parenting that are very different from our own. Unless someone is beating on their kid, I typically just make an editorial comment or two inside my head, smile, and then ignore them so Maddie and I can continue our adventure. But I forget how glaringly ridiculous these encounters are if they are not a part of your typical weekly routine. “Crazy hippie parents!” came his first text. Oh dear. Evidently, another two-year-old at the play park (it speaks volumes that I knew exactly which one he was talking about) was loudly and incessantly tantruming in the middle of the room. Arms and legs were flapping about, and the wails were reverberating through the spacious gymnasium with the acoustic power of five or six screaming toddlers. The boho not-so-chic mom reluctantly sauntered over after a minute or two, hesitantly leaned over, and said, “Radio, what do you want, baby? What do you want?” over and over until the kid finally lost interest after ten minutes or so and commenced running (at least quietly) amuck. Believe me: I know how nerve-shattering those experiences are and how frustrating it is to have to explain to your own gawking, confused child why some children are permitted to behave in ways that are not permissible for her. But I was genuinely tickled by how incensed my husband was by this incident; like it was a personal affront to his fatherhood to witness such wimpy, permissive parenting. (Please note, dear reader, that my husband is actually a fan of hippies: he’s married to one. “Hippie” seems to be the default label for a few too many stereotypes in our culture. I vote that we establish a new label for the overly permissive parent... perhaps “Permie” or just “Perm...” That way those of us cloth diapering, knitting, organic buying “hippies” don’t have to be tangentially insulted.)
It will be a colorful few weeks in our household to be sure. We will both be relieved to return to our preferred roles, but in the meantime, it is touching to see my daughter bond with her daddy in a way that not many children have an opportunity to do. Hopefully I can just remind myself of that the first time she reaches for him instead of me – he will undoubtedly have earned it :)
