Why Can't Raising Children Pay For Itself?

You remember the scripture where God tells Adam that now that he ate the fruit of the tree of life, he's going to have to labor "by the sweat of thy brow"? Understandable. Work is an important element of life; now that we have it, we know that. Maybe not all of us--after all, Tevye dreams of having the easy life. But those of us with a little moderation can have the perspective to realize that, yeah, I'll take meaningful work over bumming around all day.

But, hey, I have a kid and he makes me sweat (at least as much as anybody sitting at a computer in an air conditioned office and often more). I'm working by the sweat of my brow and my pockets are still empty. Heck, if I didn't have a spouse in law school meriting a fellowship and loans up the wazoo, my fridge would be empty too. Many other mothers and potential mothers I know either are working while raising kids or are planning on working while having kids. Most everyone in a position like ours could really use the money, but many people choose to do both because they prefer it. People like that make me feel lazy because in reality what I want to spend most of my time doing is raising a passel of children. (Yes, that's right. I did just say "passel.")

In my ideal world, children would come with their own health insurance and there'd be an hourly wage for mothers per chore and per child. A friend of mine at church is working as a nanny for two kids. I can't help thinking, "She's doing my ideal job--in fact, my actual and current job (minus #2 kid)--but she's getting paid to do it." Of course, I realize there isn't anyone to pay me, and I realize that part of the benefit of being a parent is the sacrifice without monetary rewards. But I don't need the money as reward so much as I could really use it for, um, groceries or rent. Okay, I admit, a new Sunday skirt just might come out of this imaginary wage, but considering that my most recent acquisition in the skirt department is a few years old (not counting the clothes my mom got me for while I was pregnant), I hardly think that could qualify as a "reward," per se.

Realistically, I know that women who are raising kids and working are taking on more work than I am, but realistically the idea of me doing it gives me a migraine -- and I don't even get migraines. Partially, this is my own long-established bias that homes with stay-at-home moms who like staying-at-home are healthier and more ideal (with the caveat that mothers must socialize outside their families for this to be the case). Partially, this might be laziness, but I've never really thought of myself as lazy. I've always tried to do my work well. Perhaps that's the real issue. I am pretty sure that spreading myself so thinly would stretch me too taut to do a great job of being a mother, which, as I said, is really the only job I care about right now. I mean, as it is, I'm a live-in housekeeper of sorts and a full-time babysitter of sorts -- those are two pretty demanding jobs on their own. Sometimes I feel like that spreads me thin enough.

Admittedly, wanting to be exclusively a full-time mom is not a politically correct desire. (I read some article by a lady saying that women who choose to stay at home are deluded and stupid and ruining the world for every other woman -- the idiot's version of feminism.) And I know it really isn't how everybody else feels. But I suspect that everybody who has kids (even if they want to work outside the home) would be delighted if they could make some money doing it. But, as that isn't going to happen anytime soon, we'll just have to be a little creative with our saving techniques and possibly with our money-making devices. Ah, if only I were the Mary Kay or Lia Sophia type. But, alas, as anyone who knows me knows, I'm simply not. Something else incredibly flexible is just gonna have to present itself . . . oh, wait, anybody want to pay me for this novel-like blog entry? That's pretty much the next best thing. Let me just get my bank account information, so you can transfer the funds . . .

(Dear Kathleen, now that I know how much it annoys you not to have pictures, I suspect I will get a perverse pleasure out of any entry that doesn't have pictures. Isn't it nice to know I'm thinking of you?)