A carreer?
Mar. 14th, 2013 08:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dancingsingingSo, a while ago I wrote one of my many posts-in-my-head about a realization that hit me all at once--how much my choice to be home with my kids is economic. Like, it's totally true that I think the work I do is important, and that I think it serves my children best to have a lot of time with me when they are very young. But if teaching preschool paid as well as Spouse's engineering job? You bet your sweet bippy I'd be off doing it, leaving dear Spouse at home stressing out because how in the hell do you make dinner while the baby's screaming?! And if gender socialization was different and if our dominant cultural narrative treated teaching as equally important to engineering, I'd totally be arguing that my important work that supports the family requires that *I* be the one to get a good night's sleep and Spouse just has to cope because, you know, he /could/ do his job at home without sleeping. Hell yes, I would. In a hot minute. It's disturbing to me how much my feelings about the Importance of Mommy Being Home might just be some lame justification. (Not saying it is for other women and men who stay home and do domestic stuff! Just me!)
So then, today, I heard this great interview on the DIane Ream show with Cheryl S(mumble, mumble) (I swear, that's time-constraint, not laziness!) the COO of Facebook about women and careers and her book and social project Lean In. And I'm thinking, hell, Spouse has a head start, but there probably is a job out there that I would enjoy and be good at that pays about the same as an engineering salary. I don't know about that transition, where I'm needing to be in school or learning or whatever, which makes it kind of hard to have Spouse stay home while I do it; I mean, it's nice for the family to income More than nice. But still, I have this feeling that if I could just figure it out, there would be a way to swap with Spouse, get some fucking sleep, be the one who gets to do the thing our culture calls important, and, like, have an adult life.
I mean, I made as much per hour as Spouse when I was a contract tech writer, but I didn't have benefits or guaranteed hours, which are both necessary to be the breadwinner. Also, I hated it.
So then, today, I heard this great interview on the DIane Ream show with Cheryl S(mumble, mumble) (I swear, that's time-constraint, not laziness!) the COO of Facebook about women and careers and her book and social project Lean In. And I'm thinking, hell, Spouse has a head start, but there probably is a job out there that I would enjoy and be good at that pays about the same as an engineering salary. I don't know about that transition, where I'm needing to be in school or learning or whatever, which makes it kind of hard to have Spouse stay home while I do it; I mean, it's nice for the family to income More than nice. But still, I have this feeling that if I could just figure it out, there would be a way to swap with Spouse, get some fucking sleep, be the one who gets to do the thing our culture calls important, and, like, have an adult life.
I mean, I made as much per hour as Spouse when I was a contract tech writer, but I didn't have benefits or guaranteed hours, which are both necessary to be the breadwinner. Also, I hated it.
