Half Changed World

Last week, I borrowed Fly Away Home from the library to watch with D.  I winced when I realized within the first few minutes of the movie that they were about to kill off the mother, but it was done subtly enough that I think it went straight over D’s head.  He  loved the movie, and is going around saying that he’s going to ask for it for his sixth birthday (which is only 11 1/2 months away).

We finished our reading of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe over the weekend.  Prompted by Jody’s lovely description of reading scary stories to an empty room, with her kids peaking around the doorway, it occurred to me that I probably shouldn’t send D to bed having just read the chapter in which Aslan is killed.  So we read two chapters that night, moving right from the death to the rebirth, with hardly a chance to think in between.

Sunday night we watched March of the Penguins.  Some of you are probably seeing the problem coming, but I was totally blindsided.  I wasn’t sure D would have the patience to sit through the whole thing, but he did.  And then some of the eggs were dropped and froze.  And some of the adult penguins were eaten by the leopard seals.  And when the big blizzard hit just after the eggs hatched, and some of the penguins chicks froze to death, he looked at the pictures of the pathetic little bodies and asked if they were going to come back to life.  And we said no, in this world people and animals don’t come back to life when they’re dead.  And he burst into tears. 

We stopped the movie and held him, and agreed that yes, it is sad, and yes, it’s ok to cry, and no, we don’t know why everything has to die.  And after a bit he calmed down and blew his nose, and we watched the rest of the movie.

Of all the things I want for my children, I think I most want them to develop empathy, to be people who pay attention to how things affect others, to be mensches.   But I don’t want them to be what a friend calls "skinless," totally exposed to the harshness and craziness of the world.   

When I took the intro to women’s studies class in college, Betty Friedan was hardly mentioned.  To the extent that she was discussed, she was mostly dismissed for focusing exclusively on the needs of straight, white, middle-class women.  To some degree, the problem was that she had succeeded so well — to my generation of younhg women, the idea that anyone would take satisfaction in gleaming floors was pretty much incomprehensible, so her insights seemed obvious.

And yet, here I am, in 2006, writing on a semi-regular basis about who vacuums the floor and picks up the dirty socks.  In some ways the world has been radically transformed since in 1963; in other ways, not so much.

Last month, Sandy at the imponderabilia of actual life wondered whether yesterday’s "housewives" are the same as today’s "SAH-moms."  I do think, for better or worse, the feminist revolution made it harder for women to take pride in a well-kept house.  But, in a world where children’s success can’t be taken for granted, regardless of their parents’ situation, investing time and effort in childrearing makes more sense.

The problem, however, is that childrearing is much less predictable than housecleaning.  Housecleaning is sometimes tiring, often boring, always repetitive.  But you can pretty much guarantee that if you put in the effort, you’ll get the results.  There’s something satisfying about knowing that. (I can’t be the only one who scrubs the stove or the tub when angry or frustrated.)  Childrearing is ultimately not predictable in the same way.

I’m tired, fighting off a cold, and depressed by the passage of the so-called "Deficit Reduction Act" (somehow I don’t think they’re going to call the tax cut bill the Deficit Expansion Act).  I suppose we could claim a moral victory that it only passed by a single vote, and that with a fair amount of arm twisting, but that doesn’t strike me as much comfort for the families getting kicked off of Medicaid.

So, here’s a bit of total fluff:

I got an email last week letting me know that a 4-DVD set of the Electric Company is being released next week, and offering me a review copy.  I accepted with enthusiasm, having fond, but vague, memories of it from my childhood.  As far as I can tell, it hasn’t been available until now, so I’m looking forward to seeing whether it stands up to the test of time — and whether my kids like it.  I’ll post a review when I get it, but if you know you want it, you can preorder it from Amazon.  (And yes, my husband and I are totally in the target demographic for this — we already have the complete Schoolhouse Rock.)

Update:

1) Dawn at this woman’s work has a much more thought out post about the Electric Company. 

2)  My review copy came today and we watched the first two episodes this evening.  D watched with enthusiasm, and asked for more when the first episode ended.  I’m surprised at how little my memory was jogged.  I don’t know if they ran reruns — if not, it’s quite likely that I only saw the later episodes.  (Without giving away my exact age, I will say that the compilation includes the episode that was run on the day I was born.)

3)  It’s quite fascinating comparing The Electric Company with its modern counterpart, Between the Lions.  Some parts of BtL (Sam Spud, Cliff Hanger) seem to be direct riffs off of ideas from TEC.  The big difference is that each episode of BtL is organized around a story as well as as a phonic element.  It seems that TEC was more of a true variety show, with no real plot. 

Today’s book is Barack Obama’s memoir, Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.  He wrote it shortly after he graduated from law school, when he attracted attention as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, and it was reprinted in 2004 after his stunning keynote address at the Democratic Convention. 

I was a big fan of Obama before reading this book (see here and here), and it confirmed my enthusiasm for him.  He writes eloquently of the contradictions of his life — a black man whose only family as a child was white (he only met his father once, when he was 10, and didn’t meet the Kenyan side of his family until he was an adult), a community organizer who had instant credibility in inner city Chicago because of the color of his skin, but who grew up in Hawaii and Indonesia.  And he recognizes the contradictions of others’ lives, but points them out without judgement.  He’s capable of both acknowledging how important Harold Washington’s election as Mayor of Chicago was to many African-Americans and of pointing out how little business as usual changed as a result.

The American Prospect has a cover story on Obama this month.  It notes that he has been — deliberately — low profile in the Senate over the past year, but that he clearly dreams big.  The part I found most interesting was about his ability to disagree with people, to vote against them, and still leave them feeling respected and listened to.  That’s a rare, and powerful, talent.  I’m very much looking forward to seeing what Obama does when he’s no longer worrying about stepping on his colleagues’ toes.

No post tonight, because I’m going to torture myself by watching the State of the Union address.

Instead, I point you to some terrific reading elsewhere:

Wampum very generously hosts the Koufax awards (e.g. blog awards for lefties).  Only a few categories are up so far, but there’s lots of interesting posts in there:

Categories include:

• Best single post.  I’ve only read a handful of the entries, but the one that I forwarded to my friends at the time it came out is the proper reverence due those who have gone before.
• Most Deserving of Wider Recognition.   I’ve been nominated, so have Geeky Mom and Echidne
• Best New Blog
• Best state and local blogs

(Has anyone done an OPML file of all the nominees?  I see a lot of people putting them in their blogrolls, but there’s no way I have the time to do that manually.)

I’d also like to point out the new BlogHer site, which is doing a great job of highlighting interesting posts from a range of different blogs, mostly by women.    Cynical Mom and Anne have already announced that they’re attending the convention this year.  I wish I could be there, but can’t justify the $$ and time to schlepp out to California.

In her comment on yesterday’s post, bj wondered:

"Is 300 really that unreasonable? I feel like I’m supporting personal performance. And I’d spend that much on ballet tickets, so what’s the big deal for an entertainer? I mean if we’re talking 300 ($3000) would be steep for me."

A while back, I read a book that talked about how not to overindulge kids.  (Their framework sounds similar to the one Jody mentioned last week, but the title doesn’t sound familiar.)  They offered a list of questions for determining whether something was overindulgence, which I found useful:

1)  Can you afford it?

If you can’t afford something, it’s overindulgence to buy it for your kids.  This sounds like a no-brainer, but it’s routinely violated at all income levels, from poor single moms skipping meals to buy their kids designer clothers to upper-income families taking out home equity loans to pay for summer camp. 

2)  Whose needs are being met by the spending?

The authors of this book (which I really wish I could remember) argued that in many cases, overindulgence is the result of parents meeting their own needs — to provide what they missed as a child, or to keep up with the Jones — rather than meeting kids’ needs.

The nameless mom quoted in the Great Zucchini article is clearly worried about her own reputation, not her kids:

"It’s an insane, indulgent thing to do," she said. "You could just have a party where you all played pin the tail on the donkey or musical chairs or something. But that is just not done in this part of D.C. If you did that, you would be talked about."

3)  Does the spending cause the child to miss out on an important developmental task?

Even if you’re rolling in money, you still want your children to develop the concepts of sharing, deferred gratification, etc.  No one wants to raise Veruca Salt.  Two people I know have recently commented that because their relatives always bring gifts when they visit, their kids have taken to greeting guests with "what did you bring for me?" 

***

On a related note, Maggie emailed me and shared with me a letter that she recently sent to her extended family.  I quote it with her permission:

"Having spent a good deal of this last month digging out from Christmas, [husband] and I have decided that we need to do something about the volume of toys that the kids have. Times are very different than they were when we were kids – toys are relatively cheap and we can all afford to buy lots of them. We all like buying stuff for kids. And birthdays/Christmases come around pretty darn quickly….

So I’m not asking you all to do anything radical, like not give birthday gifts entirely. I am, however, asking that you exercise some more restraint than you might if I didn’t write today!

Bottom line: It is OK to buy [child] *one* hot wheels car or *one* star wars figure for a gift. I will not think that you are cheap even though I know that one hot wheels costs about $1.99 – I will be grateful that the volume of plastic in my house is that much smaller, he will be happy to have something to open, and we can probably find space to store it in an existing storage bin. Likewise, it would be wonderful for [child] to get one T-shirt or one board book for her birthday – she won’t miss the other 3 or 4 little things that usually come along, and the one will be that much more important to her because it won’t get lost in the rush. And if you want to get something bigger, that’s fine too – I’m just asking you not to give big things where small will do, or give 4 things where 1 will do."

That’s exactly right, and I wish I had read it before yesterday’s party.  T and I considered saying "no gifts, please" on the invitation, but decided against it, because we knew that D would be disappointed not getting presents.   But I am overwhelmed by the volume of stuff that he got, and honestly surprised at the number of people who gave two or three items.  (At the same time, I have to admit that I’m also wondering if the parents of D’s friends are going to think we’re cheap for giving a small card game as a birthday present.)

Last year, I wrote a post for DotMoms about my stress over my son’s birthday party — whether to invite the whole class, where to have it, what to do.   (As it turned out, he got very sick the day of this party and we had to cancel.)

This year, given essentially the same set of facts, we decided to go the rec center route, and invite his whole class.  Basically, we decided that we’d rather spend the money than the emotional energy worrying about whether we were doing the right thing.  And I’m hopeful that next year, with D in elementary school, there will be less social pressure to invite the whole class.

After considering pirate and Buzz Lightyear themes, D asked for a Max and Ruby party (after reading Bunny Party).  This was reflected in the invitations, the cakes (Max’s chocolate mud cake and Ruby’s raspberry fluff cupcakes), and the goody bags.  The kids ran themselves crazy in the play room for an hour and then enjoyed the cake, balloons, and my husband’s juggling.  We were a bit frazzled the whole time — the rec center schedules parties pretty tightly together, so we couldn’t prep the party room in advance — but I think the party was a success.  Even if we didn’t have The Great Zucchini.

I’m wiped.  Good night.

Last week, I posted a graph, showing the impact of the NYTimes mention on my state statistics.

Now look at the graph for this week’s statistics, and guess which day Julie at a little pregnant linked to me.

Which of the following are true?

a)  A Virginia Delegate accidently fired a handgun in his office  — where he hit a bullet-proof vest that happened to be hanging on the wall.

b) The Virginia Legislature passed bills to amend the state’s 230 year-old Bill of Rights to ban gay marriage.

c) Virginia Democratic activists are trying to recruit Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of the Navy to run for the Democratic nomination for Senate.

Answer:  All of the above.

I don’t know what to say about Jack Reid.

I’m just nauseated about the gay marriage bills.  They’re pure political posturing, since Virginia already has an "affirmation of marriage" law on the books. And the language is so sweeping, it’s quite possible that it could be used to throw out private contracts and designation of medical powers of attorneys on the grounds that they attempt to "approximate the effects of marriage."  I’m already a member of Equality Virginia, and they’ll be getting more of my money before November.

The Draft James Webb movement is interesting.  Webb is an opponent of the war in Iraq, and last week he published a very strong op-ed in the NY Times, slamming the "extremist Republican operatives" that have been consistently slandering the military records of anyone (McCain, Cleland, Kerry, Murtha) who opposes George W. Bush.  And he’d have the potential of reaching voters who ordinarily don’t vote Democratic.

I don’t know enough about either Webb (especially his views on domestic policy) or the only declared candidate so far — Harris Miller — to be signing up for either one, but I’ll definitely be tracking the race as it progresses.  I will say that I consider one of the points that Lowell at Raising Kaine lists as one of Webb’s pluses — that he lobbied for the addition of the three soldiers to the Vietnam memorial — a clear negative.  Webb was one of those who thought that Maya Lin’s design — which has become almost universally acclaimed — was "a mass grave" and a "gash of shame" and wanted something more traditionally heroic.  The addition of the statue didn’t destroy the Wall as Lin feared it would, but doesn’t add anything.   We’re not swimming in good candidates enough for me to write one off for his lousy aesthetic judgment, but it’s not a plus.

While I’m on the subject of Virginia politics, is anyone running against Jim Moran?  If the unions can’t come up with someone to even run against him, as one of the "CAFTA 15" (the 15 Ds who voted for CAFTA), then the labor movement is really dead.

When Terry Martin Hekker’s Modern Love column (non-select link, thanks to Jody) was published at the start of the month, Mieke emailed me to ask if I was going to blog about it.  I sort of shrugged, and emailed back "She needed a better lawyer; I don’t have much else to say."

I decided to write about it after all after reading Christine’s DotMoms post about her reaction to the article and Ellen Goodman’s commentary.  I was struck by how much Christine reads Hekker’s regrets about her choices as devaluing the housewife role:

"But, what’s wrong with being a housewife? Why do I feel a sense of inadequacy, a sense of broken dreams when I utter the term?"

I don’t think Hekker’s saying that either caring for her children or the volunteer work that she did when they were in school was not worthwhile, or in any way diminished her as a human being.  (In fact, she explicitly says that she wishes she had furthered her education after her youngest child started school.) She’s just saying that the sense of accomplishment she got won’t pay her rent.

Does the risk involved in stepping out of the labor force mean that no one should do it?  Of course not.  People do financially risky things all the time — from quitting corporate jobs to become schoolteachers, to starting their own businesses, to taking low-paid but flexible jobs so that they can work on a novel. 

As Anne and Laura pointed out when the article first came out, there are plenty of things that one can do to cushion the financial risks involved in being a SAHP, from signing a pre- or post-nuptual agreement spelling out the breadwinner’s obligations to keeping up your professional skills.  Warren and Tyagi would add that you should be keeping your fixed costs as low as possible, to increase the odds that the SAHP could cover them by returning to work if needed.  (They encourage families to consider having non-working adults seek employment if fixed costs are more than 50 percent of family income: "A family that is financially strapped and yet has an able-bodied adult who isn’t even looking for a job is, 9 times out of 10, a family that is living out the consequences of a decision that once made sense — but no longer works.")

I think we’re in denial about how ordinary risk is.  As a result, people often feel like they’re being criticized when someone points out that they’re making a risky choice.  (Alternatively, they feel like they’re special — see the new Peace Corps ad that asks "Has anyone ever called you crazy?")  The response is often denial ("Yes, 50 percent of marriages end in divorce, but mine won’t") rather than rational planning.

One time I was taking a self-assessment, and one of the questions was "what’s the riskiest thing you’ve done?"  My answer was having children.  That sounds bizarre, even to me.  How can something so conventional be considered risky?  But parenthood is an irrevocable commitment (much more so than marriage, as I’ve written before) and you don’t know what hand you’re going to be dealt.  And while most of the cards in the deck are good ones, there are some real heartbreakers in the pack.  I once compared being pregnant to being strapped into a rollercoaster as it slowly chugs up the first slope — nothing much is happening, but you know it’s leading up to a wild ride, and it’s too late to get off.