The Real World Redux

When Dan and I do wash, we put it in the machine, close the lid, and then close the door to the laundry room, which is behind the door to our private home.

This is the appropriate way to wash dirty laundry. You won’t see me out on the front porch with the skivvies anymore than you’ll see that piece I posted yesterday again. It’s going to be, like a pair of skivvies, quietly folded and put away in a drawer. You see, I’ve had the flu since Thursday and have learned a great deal about working through illness. It’s not that this version of the virus makes you want to die; it just saps your will to live. And I notoriously deal poorly with frustration anyway.

As a mode of correction, let me reiterate that my husband is a sweet man who is trying to negotiate an equitable and happy solution to the problems of the two-career household. The transition is usually difficult when I return from the lazy, hazy days of summer to the schedules, workload and diminished housekeeping interest of the school year. This year, we are also trying to ensure that Connor’s needs are met. That’s rather like reiterating the obvious, but I’m afraid it’s as close to our personal washing as you’re going to see right now.

I have a very privileged position: Nanny, supportive husband, somewhat flexible hours (I only really need to be on campus 6-7 hours a day). All that aside, I would say that three or four different women have said that they appreciated my candor – not about the “he said, she said,” business – that’s about as interesting as watching five-year-olds fight about the last stick of gum. But about the “buck up” factor of motherhood: that sick, aching, exhausted, gotta keep-on, keeping on factor of what it’s really like to have two full-time jobs at once. Now, anyone who knows a mom knows this.

So why are all the rest of us so surprised when we either hear one of these women distressed, or we become one of them?

A student approached me in the hall the other day to say she wouldn’t be in class because her baby was sick and she had to go get her from the sitter’s. There was a time I might have internally rolled my eyes and thought: this is why it’s so much easier to get an education before you start a family. Now, knowing the reality of trying to get anything done with sick babies, I’m amazed that people (women?) do it at all. I am also perhaps galvanizing my support for those who find they must manage jobs, childcare, and the demands of a sometimes insensitive and stuck-up educational system as well. I’m going to have to tackle that one next week, I’m sure, because there are reasons for what educators choose in these circumstances, reasons why students must be in attendance and have finished their work. Yet a baby with a fever is a non-negotiable factor, not to mention a very small beloved person who feels badly. If you’re going to make a mother choose between that baby’s welfare and your assignment, the book-learning will lose every time.

I’ve never known any learning curve that was easy and each time Dan and I approach something completely new with this baby, we have to figure it out all over again. He’s teething, he’s sick for the first time, he’s needing to learn to sleep in his own bed, he’s needing to learn to be comfortable with the Nanny, he’s weaning off the Baby Einstein (yes, I read that article that says it causes ADD – mostly the Nanny didn’t like that he’d rather watch toys being played with than play with his own. I had to agree). These baby milestones, precious to us, are also challenging in ways that building businesses and writing classes, lectures, books and articles are not. We find ourselves taxed for patience when we have the least bit of it. We beg for respite from spouses who are equally exhausted, sick, and sleep deprived. Such is life.

So you pop another two Motrin, you have another cup of coffee and you pray that today will be better than yesterday.