"I am a stay-at-home mother to two children under 5. The big work is keeping two small people who can move faster than they can think from being dead or too hurt. Any time I am less than perfect could end up with them dead or hurt. I do this for about 9 hours a day on my own, and am either 50% doing it or on call for the other 15. At the same time as that work, I make and clean up food 3-4 times a day, clean clothes 1-2 times a day, clean up a lot of other things, go from place to place a lot, read a lot of books to small people, answer a lot of whys, save a lot of cats from grabbing hands (really only 2 cats, but the hands seem to be many), and so on."
Whether I'm good at it? No idea. Maybe I'll know in 30 years or so when my kids are in a position to have some perspective. The wider culture doesn't provide much in the way of useful feedback, telling me that what I'm doing is simultaneously 1) the most important job in the world, and 2) not real work, and giving me the choice of two types of mom (and I do think this is laid mostly on mothers): self-sacrificing or selfish, with no ground in between...and I'll stop on this topic now before I become excessively grumpy.
Job I have done in the past and hope to do again at some point in the future: working in a library, preferably in a reference and/or instruction position, preferably in an academic library. I have not had a professional position yet (MLS between kid 1 and kid 2), but I worked in a number of libraries as a paraprofessional for 4 years before then. Loved doing public-facing work, which surprised me, a serious introvert. Loved reference. Loved doing instruction, both big (class-type sessions - again surprising as I hate public speaking) and small (helping an individual figure stuff out). Love (and am good at, I think) explaining things in a way that helps others understand them as I do.
Hobbies are a whole other thing that I don't have time to get into right now, other than to say that I'm rather obsessed with plants.
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Belated
Date: 2013-07-18 11:39 pm (UTC)"I am a stay-at-home mother to two children under 5. The big work is keeping two small people who can move faster than they can think from being dead or too hurt. Any time I am less than perfect could end up with them dead or hurt. I do this for about 9 hours a day on my own, and am either 50% doing it or on call for the other 15. At the same time as that work, I make and clean up food 3-4 times a day, clean clothes 1-2 times a day, clean up a lot of other things, go from place to place a lot, read a lot of books to small people, answer a lot of whys, save a lot of cats from grabbing hands (really only 2 cats, but the hands seem to be many), and so on."
Whether I'm good at it? No idea. Maybe I'll know in 30 years or so when my kids are in a position to have some perspective. The wider culture doesn't provide much in the way of useful feedback, telling me that what I'm doing is simultaneously 1) the most important job in the world, and 2) not real work, and giving me the choice of two types of mom (and I do think this is laid mostly on mothers): self-sacrificing or selfish, with no ground in between...and I'll stop on this topic now before I become excessively grumpy.
Job I have done in the past and hope to do again at some point in the future: working in a library, preferably in a reference and/or instruction position, preferably in an academic library. I have not had a professional position yet (MLS between kid 1 and kid 2), but I worked in a number of libraries as a paraprofessional for 4 years before then. Loved doing public-facing work, which surprised me, a serious introvert. Loved reference. Loved doing instruction, both big (class-type sessions - again surprising as I hate public speaking) and small (helping an individual figure stuff out). Love (and am good at, I think) explaining things in a way that helps others understand them as I do.
Hobbies are a whole other thing that I don't have time to get into right now, other than to say that I'm rather obsessed with plants.