On My Working Motherhood

I've been thinking a lot of about motherhood lately, specifically working motherhood. Nothing concrete, and nothing I felt I could turn in to a blog post even if I'd had the time lately to write one (which sadly I very much have not), just a lot of circular, directionless thoughts. Maybe it's Mother's Day and reading the card in the flowers JP had delivered to my office yesterday ("Love, JP, Landon, and Claire") and realizing wow, I've been a mom of two kids for almost a year, or maybe because I've now been a lawyer for as long as I was a law student- which means I've been a working mother lawyer for three whole years, something I thought would be so Big and Hard and worthy of constant commentary- but the conclusion I keep reaching is something along the lines of: the kids are alright, we're alright, this is good. This working mother thing just isn't nearly as earth shattering as I expected it to be. It doesn't dominate my thoughts, I don't agonize over it, and I honestly don't give a damn what anybody else thinks about it. It is simply our life and my goodness is it wonderful the vast majority of the time.

Which isn't to say it isn't sometimes hard to drop off my Clairebear and think about all the cute things she's going to do that I'll miss, or that I don't sometimes get home at the end of the day and look longingly at the couch and fantasize about how nice it would be to sit on it, alone, instead of cleaning bottles and lunch boxes and directing traffic in the kitchen, or that I don't frequently wish the day was 28 hours long and all four of the extra ones could go to the kids, or, most of all, that I don't worry about how this will work as the kids get older and busier and it matters more that it is JP or I who spends the post-school time with them - because all that is true.

But what has surprised me since having children, probably because I grew up in a stay-at-home-mom dominated community and extended family (which was absolutely wonderful, but which nonetheless made the choice of the Working Mom seem like a Very Big Deal that needed to be agonized over and feared before ever having children), is that it just isn't. I work, my kids go to daycare, we come home, we eat together, we play, they go to bed, and I go back to work or snuggle on the couch with JP (or both) ... this is our day. And it's a day that is filled with more happiness and satisfaction and security and love than I ever hoped to experience- working or not. It's not a debate of quantity v. quality, or selfishness v. selflessness, or my future v. theirs. It just is. My kids are happy, secure, affectionate little people who have no doubt who their parents are and no doubt they are loved, and any time I hear some nonsense about the poor children of working mothers who are "stuck at daycare," I think of Claire excitedly clapping with her baby friends or banging on the guitar of their weekly musical guest or the way her teacher's beam when they tell me all the adorable and amazing things she did that day, I shake my head at the silly small minded person and think of how little my kids need their pity.

For us, daycare has become an important and very positive part of our life, and I am fundamentally okay with sharing my children with the amazing teachers who work there. It provides a structure and routine to my kids' day that they wouldn't have if I was home, and while I don't think socialization is at all necessary for babies, I do think Claire has enjoyed it (and Landon has absolutely thrived with it). And thanks to this daycare I trust, my kids have a mom who is happy and fulfilled and who honestly loves every single minute she spends with them. When I was home with Landon, and even on maternity leave with Claire, I spent so much time wishing they'd go to sleep so that I could do things- shower, eat, clean, sleep, be alone! But then the day would end, and I'd tuck my baby in bed and feel a crushing guilt for wishing away our hours together and not enjoying them enough. I constantly felt guilty for that. But then I went back to work and the guilt fell away. I know it's different for a lot of other working moms, but as I've said before, I feel no guilt for working and providing for my family. In my heart I truly don't believe my kids are suffering for it, and I'm not going to imagine unhappiness where it doesn't exist. While I do frequently wish for extra time together during the week, I know I am engaged and present in nearly every minute we do have, and the memory of our separation during the day reminds me to read that extra requested story or stay on the floor a little longer tickling the Biscuit.

I dropped Landon and Claire off at daycare today so I could partake in the Mother's Day festivities. Claire (who, by the way, is walking with confidence as of last night; she did multiple rounds of 10-15 steps with lots of pauses for clapping and to make sure everyone was looking at her) gave me a card with her little hand prints and a poem that made me cry (something about growing up and hands getting bigger and I don't know, my vision blurred and I slammed the card shut). Landon gave me an adorable little apron he made ALL BY HIMSELF (except, with help, though he did pick out the fabric and did the cutting and supervised the sewing machine action). Also, his teacher did a short interview with each kid about their moms and recorded all the answers. My favorite, and the inspiration for this whole post which has somehow eaten half my day (though sometimes you just need to do that), was:

"My mom's favorite thing to do is: to work at work for a long time."

Now I know some moms would read that and be sad, but it cracked me up and I immediately walked in to my favorite partner's office and read it to him (also, "My mom is really good at: doing work." I feel that should be included in my next review). Landon is 3, so I don't think he can imagine doing anything he didn't love for very long. So, since I work all day, I must love it. (Also, the "long time" thing probably means anything over 30 minutes.) But the thing that made me smile most about his little remark is that I really must never complain about my work or anything related to it. I don't assign any negativity to it (not when he's awake anyway), and neither does he. He just sees me happy, and how great is that?