AtticAddict's Open Salon Blog

Duties of SAHM's & WOHM's differ? You don't say! (Part II)

Thu, 20 Sep 2012 11:09:18 -0400

Read Part I here.

I’m sure you’re familiar with the “Job Description of a Stay-at-Home-Mom” that seems to be in constant circulation on the internet.

It goes something like: I’m not just a stay-at-home-mom. I’m a taxi driver, referee, cook, maid, grounds keeper, educator, psychologist, building maintenance supervisor, financial advisor, playmate, nurse, story teller, party planner, comedian, hair dresser, ad nauseam….

Recently a mommy-blogger posted a version of the above list on her Facebook wall. What ensued in the comment section of the post was an online back and forth argument between SAHM’s and WOHM’s that clocked in at around 9 hours. Who has it harder? Who does the most work? Who is doing a better job at raising children? Who deals with more bodily fluids? Cluck…cluck…cluck…bok…bok...beGAH!!

I generally try to stay out of the unwinnable, often malicious, stay-at-home-mom (SAHM) vs. work-outside-the-home-mom (WOHM) battles. At various points throughout my 8-year career as a mother, I’ve worn both SAHM & WOHM hats. Full-time and part-time (the term “part-time” being misleading because full-time work is actually what’s expected—both at home and at work). So I feel qualified to speak on both sides of the debate.

Sure, SAHM’s get to wear their PJ’s all day, squeeze in a work out while baby rides along, take the occasional nap, spend an ungodly amount of time on Facebook & Pinterest, get their grocery shopping over with before rush hour, watch trashy TV while they work, whip up quality, home cooked meals, etc. And all this with children underfoot or latched on, as it were. But this kind of work can quite effectively drive a person insane.

It’s monotonous. It’s repetitive. It’s under-appreciated.

I’m not going to lie—there are parts of my workday at the office that are quite glorious: staring off into space (or even laying my head down and closing my eyes) for a short break.

Drinking coffee and catching up on the news before starting my day. Lunching at exquisite places on the company dime. Here at work I hear “thank you” and “great job” when I perform the duties I’m being paid to do.

Conversation with other adults—while an essential and often mundane aspect of the office job—is a luxury we take for granted before we become parents. Working allows for a broader worldview and gives perspective to life outside the walls of our home. I’ll take the cattiness of office politics over that of the play date circles any day.

In my opinion, the most tragic part about being a WOHM (depending on how you look at it) is that one spends a greater majority of life with their co-workers than with their own family. But a perfect world is not one in which all moms get to stay at home, rather one in which work and school schedules allow for more flexibility for moms, dads and kids to do whatever is healthiest for their family and their situation. In whatever combination of working inside or outside of the home that may be; and devoid of any judgment from outsiders.

My response to the obnoxious catalogue of duties above (after a thorough eye-rolling) is:

you earned these titles not because of the SAH part, but due to the M part.

Childcare different from office work, you say? (Part I)

Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:09:16 -0400

I would like to address a few of the questions posed by this SAHM to her husband and “other office-bound parents” in her blog post.(SAHMommy-blogger’s questions are in black. My responses are in red.)

1. When you walked into work this morning and pleasantly greeted your co-worker Jim, was his first reaction to scream “NO! WANT JASON!” followed by an office supply being thrown at you? Must you greet everyone with eye contact and a friendly “hello” each morning (no matter how much coffee you’ve had yet) in order to not earn a reputation for being stuck-up or rude? Did you wake up before the crack of dawn this morning so you would have adequate time to dress professionally as required by your employer? Perform tasks which include, but are not limited to: bathing, shaving, applying make-up, fixing your hair, wearing appropriate, non-wrinkled, clean clothing? Ever get sent home to change for not wearing the approved footwear? After all, yoga pants and flip-flops are not acceptable attire for the workplace.

2. Do you have to lock yourself in the supply closet or bathroom on a regular basis in order to make phone calls? Have you ever worked in a cubicle? Not a lot of privacy in those things. Come to think of it, there’s actually no privacy in the supply closet or the restroom, either. Have you ever had a fight with your husband or talked to your OB/GYN doctor on the phone at your desk knowing your co-workers can hear every word you say (you know this because you hear every word of their conversations with their baby daddies & Gyno’s)? Fun times indeed.
3. Did you finish a complete thought at any time during the day? Possibly, but I didn’t have time to post 102 Facebook statuses graphically detailing my kid’s potty training progress. :(

4. When you went out to lunch with your fellow workers, did you have to pack a diaper/juice/extra outfit for them? Did you have to wipe their faces? Smile an apology and leave an extra tip for the waiter on their behalf? Did you shift uncomfortably in your seat and look away when the topic at the lunch table turned to politics/religion/breastfeeding vs. bottle-feeding/anything else you’d rather not debate with people with whom your job demands you remain on speaking terms with?

5. When a co-worker needed you for something, did she sit at her desk with her head tilted back toward the ceiling and repeatedly scream “SEAN! SEEEEANNNN! SEAAAAAAN!” until you came to find him? Oh, you listen to screaming and idle chatter all day long? Yeah, me too. Difference is: you can tell your kids to shut their pie hole, but if I tried that with a co-worker I’d read about it on Facebook for the next two weeks and then deal with their passive-aggressive grudge against me for the next two years (give or take).

6. When you needed a specific colleague, did you search all over for him, only to finally find him giggling in the cabinet under the sink? Did you also find six pairs of your church shoes under there with him? When your charge does something out of line can you send him/her to time-out or smack them (whichever discipline method you subscribe to)? Later, during naptime, will you gaze lovingly on their precious sleeping angel face as all your anger melts away? Yeah, because that would never happen in the office.

7. Have you had to come to an associate’s aid because she fell off her desk after trying to climb on top of it using a rolling chair? When you finish rescuing her, can you go back to folding laundry and doing other household chores? Do those mundane but necessary duties like dishes, laundry, ironing, and cleaning house sit there and wait for you to get to them at the end of the day or on the weekend? Oh yeah, that’s right, you’re able to take care of those things during the course of the day. Because that’s your job. All in a day’s work, eh?

8. When you reached for the report a co-worker was handing you, did he snatch them away at the last second and scream “MINE!” while shoving you backwards? Did you answer a ringing phone 1,000 times today to the sound of some executive with an inflated ego screaming into his cell phone at you because you didn’t answer the phone quick enough and/or didn’t give him what he wanted right away?

9. Does your colleague lift up her shirt and pick things out of her belly button every time she comes over to ask a question? Do your colleagues ever comment on your clothing/hairstyle/nail polish, etc: “That’s an interesting look.” or “That looks good on you—I couldn’t pull off something like that—but it looks good on you.”? Or some other sort of backhanded compliment?

10. While you are using the restroom, do various co-workers come in the stall and ask you to settle a disagreement or open a packet of fruit snacks? Do you have to take care of business (while pretending you’re not) in close quarters with two other people doing the same (but pretending they’re not). Have you perfected the art of creatively-timed flushing and spraying of air freshener? What’s your strategy for when the motion-sensor lights switch off before you’re “finished”? Never underestimate the luxury of your home bathroom. At least there you have the privacy of a room where you can shut and lock the door.

11. During a board meeting when everyone is present, do you notice a smell and then have to check all your colleagues’ pants to locate it? In fact, at ANY point in your day do you have to deal with another person’s feces? Yes, I do smell (and sometimes see *gag*) co-workers’ feces during the day (see #10 above).

People at my work routinely break things/spill things/foul up the restroom and then walk away to let it be someone else’s problem. Hurt feelings, tears and immature retaliation are common occurrences. So you see, tending to children is not much different than working in an office.

I didn’t write this to cause another flare-up between the SAHM’s & the WOHM’s. I wanted to prove that sizing up the tasks of each role is an apples to oranges comparison—a fruitless argument. Regardless of which side we are on we are all working our asses off. Let’s just agree that parenthood (if you’re doing it right) is hard.

The Attic Puzzle–The Final Chapter–It is Finished. (Mostly)

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 12:04:56 -0400

Chapter 1. Chapter 2. Chapter 3.

Part 1

Adam completed the forest area. Some gaps remain where pieces are missing, probably forever.

All that’s left is the blue sky area. I saved that part for last since it seemed like the most challenging. All the pieces look alike. There is no discernable design save for a few wisps of clouds.

Part 2

The blue pieces were the first to catch my eye in the attic. At a glance, it appeared to be a puzzle of purely blue pieces. It’s ironic that the blue mass was the first to be discovered, but the last to be put in place.

Déjà vu. I’ll need to group together the pieces with similar features just as I did the unintelligible mass of yellow tree on the left side.

A sea of blue. Starting to think the blue part has been the hardest so far. These pieces look even more identical to each other than the tree pieces did.

Not only that, but beginning to suspect that my eyes (or this puzzle) are playing tricks on me! Pieces appear to “match” but they don’t “fit”. ?? Or they fit, but it still doesn’t look quite right.

Interesting find: a stain located in the sky just to the left of the mountain.

One wonders if something spilled on the puzzle while it was in the attic, or before it made it there. Obviously the puzzle was intact when the stain occurred. Was the puzzle tossed into the closet out of exasperation over the spillage? Perhaps this stain holds the answer to the mystery of why the puzzle was cast into the attic.

Part 3

After much trial and error; many sessions in which only one or two pieces fit together, it is so close to being finished. Only about 20 pieces without matches remaining.

It was by dogged determination alone that the blue sky finally started to come together.

Part 4

I completed the puzzle on a Friday night. With the final section—the sky—narrowed down to a pile of about 7 single pieces and 6 chunks of intact areas, it took mere minutes to figure out where they all fit together in the “big puzzle”.

Looking at the finished product, I’m now questioning my earlier theory that the stain occurred before the puzzle entered its final resting place in the attic. There appears to be several blemishes dispersed across the puzzle—on random, individual pieces.

The only exception is the one near the mountain, which seems to span a mere two pieces.

When everything started coming together in the end I felt such elation and excitement. (Followed later by a “what now?” feeling.) Every time I enter the room and see the gap-filled wonder, I think back to when this adventure first began—when it was an unmanageable mass of dirty pieces—and I’m filled with a feeling of pride and accomplishment. I want to do it again! Wish there were more abandoned puzzles in my attic!

Oh, and I lied about this being the final chapter—I now believe a final attic excursion is necessary.

The Attic Puzzle - Part III

Thu, 8 Mar 2012 17:03:42 -0500

Read Part I here. Read Part II here.

Day 6

Spent a good two hours working on the puzzle. Uncovered brown, hilly area near tree in left corner. New strategy: group together the pieces with similar colors. Then work them as several small puzzles. Now maybe it’ll become clear how they fit together with each other. Feeling really confident with the amount of progress made.

Day 7

A setback

Someone (who hasn’t/won’t confess) knocked or bumped into the posterboard holding the pieces sorted by color and the groups were destroyed. This has discouraged me. Think I’ll take a night off before putting things back together again.

Day ??

Momentum Lost

The days are all running together now. Admittedly, I gave up for awhile. Even after I took the time to recreate the groups from Day 6, they were destroyed a second time at the hands of a youngster.

At times I become frustrated, befuddled, overwhelmed and hopeless. I stare at the sparse sections that are completed. I stare at the pile of unmatched pieces. I try and try all different angles to make the little fragments fit. I keep a bottle of glue next to me to repair any damage occurred during the trial and error process.

Things are moving very slow. Many evenings, I sit down for 30-45 minutes and make one, maybe two connections. Three if I’m lucky. Stare. Shuffle. Repeat. Look for clues. Try and fail and try again. Rejoice even the smallest victory.

I move the pieces around. They all look the same. I wonder if there are too many “missing” to complete even a portion of the finished product. Trying my hardest to discern what the “big picture” is supposed to look like.

As I go about daily life, I sometimes come across a picture or painting with similar aspects as those I spy in the tiny bits I work with every night and I wonder if it could be a copy of my mystery puzzle.

After two setbacks and many stops and starts, I have only made a little more progress on the tree on the left side. And a little portion of the mountain on the right side.

More pieces discovered!

Got my second wind. Connected about 12 pieces---which is a lot. Usually I connect only about three in the same amount of time. Adam got into the attic to conduct another search and emerged with 30 more!

Delighted that several edge pieces were discovered during the third exploration of the attic floor. A few are already matched up. I’m excited to clean them and add them to the mix. Every little bit helps.

Helping Hands

Elizabeth returned to help work on it today. We made several breakthroughs. Discovered where the “houses” fit in at the bottom. Found a castle-wall section in the middle. Practically completed the tree on the left side.

Our enthusiasm must have been contagious because later that evening Adam worked on the project awhile.

The near-completion of the large tree on the left led to the revelation of a separate forest area in the middle. I often confused these pieces with those of the tree on the left side since they all contain tree-like elements. I could tell they belonged to a separate part, though, from their dark coloring and bright-yellow, pointy trees.

The extra set of eyes and hands seriously renewed my motivation to complete this enigmatic puzzle. I predict that the next post will be the final chapter. Stay tuned!

Love Advice from Mom

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 22:02:48 -0500

Early in my freshman year of high school I developed a crush on the guy who sat in front of me in Algebra. He had a nice body, passionate green eyes, beautiful brown hair, and luscious lips. He hung out with the “skaters” (the rebellious kids) but also seemed like the quiet, sensitive type. The finest thing about him? His rattail. This was the early 90’s, when those were still cool…sexy even. Oh yeah, also back then we used the word “fine” the same way today’s kids use “hot” to describe a cute guy.

So even though I sat behind this dude every day, I was convinced he didn’t even know I existed. Unsure of how to catch his attention, I went to my mother for advice about talking to boys. I described all of his foxy features, including the rattail. She suggested a little coy flirting. “What do I do?” I asked, “What do I say?” She replied, “Just give that tail of his a little tug, then smile sweetly and say “just wanted to see what that felt like!”.

The next day I sat behind him in class and stared at that silky soft hair, working up the courage to try Mom’s plan. Finally, I pulled on his mane gently and he whipped around. I could feel my face burning red as I barely squeaked out my line. “Bitch.” he spat, then turned around and tucked his tail into his shirt.

Huh. That didn’t exactly go as planned…or did it? Now at least he knows I’m alive. And that I’m into freaky stuff like hair-pulling. Maybe he just wasn’t mature enough to handle a flirtatious woman such as myself. Or maybe he was gay. Alas, our love was never meant to be. And so began seven months of awkwardness in Algebra class….

Happy Valentine's Day!!