Everything I know about being a working mother…

I learned from my mom.

Of course, as a kid, I took for granted how much she juggled for us. I wouldn’t say she made it look easy, but she made it look standard. I certainly didn’t know that she had chosen to be a working mother; for her, it seemed like almost a mandate.

It was the ‘90s, when women who came of age in the ‘70s were told by second-wave feminism that they could have it all. And, because their mothers had fought for them to have it all, they understood that they must have it all - and all at the same time - or it would be a betrayal of the women who had broken the path on which they tread.

(It must also be noted when talking about the era that Boomer dads were more involved than their fathers before them but not as involved as millennial husbands are now, and my dad was your typical upper-middle class white-collar workaholic. One of my visual memories of our annual summer vacations at my grandparents’ house in Connecticut is of the table in the den covered in Dad’s yellow legal pads. He was there but he wasn’t there, if you know what I mean.)

My parents drove in to work together in the morning, dropping me and my sister off at school on the way. Mom worked full-time and our au pairs shuttled us to and from after-school activities; we saw Mom at the end of the day when she rounded the corner onto our street, walking home from the metro. I have this image of her in my mind, wearing white socks and sneakers over her nude pantyhose and a silk scarf tied around her neck. She’d come in the house, go upstairs to change, and then head straight to the kitchen to make dinner. Mom was the queen of the 30-minute complete meal: a protein, a vegetable, and a starch. Afterwards, she’d help us with our homework, walk the dog, and, if needed, go to the supermarket before going to bed.

I have no idea when she had time for herself on weekdays - or weekends, for that matter, because everything I can. remember her doing revolved around us kids, the house, or the dog. In my typical childish self-absorption, it didn’t occur to me that she needed time for herself. I texted her while drafting this post to ask:

Okay, this is turning into a completely different post than the one I intended to write. I think I’ll stop here and come back to it later.