THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, February 19, 1995 TAG: 9502150070
SECTION: REAL LIFE PAGE: K1 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: REAL MOMENTS
SOURCE: BY MARY FLACHSENHAAR, SPECIAL TO REAL LIFE
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines
IF YOU ARE a contemporary American mother, you are stalked by demon guilt.
You feel guilty if you work outside the home.
And if you don't work outside the home.
If you cook dinner.
And if you don't cook dinner.
If you help the kids with their homework.
And if you don't . . .
What follows is the story of one woman's guilt.
A little more than 15 years ago when she became pregnant with her first child, the woman knew immediately that she would quit her job as a newspaper reporter to stay home. No background check on a baby sitter would ever be thorough enough to assure her that her child would be safe in someone else's care.
The second baby came 21 months after that. The third came three years later.
With the birth of the last, the woman was temporarily delivered from an unsettling feeling of guilt: Caring for three children, instead of just two, would justify her even more in her commitment to full-time motherhood.
But the guilt-free moments were short-lived.
Raising three costs more than two, and the family's single paycheck had been stretched to the limit already. Her family was eating homemade bread but would they have been better off, she reasoned, if mom was bringing home some bacon?
While it took her most of the day to clear the dining room table of laundry, the day's mail and the pizza coupons that were attached to her front door, the woman sensed she should be doing more.
When the Heart Fund asked if she would do the neighborhood collection, she said yes.
When the teacher asked if she'd be a room mother, she said yes.
When the Girl Scouts asked if she'd be a leader, she said yes.
The woman thought her days couldn't get busier but all around her women were putting in much more amazing days.
Like the pediatrician and mother of three who led a Scout troop, made Halloween costumes by hand and gave each of her children a flawless birthday party with a theme.
Being around this friend and others like her made the woman do extremely wacky things.
Like the time she stayed up through all the late-night talk shows gluing the names of 20 kindergartners onto tiny felt Christmas stockings in alphabet pasta letters.
Guilt was the evil force that drove her to tell an occasional white lie, especially in the last few years, when all of her daughters have been in school full time.
When asked, ``What in the world do you do all day?,'' she would often reply, ``I work on my novel.''
This was not entirely untrue.
Sometimes, if there was time in the day for a sit-down lunch, she would try to read a few pages of the novel she'd checked out of the library weeks earlier.
While feelings of guilt haunted her almost constantly, the woman tried to keep focused on her original reason for staying home. She continued to believe that young children benefit from the near-constant presence of a person who is absolutely crazy about them.
The woman felt that the seemingly insignificant moments in life, not the Christmas mornings, are the stuff that powerful, comforting memories are made of.
So sometimes when the kids arrived home from school, the woman would be taking a tray of cookies out of the oven.
She wasn't looking for praise, not even thanks. She wasn't surprised that what she felt during one memory-book moment was guilt.
``Oh, no, not homemade cookies again,'' grumbled the oldest. ``Why can't we eat cookies from the store, like everybody else does? Get a job, Mom. Get a life.''
The child was probably right.
Now that she was the mother of two young teens and a preteen, there were braces, violin lessons, summer camp and shoes, so many shoes, to pay for.
Besides, from everything the woman had read, she sensed it was impossible for a contemporary woman to develop a sense of identity without a job. So now she spent her days networking in the community in search of employment.
She was actually quite excited about ``getting a life'' although she was resigned to the fact that it wouldn't be guilt-free. She knew she'd feel guilty when she had to say no to the PTA and when the family ate frozen entrees for dinner.
But she was sure looking forward to the coffee breaks. MEMO: Mary Flachsenhaar is a free-lance writer who lives in Norfolk with her
husband, three daughters and dog, Sam.
by CNB