How Domestic Is Too Domestic?

I think my kids are worth every minute I've put into them. Really, as far as getting a return on your investment of time, kids have a superior rate of return. Which is why I have such a hard time puzzling out why I don't ever feel fulfilled by homemaking. I feel guilty that something as wonderful as being someone's mother and keeping house for them doesn't completely fulfill me. I've really tried hard to be fulfilled for 3 years now (since I gave up freelance editing). Oh how I've tried. But I'm still puzzling over the reasons homemaking is not satisfying my every need. One of them is that I seem to have the social sensibilities of an adult male. That's a whole different blog entry. But here's a new reason that I just discovered:

Homemaking is not something you can do hardcore.

Not any more, anyway. At least not in California. Maybe in Utah. There are just certain jobs that, if you take them too seriously, people think you're a little off kilter. It just occurred to me yesterday that homemaking is now one of them.

Jobs you can do hardcore and still be taken seriously: lawyer, teacher, stock trader, boxer, chef, heart surgeon, pretty much anything that Hollywood has made a movie about.

Jobs you cannot do hardcore: dry cleaner, dental scheduler, vending machine filler, Costco food court worker. (None of these really deserve to be compared with homemaking--but just stick with my while I try to make sense of this.) These are the jobs where people expect you to do your duty and then get on with your life. Can you imagine going in to pick up your drycleaning, paying your bill, and being ready to walk out the door when the dry cleaner stops you. "Wait, I didn't get to tell you how I got the strawberry out of your blouse! It was a special combination of enzymes I like to call 'the fruit juice detonator.' And for a few minutes there I didn't know if your blouse was going to make it. I could hardly stand the suspense..."

I had a dentist like this. Every time I went in he pulled out his special marker and circled areas on my x-rays like a football coach diagrams plays for his team, and gave me a pep talk to match.

But homemaking has slipped into this category. A homemaker can't take herself too seriously. Fold the laundry, good, go to the PTA meeting, fine, but the minute you start ironing your sheets, people think you've gone overboard. Put down the iron and go play with your kid or read up on international politics. And you know what? I agree. I don't know if I'm right or wrong or neither, but I would WAY rather be hanging out with my kids or reading up on international politics than doing most of the home arts. I know it's not a new problem--look at Mary and Martha--but even though Martha didn't necessarily do so, June Cleaver made homemaking look so fulfilling.

I know I am high strung. And that's why I like to choose a few things that are worth my time, and really delve into them, do them "hardcore" if you will. If I go to the gym, I go not to walk, but to run wind sprints! If I'm going to learn to cook Italian, I want to delve into a thousand-page book roughly translated from original Italian that Italian mamas have relied on for centuries. I think this is why I was so uninterested in making the Popsicle-stick ornament that they offered for Enrichment last Christmas. I'll come chat with the other ladies, fine. But if I'm going to make something out of popsicle sticks, I want it to be intricate and five feet tall, and I want to learn all about the history and cultural significance of the popsicle stick. I have tried to go hardcore on homemaking. I've tried several times to read Cheryl Mendelson's 900-page book, Home Comforts from start to finish. But I have yet to accomplish it.

Now I do like to cook. And I reverence good craftsmanship and a well-run home, but please don't make me knit, or can, or bargain shop when I ache to have time to read or follow the stock market or take dance.

Homemaking, by its nature, also needs to be flexible. And by flexible, I mean take second priority to a lot of other things. Let me give you two examples from just this week. EXAMPLE 1: I made Brent rush home from work on Tues. so we could take a family Christmas pic. I felt so silly sending the email--"Honey I know the sewer recently exploded at the middle school you're building and you're dealing with the media, but honey, I need a cute picture to send out with our cards this year!" EXAMPLE 2: We all sat down to shape some Christmas cookies for our own consumption, and Brent slopped his dough down into shapes of varying thickness with lots of spiky protrusions. I looked at those cookies and thought "those things are NOT going to cook evenly, and the spikes will burn and yield an unsavory cookie." I felt so uptight--but when he left the room, I reshaped his cookies. (They're my favorite cookie, or I would have left his creation alone. Brent is always understanding about all of this, thanks, honey).

One day I am going to test this theory. Brent is going to come home and I am going to be in a house dress and pearls, hard at work in the "women's realm." I am going to just be putting away the dust cloth after wiping down my vacuum which I just used to dust all the lampshades. Then I will walk over to the oven to remove the roast and vegetables, arrange it on a lovely platter, which I will place down in the center of a perfectly-set table. And after dinner I'll take freshly-baked bannana bread to all our neighbors. Who will look at me in my house dress and think I'm NUTS.

Some day I want to make a difference with something I'm good at and passionate about, just like all the entrepreneurs on the podcasts I listen to. Sadly darning and dusting don't fall into that category. However, for now I will do my part. I will have as many family dinners as possible (hey, research proves its far-reaching benefits), and I will keep doing laundry. Because I believe God wants someone to be responsible for each child he puts on earth, and I think mothers have the gift to follow through with that ultimate responsibility. Even the high-strung ones. And also because I like my kids. They're pretty fun.