A job with no glass ceiling

Posted on September 8, 2009 by Margaret

My husband is good at giving compliments and has given me hundreds over the years. But the best one, the one that stands above all others, was just three little words.

A visitor to our home, a man, was asking about our family. When he learned I was a stay-at-home mom “just” caring for children, he said, “Oh…. so, she doesn’t work?”

Nate lifted his eyebrows and responded, with an effective pause, “Oh… she works!” Something about the way he said it in that context lifted me like no other compliment.

Mothering is hard, constant and open-ended. It felt good to hear Nate recognize the work of my job. Whether we work outside our homes or not isn’t the issue. If we have children, we’re working with and on them every day. After they’ve grown up and left home, we continue to care, to love, to pray, to work for the benefit of our kids. Much of what we read and hear about motherhood, however, brushes aside our honorable, challenging work with a, “Yeah, yeah, yeah… blah blah blah.”

Recently, I stood in line at a grocery store deli next to a woman with a toddler in her cart. She turned my way and asked, “You got any kids?”

“Seven,” I said, smiling at her little girl. “Aren’t kids wonderful?”

Her response startled me. “Being a mom is totally boring. There’s nothing to do. I just watch TV all day.”

I thought back to my own mothering of young children and can’t recall ever being able to watch TV. There was too much happening with my kids for me to tune out of mothering and tune in to television. There was too much we wanted to do. I suppose children can adapt to a mom’s habits, even if it means leaving her alone as she watches TV. But what about the golden opportunities lost?

We can make of motherhood whatever we want, putting forth massive effort or very little. The good news is, there’s no glass ceiling on the career of motherhood, no CEO holding us back. No one in a corner office discriminates against us when we rise to new levels of excellence in being moms. We can shoot for being the very best.

We’ve all read the long list of what every mom needs to be: teacher, chauffeur, nurse, secretary, inventory manager, recreational director, safety instructor, record keeper, spiritual mentor, nutritionist, cook, play partner, shopper, tutor, counselor, psychologist and more. These tasks can’t be done well while watching TV.

Even though some people think raising children is menial, unimportant, and not real work, we know the truth. It’s the most important job on earth. And in doing it, we have the freedom to set it up any way we want to, a freedom unavailable in most other working positions. May we never tire of pouring ourselves into it with enthusiasm and joy…. and lots of hard work.

“Oh Lord, I have to pack!”

Posted on September 6, 2009 by Margaret

When the reality of our upcoming move finally hit me, it was like a tidal wave with water up the nose and an undertow that swamped me.

From my prayer journal:

“Lord, Today I have five hours at home to work on organizing and throwing stuff away. All I feel like doing is throwing up. I’m not kidding about the nausea. Where do I even start? Basement? Attic? Garage? Crawl space? Book shelves? I can’t do it alone. Also, I need a handyman, a carpenter, a plumber, an electrician and a landscaper. Who are they? When can they come? How can we pay them? Oh Lord, please prioritize this mess!”

And under I went, swirling in a wave of confusion and chaos, wondering if I’d be able to make it through to order and stability. I called out to God often, whenever panic started rising, which was every hour.

One day I walked into the house with several cardboard boxes, and the phone was ringing. It was my friend Sue from Colorado. “Don and I have cleared two days, and we’re flying to Chicago to help you do whatever needs doing. Don will bring his tools.” Now it was my turn to cry. God had heard my questions, and Sue and Don were his answers.

They arrived toting overnight bags full of work clothes and tools, as promised. After Sue asked, “What needs doing?” it was obvious from my stuttering that I didn’t know how to begin.

“We’ll begin in the basement,” she said with firmness, marching toward the stairs. I followed, quietly whimpering with gratitude. “Get me a marker, a roll of tape, three black garbage bags and those boxes you collected. We’ll start in one corner and work out from there.”

As I stood staring at her in wonder, Sue continued. “One bag will be for trash, black because once something goes inside, you won’t be allowed to see it again. The second bag will be for give-aways. You’ll be downsizing, so you won’t be able to keep everything. The third bag will be for keepers. When that bag is full, we’ll transfer its contents to a box, label it, tape it and stack it.”

I felt my body go limp with relief. Sue had become my life preserver, rescuing me from going under for the third time. As we worked, we talked and laughed. When we came to a questionable item, such as a science project one of the kids had worked hard on and received a blue ribbon for, I began to sink again. “We can’t throw that away!” I whined. But Sue squared her shoulders and said, “Get your camera. We’ll take a picture of it, then get rid of it.” For each “no-I-can’t” dilemma, Sue had a “yes-we-can” idea.

Meanwhile, Don was eliminating items from my “Handyman List” the way a bee bee gun shoots cans off a fence: done, done, done. Slow toilets ran faster, sticky doors opened, a stubborn computer obeyed, rotten house siding morphed into new, malfunctioning light fixtures shone, and 23 other things.

In the basement, Sue and I gradually transformed piles of debris into neatly stacked, labeled boxes ready for our move. Garbage cans were loaded and my mini-van was filled with bags for Good Will. The tidal wave had calmed.

As Nate and I stood at the door waving good-bye to Sue and Don, the phone rang. It was my sister. She was coming over the next day to help me “with anything that needs doing.” God and friends were bringing us through.

Flashlight or floodlight?

Posted on September 3, 2009 by Margaret

When our dog Jack and I take our late night walk through the neighborhood, tree-shaded streets are inky black. I always grab a flashlight, because without it, we’d walk into parked cars and yard fences trying to find our way.

Most of our flashlights are the dollar store variety. Their circle of light is small and often inadequate, although a little light is better than none. Then there’s the heavy flashlight with the powerful halogen bulb. When I carry that one, I feel guilty for producing a swath of light that spills into the privacy of people’s living rooms. It’s a floodlight in a tube.

Last night when Jack and I walked, my cheap flashlight was flickering with weak batteries, casting only a faint yellow glow in front of us. This was irritating since my light would only shine as far as the next spot my foot would land on and no further.

Scripture gives us a word picture of this exact situation. “Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.” (Psalm 119:105) When walking along life’s path, I crave a peek all the way down the road, right into my future, preferring a floodlight to a flashlight or a lamp.

But God is the only one who can see all the way down the road. Because of that, it seems sensible to leave the darkness and uncertainty of what’s ahead, up to him. He’ll light it up when we need to see it. Meanwhile, he hands us the lamp of his Word. He says, “One step is enough for now. Walk into that circle of light in front of you, and let me worry about what’s ahead in the dark.”

Last night Jack offered the perfect example of why we ought to take God’s advice on this. He stepped in front of my flashlight’s beam, which suddenly cast his own black shadow directly in front of him. He startled, jumped to the side and searched for the dark villain he’d just seen, but the shadow had disappeared. The walk goes better if he stays behind the light and follows where it leads. blog street