The week I tried to have it all (and why it sucked)

Today is International Women's Day, so I thought this was the perfect time to discuss being a woman. I know it isn't something I'm forbidden to speak about the other 364 days a year, but I recently tried an experiment, and its findings seem relevant on a day like today.

If you ask a woman what the three most important things in her life are, she'd probably have a hard time answering you. We all have so much going on, it's sometimes hard to put a number on anything in our lives, but I'm going to hazard a guess and say a pretty popular answer would be family, friends and financial security. That's just a total stab in the dark (and probably what I'd say if asked). But these are three very big things, and they can be hard things to juggle. Some women have an ability to do just that, and make it look easy too, but I don't think I've ever been that woman. If my career is going well, my housework is suffering, as are my friendships. If my family life is taking up my focus, my work ethic goes out the window, along with my cleaning schedule. (Let's face it, I'll take any excuse not to clean up after myself.) I've never been able to find that perfect balance, and I will quite often choose to sit on the couch and drink coffee rather than actually do any of the things on my mile long to do list. I'm an expert procrastinator, just ask me. (But not right now ok, I'm too busy staring at my eye worms.)

But recently I wanted to find out whether or not it is indeed possible to have all the things. I wanted to know whether there was a way to be the perfect woman we always see in the media. She's impeccably groomed, she has time for coffee with the girlfriends, she has wholesome home cooked meals on the table every single night, and I'm sure she's a tiger in the sack too, but they never really show that part during prime time television for some reason... So I decided to become that woman for a while, to step into her shoes and find out exactly how the hell it is she does all the things the television says she does. I was hoping that I'd find some secret formula to all of this, which I could then rush off and share to all of my female friends who at the end of the day always look the same as me; exhausted, overwhelmed and not a little bit crazed. So for one week I decided to become the "perfect" woman, I was going to be everything for everyone. I was to be the perfect mother, the perfect daughter, the perfect sister, the perfect housekeeper and the perfect employee. I'm sure you've all already guessed how this turned out.

In order to be the perfect mother, I decided I couldn't reprimand Miss K too strongly. You would never see a TV mum calling her kids bone headed for sticking their finger in the fan, so neither would I. (I did giggle while I was comforting her though, which is also something you'd never see a TV mum doing.) You'd never see her sending her kids off to school with junk food in their lunch boxes or serving convenience meals for dinner, so neither would I. All meals for the week were to be healthy and well thought out. There was to be nothing artificial pass our lips at all during this time. And all this meant was a lot more time spent in the kitchen for me. Of course there were some moments of pride like the night my carbonara fettucini turned out really well, or the day Miss K and I made popcorn for her lunches (no salt or butter though, that's just too unhealthy) but for the most part all I remember is pruny fingers from having my hands in dishwater, and sweat pouring off me while I slaved over the stove in 30 degree heat (86 degrees farenheit for my American friends) which immediately made me regret not trying this experiment in the winter when my kitchen is my favourite place in the house simply because of all the heat I can generate at once. I will say the time spent with Miss K at the end of the day as we ate our dinner without watching television, and cleaned the kitchen together were pretty pleasant when I wasn't stressing that she wasn't eating her vegetables, or was taking too long to dry the dishes (mainly because she was turning the cutlery into people), but listening to her constant chatter was always guaranteed to make me smile.

Being the perfect daughter was more of a challenge for me, because I'm pretty much perfect already. (I can hear my mum laughing at this statement already.) but I figured that given I know one of mum's biggest pet peeves in the world is a dirty kitchen, all the time I spent in there keeping it pristine would have made her pretty happy. Plus she had a whole week off from having to cook food, which is something all mum's dream of. (Trust me, I know.) I felt bad that I couldn't think of anything earth shattering to do to assert my role as the perfect child, so I had to take comfort in the little things like a (mostly) edible meal sitting in the microwave every single night, and a block of cheese in the fridge for her midnight snacks at all time. It clearly worked though, because she literally just called me a dick, so I'm obviously the favourite child right now.

As for perfect sister and perfect employee, they kind of ended up being rolled into one, as I spent the week helping my big sister who is trying to get a business off the ground. I'm hoping that by getting in at the ground floor, I'll be in for easy money once she's a millionaire. So for this part of my role, I spent my week studying up on contract law, and drawing up terms and conditions as well as a refund policy for her new business. I also drew up a business plan for her, and got started on the registration process for taxes and other boring stuff. Believe it or not this was actually the most fun part of my week, which makes more sense when I tell you I do my budget for fun, and I can write up legal documents in my sleep. This was also the area where I felt the most useful. There are definitely times where I miss being in a work environment, so having a chance to play secretary for the week was rewarding.

One of the things I learned throughout this week is that it takes a hell of a lot of organisation just to be remotely proficient in more than one of these areas. I had more lists running through my head and written down in my organiser than I knew what to do with. I would almost be happy never to see another list again. I also learned that when you're doing everything for everyone else, it is very easy to forget yourself quickly. My own needs eventually became low priority, simply because I can forgive myself for forgetting to shower more than once a week. (Another reason why this would have been a better experiment to do in the dead cold of winter.) I also became very protective of time I put aside for myself. Texts and snapchats suddenly became an intrusion during a time I wished to speak to no one, whereas once upon a time I was happy to be reachable right up to and even sometimes after bedtime. When you put so much of yourself into working for other people, those three hours at the end of the day when kids are finally in bed but you are not become a revered time that you spend all other waking hours dreaming of. When someone dared to take up that time by making me look at photos of their latest trip to the pub I started to feel just the tiniest bit stabby. I could have turned off my phone, but a perfect person probably wouldn't shut themselves off from the world like that.

But where did all of this leave me at the end of the week? It leaves me with a sparkly clean kitchen, a freezer full of pre-prepared meals I can pull out and defrost, it leaves me with lots of lovely memories of times I didn't lose my temper at Miss K like I normally would, and it hopefully leaves her feeling a little bit more secure about her place in my world. But most of all it leaves me feeling over tired and under appreciated. It's not like I went into this looking for praise or accolades, or even that people didn't recognise the hard work I put in during this week. My big sister even forced me to take the weekend off from working for her, simply because I was starting to look like a zombie by the time Thursday rolled around. It was more the feeling that what I just spent a week doing is expected as the bare minimum for women these days. We're expected to go find work outside of the house, plus keep doing the work we've always done inside the house, and look like a million dollars the whole time. I simply couldn't keep this up for much longer before I needed a week at the local psych ward. I definitely understand why women turn to alcohol.

 I certainly don't feel perfect right now, if anything I feel less perfect than I did before I started. It served to highlight all of the areas in my life where I don't balance things properly when I'm not watching myself, which is always a cheerful thing to think about. But I definitely came out of this with a newly found respect for women everywhere who do this for more than one week at a time. For the women out there who this is necessary each and every single day. Be it because they simply don't have the support network I am fortunate to have around me, or because they find doing all of this rewarding, instead of exhausting, or even simply because they want to prove that it can be done; I still think you're slightly mad, but I salute you anyway.

Now if you'll excuse me, this perfectly imperfect woman has just earned herself a perfectly long nap.

The week I wrote a book

I know, I know, I disappeared again. I keep doing this to you guys, but I promise I have a good excuse this week, I wrote a book. Don't start jumping up and down just yet, you won't see my name on the New York Times bestsellers list just yet, because my name isn't on this book. I don't know whose name is going to be on this book because I didn't write it for me.

I mentioned in a post at the very end of last year that I was unemployed now, and we are currently struggling to find ways to stretch a very limited income. Well one of the ways I have found is freelance writing. As I'm sure you guys are all aware, I love writing. It has always been one of my favourite hobbies (right after sleeping) ever since I was a kid. So when I found a website that gave freelance writers a place to apply for work, I signed right up. This was back in October of last  year, and while I got employed almost straight away writing articles for various blogs and websites, my new boss (or as we freelancers call them, clients) was shady as all get up, and I ended up doing a months worth of work for free, because he never paid me for any of the writing I did for him.

Fast forward to this year, and my current empty money bag. I decided that I don't want to write SEO articles for other people, if SEO was important to me, I'd be using it here for goodness sake and driving traffic to my own awesome corner of the interwebs. I decided what I really want to do is what I dreamed of doing back when I was young and optimistic, and that was write books. Of course I have a huge problem standing in the way of being an author, and that is the fact that I have nothing to say on any subject until you tell me to start talking. So in comes my freelance hiring website, and my best use of the biggest words I know, trying to impress e-book publishers and convince them to hire me to be one of their typing monkeys. And wouldn't you know it, someone took the bait.

Unfortunately for me, being a freelance writer means you have to write on whatever subject your client wants you to write about, and this client wanted a how-to book written up for a very popular computer game. Now I'm well aware of this computer game, I've even tried playing it once or twice, but I'm what gamers call "a total noob" so I'm probably the last person you want writing anything about games. Of course I can't admit this to my new client, so I had to panic quietly, and then I did the smartest thing I have ever done, I called my big sister, who plays this game with her son religiously. They watch YouTube videos, they go on public servers, they've even run their own server. They spent the next week schooling me on this game, and helped make sure I wrote something that was not only coherent, but also correct. I even had to learn the language these gamers speak. This was a crash course in nerd like I've never had before.

So now, I can proudly say I am a struggling artiste, as I sit around coffee shops stroking my neckbeard (what female hipsters can't have neckbeards? tell that to my European genes.) instead of simply a stay at home mum who relies on rice to pad out way too many meals. And just because there's nothing better than unwarranted advice on a personal blog to help you guys out, here is the perfect process for writing a book for someone else on a subject you know nothing about.

Step 1: Stare at the screen dumbly while you try to process exactly what you just agreed to.
Step 2: Have a brief moment of optimism as you ask yourself exactly how hard it could be to write a book about computer games/eliminating bedbugs using steam cleaners/whatever other crazy subject people apparently want to read about.
Step 3: Run around the room in a blind panic as you realise you're about to reveal yourself as an absolute fraud.
Step 4: Find an expert on the topic you need to write about, bribe them with chocolate (or alcohol, or even Pokemon cards if they're young enough).
Step 5: Begin writing, realise this is going to be harder than you originally thought.
Step 6: Spend a week hunched over your computer day and night pouring over wiki articles, YouTube videos and Google as you find difficulty after difficulty after difficulty in your way.
Step 7: Begin dreaming about the video game/topic you're currently writing about. (I'm not even kidding about this one.)
Step 8: Write the book, proof read the book, get someone else to proof read the book, proof read the book for a second, third and fourth time, Check it once more just to make sure you absolutely haven't left anything out.
Step 9: Submit your book and pray your client is gentle with their criticisms.
Step 10: Read the email telling you the client loved your book, and wants you to do another one on the exact same subject.
Step 11: Crawl into a bottle of wine and never crawl out again.

So that's it. I am now trying to find a nice way to tell my new client that I never want to write another computer game based book as long as I live, but I think I'm just going to take the chicken's way out and tell him I've now moved on to other projects. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to play a computer game, because thanks to this stupid book, I'm officially addicted to this game. If you're interested to learn more, all my tips and tricks are yours for the low, low price of a bottle of Jack Daniels. (or $0.99) if you can wait for the book to come out on Kindle.

Am I completely insane?

Hello again wonderful people that make up my audience, I am back again. I've had a nice little break from writing (actually it was terrible. I missed writing and I missed talking with you guys) but fear not because the holiday is over and I finally have something to say. First of all I have been very relieved over the past few days of stalking reading other blogs online to find out I have not been the only one filled with blog ennui (otherwise known as writers block). For any of my fellow bloggers in Australia, I have a feeling it is the onset of winter that has us feeling uninspired and full of meh. I spend my days enviously reading all of my American blogs filled with summer activities and warm weather and I just want to pack my bag and move north. But given I have a job interview on Tuesday any plans to move will have to be put on hold for now.

That's right, a job interview. I thought I'd just sneak that one in and see if you guys noticed. Once upon a time, (or in 2007 if my old resume is anything to go by) I used to work for a local solicitor as one of her secretaries. The work was fast paced and pretty challenging for someone who hadn't done anything like dictation or writing up legal documents before, but the thing that made me quit was all the horrible stories I heard while working there. There's nothing like listening to everyone's divorce and custody stories to put you in a bad mood every single day. So I quit the job after 6 months and moved to Melbourne to work in yet another call centre. (I can't remember exactly how many call centre's I've worked in, but needless to say it's a lot.) Well fast forward 5 years to when I'm going through my own custody battle, and the only solicitor I wanted to represent me was my former boss. Given I had insider's knowledge to how she works, I knew that she was my best bet for ensuring that Miss K's needs were the main consideration in any custody agreements.

Well we never ended up going to court or even writing up any custody agreements, and Miss K's dad and I ended up sorting everything out on our own, but I did learn from my solicitor that a job would be coming up in her office soon. She told me the job was mine if I wanted to come back, and to my surprise I said yes. Well this was over 7 months ago, and I never heard anything more about it so I put it out of my mind and went back to being a full time mum. On Thursday of this week mum was reading the local paper, and spotted a job ad for my solicitor's office. She told me to call her, but given the ad only gave her postal address and email, I ended up emailing one of the secretaries and asked to be considered for the job. Well less than 12 hours after I sent the email I got a call asking to come in on Tuesday next week. I don't know if this means I've got the job and she wants to discuss starting times etc, or she just wants to do a formal interview in the interest of fairness to all candidates, but just quietly I am soiling my pants at the thought of either prospect.

Not that I'm scared of job interviews, I've had my fair share over the past 11 years, and although not every one of them ever resulted in a job, I have learned over the years how to cruise through them. No, my real fear is that I actually have the job. Now I know that I can do the job, and if I stick around long enough I'll actually be sent off for proper training, but I don't know what going to work will do to me and Miss K. Anyone who has been here for a while will know that I am a big advocate for stay at home mums. However I have known since the beginning that the time would come where I have to return for work. Sadly for me the time has come sooner than I had hoped, as money is nothing more than a rumor around here these days, and with Miss K needing specialist appointments for her eyes, plus therapy for her speech and motor skills, we are struggling to keep our heads above water at the moment.

When I was younger, I had always dreamed of finding the perfect job where I jumped out of bed every morning looking forward to spending the next 8 hours at work. Sadly after 11 years of working (and not working) I am more realistic about what to expect from a job, and know that there is no such thing as the perfect job. I will never look forward to working, and even though there will be good days and bad days, the purpose of work is really for money, and not any kind of personal fulfillment. The work here will be hard, and I will earn every single dollar that I make, but my solicitor takes good care of her staff, and because of her incredible work ethic and knowledge she is never short of clients. (That and divorce is too easy these days.)

But what about my other job? The one that I'll have till the day I die. Miss K is the reason I'm applying for this job, and she will be what most of the money will be spent on, but what is my absence going to do to her? The shortest answer is I don't know, and I won't know until it happens. I know I'll miss so much while at work, and it is part of the trade off for being financially secure, but it just feels so cold to dump her on someone else while I go and play with the big people all day. I am lucky to have a wonderful family who have agreed to help me with taking care of her while I'm at work, so hopefully we won't have to put her in daycare at this stage. That is a small form of relief, because at least I know that while I'm not around she'll still be surrounded by everyone else that she loves and trusts, and she'll get the best care possible. But it also brings up the concern that we are being a burden on my family. Of course they'd tell me I'm being stupid right now, but I can't help but feel this way.

But all of this is just speculation for now, because like I said I still don't know if I have this job. Right now a more pressing concern is the fact that I've been out of work for 3 years now, so my corporate wardrobe is non-existent. So if you'll excuse me I'm off to raid every wardrobe in my family for something to wear. Wish me luck and I'll be back again soon.

 

Image courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net

I'm assuming this is still inappropriate wear for a job interview yes?

Mad as Hell and the Rant that Proves it

Ok I know I missed out on yesterday's recipe post for this week, and at this stage it doesn't look like I'll get a life hacks out today, especially given that it's now Wednesday morning, but I have had to take a break from my computer since yesterday otherwise it would have ended up out the window. 

The sad thing is it wouldn't have been the computer's fault that it was thrown out of the window. Despite the BSOD* that keeps happening with alarming regularity these days, the reason for my anger wasn't in the computer itself, but in an article I read. One of the bloggers I have read ever since I was introduced to the wonderful wide world of blogging a year ago, Corrie from Retro Mummy, was featured this week on the website Essential Baby. The article was about the rise of the "retro housewife" and despite the fact that it was written by a woman, was so full of misogynistic crap, I saw red. I popped over to Retro Mummy's website to see what she had to say about the article, and saw a completely different side to her story than what the original article wanted me to see.

The article painted a very pretty picture of Corrie as a Stepford wife, complete with "a patchwork skirt and bare feet" (really? did she have to be barefoot? the only thing that would have made that worse was if she was pregnant at the time and holding her youngest baby on her hip. Now that I think about it, Corrie has put photos up from the photo shoot that accompanied the article, and in each picture she has displayed, she is very clearly wearing shoes. What the hell was this writer trying to do?) They described the rustic dining room table, complete with a vase of Irises, and a delicious cake cooling (on the windowsill I'm assuming.)  They contrasted this scene of domestic bliss against her former life as a credit analyst playing with the big boys, almost with a sense of regret that she had stooped so low as to give up a high profile job to play at mummies and daddies. There were several similar stories of other Stepford wives, complete with herb gardens and bee hives and complete happiness, but no real sense of the women behind the facade.

Corrie tells a sadder story than the blissful scene that the "journalist" stumbled upon the day she arrived, telling how she had chosen to turn her back on the corporate world for the sake of her children because her mother had been unable to do the same. Corrie was a latch key kid who spent her afternoons watching children's television while her mother was off earning a buck. She refused to put her children through the childhood she had lived through, and wanted to make sure that when they came home, there was an adult there to care for them, listen to them and be a parent to them. Why that never made it into the article I will never understand, but apparently that doesn't make for interesting reading for some people because it's not even hinted at in the Retro Housewife. 

Now for any of you who haven't read the article yet, you're probably wondering why I'm so angry at a superficial article describing pretty people playing with pretty things. Well that is because the article then did a full 180, pulling out the big guns of a group of angry feminists, shaking their fists at these women deliberately choosing to stay at home and raise their families, and blaming them for the decline in working mothers in the workforce. One woman in particular is angry that the very generation after the first feminists started fighting for "the right for married women to keep their jobs, to have equal access to promotion, and to be paid the same as men, scores of women are walking away and saying, 'We'd rather be Mummies" Well the last time I looked, women still weren't getting equal access to promotion, or equal pay. Is she seriously surprised that mums are starting to re-evaluate their priorities? That they have started to decide we don't want to be super mums, some of us are happy simply with the title mum.

The term Super Mum has been thrown around a lot over the years, and the image that it conjures up is of the working mother. She gets up at 5, makes sure her kids are fed, dressed immaculately and then ferried off to their excellent school in the latest model Range Rover. Then she schleps across the city to her job, works her butt into the ground for 8 hours, then gets home, cooks dinner, does the dishes, does the laundry, mops the floor, makes tomorrow's lunches, and then probably pleasures the husband before collapsing into a coma for 5 hours. The problem with this image is I don't personally know anyone who could sustain it for more than a week before she needed to be institutionalised. I know we women are strong, but I don't think even Superman would be able to cram that much into his day. (Especially with working 2 jobs, one of them including facing death every single day.) 

The problem with the super mum is that the title assumes that the mother has to do everything. It doesn't say anywhere in the title that she gets help from the family with anything. So a lot of women are putting themselves under extreme pressure just to live up to an incredibly unrealistic and dangerous image. Hell I'm a stay at home mum, and even I can't muster up the energy to do absolutely everything that needs to be done in a day. So the fact that women are starting to realise that we can't do everything and we need to simplify our lives is of absolutely no surprise to me at all.  

But apparently I seem to be different to the feminists because they are surprised. And they are angry. They call this move to more traditional roles "self sabotage" and say it "cements gender stereotypes". They also say it suggests a "downturn in ambition in women", as if being a mother is a completely unambitious pursuit. Rubbish! You want to make sure that your children turn out to be the best versions of themselves, then you have to be damn ambitious, because raising children is not for the weak hearted. 

Then the feminists turn around and pull the same man hating stunts they have been pulling for years and start saying that maybe men need to stay at home more. Men need to be the home makers while the women go out and get jobs. Well I don't know about any of you, but every man I have ever dated has been a terrible housekeeper, and I would feel better leaving the running of MY house to a pack of wild chimps than any man. (This of course does not apply to my little brother who is the best stay at home dad I know, and his house is always spotless.) Women are by default the home makers because they are the ones that are able to look at a room and see absolutely everything that needs to be done. Maybe not all today, but it will get done. We have the ability to write lists in our heads and we have internal calendars and the ability to memorise a shopping list to the point where we can do the grocery shopping in our sleep. Now these skills may not seem important to you, and you may think they would be absolutely useless in the working world, but they translate there too. Which is why women are as great in the working world as they are at home.

Now I'm doing the 180 I hear you say. But I'm not, and that brings me to the thing that makes me angriest of all. These feminists, these women who feel that they know everything about gender equality and what women are meant to want have forgotten the fundamental fact behind feminism. When the feminist movement was started, it was meant to be about CHOICE. Women wanted to be able to choose whether they wanted to go out to work or stay at home. Women wanted to be able to choose what happened to their bodies, women wanted to be able to choose where their futures lay. And as far as I'm concerned these women aren't anti-feminists, because they are choosing to stay at home and be housewives and mums. 

Now despite my anger at the women featured in this article, I'm not anti-feminist. I am glad that the feminist movement happened, because thanks to the pioneering women who started it all I am free to take birth control. If I ever wanted an abortion (which I don't) I am able to go to a safe and clean hospital instead of a back alley butcher. I have been allowed to be a single mother whereas once upon a time my daughter would have been taken away from me and I probably would have been shipped off to a mental institution or a convent. I am free to work if I want to, or stay at home and take care of my daughter if I so desire. These women were brave, and ambitious and not afraid to say "Give me what I want or I will raise hell to get it" and I thank them for their bravery. But to have their message warped to suit the feminists of today makes me mad as hell. This is not what they wanted. They didn't want women drawing a line in the sand and saying this side is the right side and that side is the ignorant and wrong side. But thanks to the Neo-feminists of today, that is exactly what is happening, and I think it sucks.

Image courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net

Pictured: what the feminists want us all to look like

Well that is my rant for today, I would love to hear what you guys think, even if you disagree with me completely. Don't be afraid to pipe up with your two cents, but I ask as always that you leave any name calling at the door. Hopefully I'll be able to resume my normal "unambitious" writing tomorrow, but for now I'm off to bed. Stay awesome people.

*Blue Screen of Death AKA the worst thing you want to see appear on your computer screen ever.

Let stay at home mums stay at home

So yesterday I was reading one of the pull out sections of the weekend newspaper, when I stumbled upon an article by a woman called Wendy Tuohy banging on about the differences between men and women. Don't worry, today's post is not a battle of the sexes one, as that has been done to death everywhere else, and I don't really have anything original to say about it. Now Wendy's article was based on a list some man somewhere had written about the worst and best things about being a guy. She had decided to counteract this by writing the best and worst things about being a woman. However given some of the things on her list, I'm not entirely sure she is an expert on what she was saying.

Towards the end of the article, she said that one of the best things about being a woman was the fact that women could leave work to go off and have a baby, and everyone would be completely understanding if she didn't want to go back to work, and wanted instead to stay home and be a mum. Well the last time I checked, no one is OK with this any more except the mums themselves. The government certainly doesn't want anyone to stay at home and raise their families, they want all of us to be out being productive and making money for them. They have even gone as far as refusing to pay you to be a parent once your child is in school because then you're out of excuses. There is no reason for you to stay at home any more because the school system is now raising your child, so off you go, get a job and start doing something useful.

The only people wanting mums to stay at home and take care of their children are the mums themselves, and even then not all the mums are content with this. Some of them are quite happy to pay professionals to play with their children while they go off and have adult time at work. Now I'm not passing judgement on mums who work. In a couple of years I will have to be a mum that works, but this is not my choice. If I could choose, I would be at home all day waiting for Miss K to come home from school. And it is not because I have an obsession with daytime television either. (especially since all the daytime television I watch these days is aimed at children.) It is because I feel that as Miss K's parent, my job is to take care of her and run her home. I have already discovered as a childless bachelorette that I am terrible at balancing work and running a household. Once upon a time when I was a full time professional person my house was always messy and dishes were done as I needed a new plate and cutlery. Add the extra mess that a child brings to a household and pretty soon you'd be seeing me on an episode of hoarders or how clean is your house.

Given that I am a single parent, and the sole provider of income for my family, I have no choice but to go out to work as soon as I can, in order to make sure that Miss K and I have a comfortable life. I have had to accept this and I'm even taking steps to make myself more employable once that inevitable day comes. But I really resent the fact that my current job isn't appreciated by anyone other than Miss K. Of course you could rationalise that she really is the only person who needs to appreciate it as she is the only one who is affected by it, but given that she isn't the one that determines whether I get paid or not, her appreciation really doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things. It is because of people forcing mothers to go back to work that we are raising a generation of privileged brats who respect nobody but themselves. And I'm not saying that working mothers are bad parents here, I'm saying that children of working parents are being raised by child care centres who aren't allowed to use the word no, and aren't allowed to discipline a child when they need to be brought into line. Have we all forgotten that these are the people who are going to be choosing our nursing homes? I don't know about you but I'm very afraid.

The real issue that comes with returning to work after a 5 year "vacation" as you raised your child is that the skills you once valued as a worker are probably all a distant memory. Once upon a time I was able to juggle several conversations at once, stare down an entire basket of typing without flinching and manage a to do list as long as my arm. These days I struggle to have one conversation at a time, I wince every time I see another basket of laundry and my to do list stretches to next year, with very little progress ever. Of course being a mum means you can become creative when redoing your resume, as for the past few years you have been an entertainer, chef, personal assistant, nurse, negotiator and maid, but I know very few bosses who really care that you are able to sneak vegetables into your meals on a regular basis, or that you can diffuse a potential temper tantrum in five seconds flat. And very few colleagues appreciate it when you offer to kiss their boo boos better.

Luckily for me I still have a good couple of years left before I have to worry about returning to the adult world, and I'm determined to make the most of it. But I do wish that more recognition was given to the working soldiers whose battlefields are the kitchen sink and kids bedrooms. You may not think so but they work just as hard as you do, and sometimes even harder.

Information overload

So three days into my new course and I feel like my brain is slowly leaking out of my ears. I have successfully completed two assignments in these three days which was no small feat for me considering I had to squeeze them in between Miss K's meals, bedtimes, bath times, temper tantrums and constant demands for attention. It seems that Miss K is not as excited as I am about my foray into the finance sector, and is choosing to demonstrate this by getting into everything she possibly can in an attempt to get my attention. I am beginning to doubt if I will ever be able to successfully juggle being a single parent and a working mum at the same time, because already being a single mum and a student feels completely overwhelming.

Mum is helping in every way she can, by taking over some of the meal times for me so that I can finish just one more paragraph, or taking Miss K for a walk to the letterbox so I can get five minutes peace and quiet, and my big sister kindly babysat Miss K yesterday afternoon, and even managed to get her to fall asleep on the floor, which is something she hasn't done since she was about 4 months old. I am so incredibly lucky to have such a wonderful family who are willing to support me in this insane quest for a piece of paper, and who will even put my needs and Miss K's needs in front of their own. I am just terrified that I won't be able to hold up my end of the bargain and pass this course. Some of the work is so dead easy for me, it's almost insulting that I actually have to go through with studying it. I have an entire book sitting at my feet which is designed to teach people how to produce office documents, but given that this kind of thing has been my bread and butter for over ten years now, I can't get excited about learning something I've known for the past decade. However, there are things that I have never had to deal with before, like business ethics, and just the sight of those words are enough to bring me out in cold sweats.

The fear here is not that I won't be able to complete the work, I've already shown that the workload itself isn't an issue thanks to my wonderful family. The real problem is will I be able to complete it to a standard that my teacher will accept and pass? I guess this all traces back to when I was at high school. It was the first time I was actually any good at my work, and I took great pride in bringing home lots of A's and A+'s. If I got lower than a B+ I was disappointed and beat myself up over it, or if I felt it was unjustified, called my teachers rude names behind their backs. I was the biggest nerd ever and proud of it, and I had the grades to prove it. But it's been over ten years since I was in school and I'm not so certain any more that I'll be able to provide my teachers with what they want. Luckily for me there are a lot of resources made available by the TAFE to help me, including face to face sessions with my teacher every 2 weeks which I plan to make the most of, even though it means driving half an hour in the dark to get there.

Well it's incredibly late and I have spent too much of my day in front of this computer already, so I'm off to bed with a wonderful fat book which is going to tell me all about the OH&S practises that have been drummed into me every time I started a new job. I'm going to prove to my teacher that I can do this subject in my sleep. Ba da boom CHING!!!!!

Stay awesome my wonderful readers, and I'll be back soon, a rambling incoherent mess I'm sure. Until then take care.

Exercise in frustration

Wow two posts in one day, I'm on a roll. But given that everyone else who is in the house with me right now is currently having their morning nap and the washing machine only stopped 20 minutes ago, I have a little while before my load of washing starts to smell, what better way to spend it than writing another post. Anything for you my wonderful readers.

I mentioned the other day that I am trying to enrol in a bookkeeping course in an attempt to update my skills and make myself more employable when the inevitable day comes that I have to go back to work. (The government says this will be once Miss K turns 6.) However it is turning out to be a lot harder than I thought. I know that May is possibly the weirdest time to decide to enrol into school given that the first half of the year is almost over, but I was prompted by the announcement that the government is about to pull it's support from the tertiary education system, and after June 30 this year there will be no subsidies for further education. It is trivial things like this that really help get a person motivated.

So I contacted my local TAFE and was told I could enrol to do my course of choice online which suits me perfectly as it means I can get an education and raise Miss K at the same time. I had the lovely woman on the telephone email me through the enrolment forms (It took me two tries to get them, as I suspect she put the phone down and then forgot about me, so I had to email her and remind her that I existed and I want an education.) Unfortunately the enrolment forms gave no indication as to how much money I was going to have to pump into my plans, nor did it tell me how to go about getting a student loan. This prompted a second phone call and a three day wait for a response from her (Why are TAFE teachers so hard to get on the phone?) The second time we spoke she was less optimistic about my prospects. This time I was told I was probably better off waiting until the start of next year and enrolling at the same time as everyone else as they were already 3 units in and I had a lot of catching up to do. (They appeared to have completed an entire unit in one week, as when we spoke the previous Monday they had completed 2 units, and she didn't think I'd have a problem catching up) Now I am no stranger to hard work, having worked in 2 law firms, and a slew of other government departments, and I reassured her that the units they had completed were all full of stuff I have spent the last 10 years doing for a wage, however she remained unconvinced and advised me she'd have to speak to somebody else in the department before making a final decision whether to accept my enrolment form. I am currently waiting for an email from her with the department's final decision about when I can enrol for my course.

Of course this isn't what really bugs me the most about trying to enrol. What gets me is the cost. Even with government subsidies, this online course is going to cost me over $1,300.00 for the course itself, and a further $600 for books and materials. (That fee I don't understand because I was under the impression that an online course meant the books and materials would be electronic, and I've looked at the cost of E-Books, they don't cost $600.) There is a massive push at the moment in Australia to get stay at home mums back in the workforce as soon as possible. (I'm not entirely convinced they wouldn't force everyone back to work as soon as the doctor sews you up if they could.) The problem with this is unless you have a degree before you go off and have your children (something I don't have) then you will wind up in a low paying job that wouldn't even cover the cost of daycare. Of course you could spend your down time as a stay at home mum brushing up on your skills and getting a degree if you can afford to go to school and put your children in daycare. (Of course you'd have to spend the rest of your time working the drive through at McDonalds just to be able to afford your week's supply of tinned spaghetti so you and your child don't starve.) The government wants its citizens to be skilled workers and have degrees and lots of wonderful letters after their names, but they don't make getting these degrees and letters easy. University courses cost tens of thousands of dollars a year, and TAFE fees aren't much better. It's a catch 22 that they have created and refuse to fix. And that people is what grinds my gears.

So for now I sit here in anticipation, waiting for the email that decides the next few years of my life. Whatever the decision is I will accept as I don't really have any other choice, but to be on the safe side I'm going to start stocking up on tinned spaghetti now in anticipation.

What do you DO all day?

I along with a lot of stay at home mums were very insulted to read a letter written to an advice columnist with the Washington Post, basically saying that she didn't believe that stay at home mum's actually did anything with their days that earned them the right at the end of their day to complain about being so tired. (For anyone who wants to read the letter, and the columnist's reply, the letter can be found here) Luckily the advice columnist is or has been in the past a stay at home mum, so her response is both witty and incredibly accurate. I found myself nodding vigorously at everything she had to say, and it took a great amount of strength to not stand up and cheer when I finished reading her response. (I have a sleeping baby and a sleeping mother who probably wouldn't have appreciated my enthusiasm as much as I do).

This isn't the first time I have heard this old chestnut, and not even the first time I have heard it since becoming a mum, but it makes my blood boil nonetheless. Even before I had Miss K, I knew from years of watching my mum be a stay at home mum to 6 children, that the stay at home mum that had nothing to do, was not a stay at home mum. When I was a kid, when I would have sick days, I'd sit in the lounge room and watch telly, and be vaguely aware of mum buzzing around in the background doing whatever it is that mums do. Even when she did stop at lunch to watch her soaps, she did it with a mountain of laundry and an ironing board in front of her. Even now, mum has a hard time sitting still for too long, having learned years ago that as a mum, your job is never finished, even when all but 2 of your children have moved out of home, and one of them is a mum themselves. Even sore hands aren't enough to stop her trying to do the dishes or clean the house up.

While I won't bore you with a list of everything that Miss K and I do on a day to day basis, needless to say, I don't have a lot of time to stop and smell the roses while she's out of bed. I'm still trying to figure out how to successfully do housework while she's awake. Tying her up has been ruled out as slightly over the top, and she so far has been unresponsive to suggestions of helping me to tidy up her toys, but we press on regardless. Sometimes it's hard to know whether I am getting the balance of attention to my daughter and attention to the house right, but I take the huge smiles I get from her as an indication that everything is OK. Even if there is a pile of books and Mega Blocks in the corner still not tidied up from yesterday, and I can never seem to get on top of keeping her room clean.

It isn't fair to assume that just because a woman doesn't go to an office and work from 9am to 5pm to pull a wage, and instead chooses to raise her children with her own hands, that she spends her entire day sitting around drinking coffee and socialising. If she does have a coffee, it is more likely to be sitting on a table going cold as she chases a child around, making sure they don't pull things on top of themselves, or eat things off the floor.

As for me, I hear Miss K singing my song, so back I go to being a stay at home mum. Someone pass me my cup of cold coffee......