My new church is currently running a series of women’s evening events. These are brilliant, both in content (biblical, practical, inspiring) and in arrangement (a weekend evening with hot drinks and endless chocolates, timed so that most women are able to attend, as opposed to the lovely mid-week meetings which are the privilege of the semi-retired or on maternity leave – in my experience, these very precious groups create wonderful relationship opportunities, but sadly exclude the working woman).
And the working woman is what I feel inspired to write about. Because, as ever, I am feeling the tension.
More reflections on work vs. home here: https://sarahhadfi.wixsite.com/website/post/on-wise-words-from-a-welsh-woman
This month’s women’s session was on the topic of ‘Expectations from the world, Pressures in the Workplace’ and the speaker brilliantly led us through recent cultural shifts about expectations of women at work, and then some key Bible bits on work and on the role of women. I’m pretty sure the talk raised more questions than it answered, but the key challenge I was left with was: what really shapes my view of work – the current culture (as I swing between comparing myself to the have-it-all impossible insta image, and the worthy SAHM counter movement), or the Bible?
Perhaps of equal value to the speaker’s words were our discussions around tables. I was nicely sandwiched between a granny and a younger lady pregnant with her first child. At one point I asked the older lady (an industrious, servant-hearted woman, who is very sacrificial with her time in helping with family and church things), “Do you feel like the work you do is unrewarded?” Her reply? "I feel like... a parasite!” because, she explained, in working at home she wasn’t paying her own way.
A parasite? A parasite! Nothing could be further from the truth! I’m pretty outraged that someone particularly of that generation could be so generous with her time, so dedicated to child-rearing and home-making and church ministry, and still feel the cultural pressure that says that work is valuable when it has monetary value. It made me feel newly grateful to my husband who has allowed me, nay, encouraged me, to not work much for the past decade, and managed to not make me feel parasitic. I should really be nicer to him!
And I think I also have too strong a self-righteous sense of the slog of the last decade to question whether I am earning my keep in my work at home. I've blogged about the breastfeeding difficulties https://sarahhadfi.wixsite.com/website/post/on-appreciation-of-dairy-cows the medical appointments https://sarahhadfi.wixsite.com/website/post/on-hospitals-and-storm-troopers and just the emotional toll of being the main carer https://sarahhadfi.wixsite.com/website/post/on-the-surprising-challenges-of-being-an-expert The decade has been without doubt, the best and most joyful of my life, but also the most tiring. As I cook and clean in a cold kitchen (so cold that there’s no hurry to put items away in the fridge, so cold that even the African snail has had to move out into the relatively balmy warmth of the hallway, but that’s another story) I sense not the joy of sharing in the privilege of work, as modelled to us by God in his acts of creation, or bestowed on humankind on the seventh day as a mark of their God-reflecting image, but rather the festering muttering resentment of the Genesis chapter three Fall, where the ‘thorns and thistles’ are for me never-ending laundry, the repetitive making of lunchboxes. I’m not pretending that my work at home is impressive or efficient (you should see my kitchen right now!), but I have a strong sense that it is enough, that it would be wrong to accuse me of laziness.
Meanwhile, on the other side of me at the women’s event, my mum-to-be friend tried to articulate the struggles of how her identity is tied to her job role, and what that would mean when she went on maternity leave. I think she’s right to be worried; such a major refocus of one’s energies is bound to shake one’s sense of self. It certainly has mine.
My very talented cousin just wrote an excellent article (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/whats-our-industry-like-working-parents-im-3-weeks-post-kate-thomas?fbclid=IwAR36dpRT5fUMlCiijYgER2NeeOOe8ZmLH8tMvSvwrBz84X8e8JPv4xLSTXs) in which she praises the ‘unsung heroes’ the working parents, and lists their many qualities which make them more valuable in the workplace. There is plenty to celebrate and agree with there. But when I look at myself as a case study, I’m pretty sure being a parent has not made me a better employee. A better human, definitely, more compassionate in my relationships, yes, but a reliable worker, not so much.
We’ve just had a vomiting bug at our house. It’s not unusual, there’s plenty going round, and small children are like walking petri dishes brimming with germs. But when someone’s got to stay at home with a sick child, that someone is most often me (my husband’s senior position at work normally makes it more problematic for him to take time off). So I've been at home, the board games cupboard has disgorged its contents of Orchard Toys offerings, and the work to-do list has piled up.
Teaching is not exactly a job which works well being done from home (as recent experiments with Teams teaching have only served to prove.) Teaching is definitely a role where being there, present in the classroom, is a prerequisite to being a good employee. And whilst I can say with a clear conscience that I work hard at school, that I am committed and trying my best, I can also say that I shudder to look at my attendance statistics for the previous year. Because when every fever or cough triggers a period of isolation and a PCR test, and there’s five of you, that’s a lot of opportunities to be emailing to say, “I’m so sorry but I can’t come in…”
I can’t do it all or have it all. I type that with no resentment but as a realistic statement of fact about myself. I have inspiring colleagues who juggle things very impressively, and perhaps they are just more efficient or capable, or perhaps their outside-of-work commitments and family set-ups just look very different from my own, but I am not like them; I see the limits to my capacity. I’ve recently taken on a temporary promotion at work (they are clearly excellent employers to be so flexible, and willing to invest in part time staff) and the unsurprising result is that things are impacted at home. The boys are shoo-ed off so I can just reply to this one email, the shirts are piling up unironed, the Christmas present shopping isn’t finished.
I’m blessed to have a job I enjoy and I’m blessed to be able to do it part time so that I still get time at home with the family. And I guess if I spent a bit more time reading the Bible and a bit less time on social media, I could have a healthier view of what working well looks like as a woman, and really make the most of those blessings.
On the way out from my women’s meeting, a new friend asked if we could meet to chat, as I’ve had more years of experience of the challenges of being a part-time working mum. I laughed and promised to offer sympathy, if little in the way of advice, as “at school I feel like I’m doing a bad job because of stuff at home, and at home I feel like I’m doing a bad job because of stuff at school.” But as another woman came over to return her coffee cup, she put in, “That’s not being a working mum; that’s just being a worker, and always feeling like you could do things better.”
We need each other; we need to share these experiences and insights as they help give fresh perspective to our own situations, as I hope my musings might have given to you. In the meantime, I’m so thankful for these meetings, and for the reminder to turn back to what God thinks of our work.
More reflections on what God thinks of our work here: https://sarahhadfi.wixsite.com/website/post/on-being-good-enough
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