Housewife is a Dirty Word -part 1

I think I prefer the term “stay at home mom or SAHM” over housewife. Why? I was the first person in and so far the only person in my family to get a college degree and now I am at home raising children. Don’t get me wrong, I love being at home most days and getting to see the kids grow and I am free of the rat race of corporate life. I never imagined the term would go with me. Housewife seems so derogatory to me. Why I wonder?

I am currently reading a book called To Hell With All That- Loving and Loathing Our Inner Housewife by Caitlin Flanagan. That fact that I am “reading” a book at all should be noted as my best friend says, “you don’t READ!’ This bright yellow book caught my eye for $3 in a dump bin at Big Lots. I find it comforting that other women have the same modern day questions about the antiquated notions of housewifery that I do. Everything from the idea of the white wedding, having children, dinner woes, the right amount of sex in a marriage etc. are covered. It is rather liberating to read that most women in modern society feel the need to be superwoman just like me.

To coin a phrase made popular by today’s epic TV shows like Lost or Grey’s Anatomy “what’s the back story?” I grew up in a super small town in Eastern PA and it was a great bubble to grow up in but ironically I didn’t ever really know too many housewives growing up. My Nana worked in a factory, my mom worked as a nurse and helped run the family business and my friends moms all seemed to work too. There was a housewife or two on our street and the whole concept seemed very June Cleaver to me. The women I knew were all hard working especially those that worked outside the home yet they managed to always have dinner ready, get me to where I needed to go and keep up with the house. It was still customary by the way to change drapes with the seasons and do spring cleaning with a seasonal furniture arrangement; who had time for that?

So, why is housewife a dirty word to me? In my time now as an adult I just don’t feel I have the right to call myself one. I don’t have a four course meal in the oven, I have resorted to naming the dust bunnies and our fridge is housing some kind of science experiment in the back corner of a slide out shelf I NEVER slide out! I realize my choices and lifestyle are different than those of the women I watched in the 70s and my days are filled with homeschooling, running around to get the best deal on bananas (5lbs for $2) and whatnot but geez can’t I do my “job”?

Let’s be real for a minute. I love to iron but don’t. I love to cook from scratch but don’t nearly enough. I love the smell of a clean room and vacuum marks in the carpet but rarely make the time. So what is my “job”? A very smart mom once told me that her “house was LIVED IN”. I have gone with that ever since to describe my own home. Does it really matter if I haven’t dusted this week or this month when I know my kids are getting to play outside or we all sit down to eat together because we don’t believe in overscheduling our kids? How many jobs do I really have and how many can I do well? In twenty years I want my family to know I was here in the dust for them not the other way around.

Granted I could get to a lot more tasks but don’t EVER look for me to change the curtains seasonally. In fall I will get to more like it or not as our homeschooling will end as our youngest attends a local charter school. I don’t mind the duties of a housewife and maybe I expect too much of myself; secretly I want to be June Cleaver. Times have changed and will continue to change and one day I will work outside the home, go back to college or both but I know one thing. I am too much of a hot mess to be a housewife and I’m ok with that.

It's Not Easy Being GREEN!

Kermit was my favorite growing up.  I'm not sure it was his froggy voice, gentle ways, temper or his sage advice.  "It's not easy being green."  He was refering to his color of course but in this day and age the phrase rings true for daily living.  Growing up we didn't recycle, didn't have a limit on garbage, have any regard for the planet and everybody had a burm barrel in the back yard.  This seems shocking just three decades later and perhaps I feel I must now make up for the entire neighborhood's ignorance but green is how we are trying to live at my house.  Are there times I have NO interest in washing out the mayo container and just pitch it; yes!  Most of the time I frantically "break down" everything from frozen dinner boxes to a box big enough for me that our bulk paper towels come in. (I know I know; working on getting rid of them entirely)        
      Of course this recycling business is not the only way to be green.  Just this year my New Year's resolution was one I could finally follow through on; buy sulfate free cleaners.  "Ignorance is Bliss" is another saying that seems to lead to living green.  I had NO earthly clue what was in mainstream, name brand detergents that come in those red and green bottles.  EWWWWW about covers it; beyond the effects on our water supply who wants that stuff on their clothes or the dishes they eat off of?  So, I set out to the local gorcery in January and bought seventh generation laundry and dish detergent.  Let me just tell ya, the detergent packets they make for the dishwasher (which uses less water than handwashing BTW) are FABULOUS!  So, every month or so we restock and sometimes we even have a coupon but for the most part they only cost 40 cents to a dollar more than the icky stuff.  My water and my planet are worth that right?
       "Live simply so others may simply live" is another great saying that goes with green living.  This one is so much easier to say than to live.  Let's be real; I love a lot of modern day things that up my carbon footprint including my tv, my dogs, my SUV, and so on and so on.  So, how do you live simply in mainstream?  I'm trying.  I think there is no good reason for styrofoam and refuse to have it in the house for anything and dreed when the left overs come home housed in it.  I can't remember the last time I bought a paper plate or paper napkins or even took a shower for more than 5 minutes.  I saw a documentry on the world's water supply this past fall and it changed me.  I went right out and bought aluminum water bottles for the whole family.  The movie made me want to go postal and drive my SUV into the local water bottling plant feature in the film. 
        The next green step is to buy organic and local.  Even though we burned most of our garbage as a kid we could also go across the street to my great aunt's to get fresh eggs or beans.  I had to go no father than school to know a kid in 4-H who was raising a steer that would later become my dinner.  These thoughts came to mind about a year ago when I explained to a classmate why I hadn't eaten meat in over 12yrs.  Why must my produce travel from countries unknown for me to eat them?  The modern consumer is I want it now and I am guilty of that.  I don't think folks like my 90 yr old Nana would flip their lid in the grocery 50 yrs ago if there were no grapes available in the dead of winter like I might.  So, alas the ignorance about my food supply is gone as well but while buying all organic is easily doable buying the same locally is next to impossible.  As a side note beware of the Allentown farmer's market as most of their produce is trucked in and I don't think I have ever seen a farmer there.
        I am no where near the top of the green living podium but I can do what I can.  That's all we do for ourselves, our children, each other's children and the world.  Take baby steps, I have.  It isn't easy being green but it's better than the alternative since we now know better. 
http://www.seventhgeneration.com/