The Harsh Reality of 2nd Grade Logic | Mar 15th 2009
The other day I lost myself in a moment of nostalgia. I turned to my 7-year-old and said that one day I could train her to do what I did for a living. Wouldn’t she like that? She could work from home with mommy and I’d even pay her! Then she’d have this great skill to take with her to college so she could help pay her way (okay, so maybe it was a little self-serving).
I’m not sure what response I was expecting, but I know it was something loosely based on a magical Hollywood moment that I’d seen long ago.
She would say something like, “Work with you, mommy? Really? That’s awesome!” or “I want to start right now!”
Her actual response was a little different.
She got the same expression on her face that she gets when I make her stop doing something fun so she can put her socks on and said, “Mommy, I don’t want to stare at a computer all day.”
And there it was, from the mouth of my baby. That one short sentence deflated the rest of my day (okay, week).
I dropped her and her sister off at school, drove home listening to Deer Tick’s, “Art Isn’t Real (City of Sin)” and sobbing.
After I got over the simplistic, yet accurate, summary of my work day, I felt better. Sort of.
I realized that my expectations were a bit unrealistic. My child is seven. I mean, what was I thinking?
However, the entire experience made me consider the way I spend my time each day and how that might look to a child. When she sees me working, I’m staring at my computer. There’s nothing beyond that for her. I’m stuck at my desk while she’s playing in the mud with her friends.
But when I think how I’ve carved out a niche for myself that enables me to work from home, continuously rearrange my schedule, and support a family, I realize my perspective is impossible for her to understand. I see my computer as an instrument of freedom, rather than a ball and chain around my ankle.
I don’t want to give my daughter spreadsheets to update and files to edit. I want to give her the tools to carve out the life she wants. Someday she’ll understand that, but for now we’re both happy to let her play in the mud while mommy stares at the computer.
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This article was published in the Poughkeepsie Journal on 3/14/09 under the title, “Be Like Mommy, Girl Isn’t too Keen”