Wherein the extended family grills you about work

I see my immediate family regularly. Like every three weeks regularly.  However, I see our extended family way less often.  Like once a year often.  What brings us together are those typical family events like weddings, showers, funerals (the worst kind of events), you know, those events where your saving grace is having a full glass of wine in hand so that you can knock a few swigs back before your aunt-in-law quizzes you on your breastfeeding skills.

Trust me, I love our family. I do. But sometimes when we get together I feel like I’m enduring the Spanish Inquisition of motherhood.

Take last night, for instance when the whole family came to town for the second cousin’s bat mitzvah.  It was a lovely affair which took place in a Unitarian Church (no, I had never been to a bat mitzvah in a church either) with a guitar-playing rabbi.  I didn’t realize how much better Hebrew songs sound with a little C-chord thrown in.  Really.  Even though the church didn’t have the heat on, my feet were freezing in my fabulous Tory Burch high-heeled boots, and I was starving (I didn’t mean to eat the candy at the end of the service that was meant to be thrown at the bat mitzvah girl), I felt warm and fuzzy after the bat mitzvah’s wonderful performance. Post-candy gorging, I was looking forward to celebrating a young girls’ rite of passage into womanhood after the service.

Until I got to the dinner wherein the inquisition from my working mom cousins-in-law began.

“So, how is it not working? Is it horrible? Are you miserable? Do you feel like pulling your hair out?”

I hadn’t even had half a glass of wine yet.

“Uh, well I actually am really enjoying it.”

“Really? I couldn’t do it. I have the greatest job, I work from home, my son’s in a day care and I work for myself – it’s great. I love my work.”

How do you respond to that?

I immediately got defensive.

“Well, I’m doing some freelance writing, and it’s not like I’m going to be an SAHM forever. I’ll probably go back to work one day.  Sounds like you have a great situation that works. My situation stopped working for me and I wasn’t happy.”

Of course most part of that was true.  But what if I had tweaked my response just a little bit to say, “I just wanted to stay home to be with my son.”

It should be that simple. I should be able to confidently say to my family, “I just don’t want to work. Right now and maybe forever.” Instead, I started to sweat and cringe and talk up my meager writing gigs just to fit in with my cousins who are more career-oriented than I probably will ever be.

On the way home from the dinner, I discussed this issue with my famous psychoanalyst stepfather-in-law. Dr. Dale understands what makes people tick an why they say the things they do.  And we came to, what I think is an interesting perspective on the topic of why women judge each other and get highly opinionated on the issue of working or staying at home. 

As a mom, you do what you do because it makes sense for you and your family. Not because your neighbor thinks it’s cool that you met Oprah one day on the job.  You do it because it works for you and nobody else.  And you can’t generalize those feelings to others. So of course if you like your job, you have a flexible schedule and your son is happy in day care, you can’t even remotely imagine what it would be like to stay at home every day and attend gymnastics classes with your two-year-old. Or maybe that’s just my cousin-in-law.  Or maybe our theory is whack.  But believing in that sure beats the alternative, which would include for me a sleepless night ruminating over why I threw away a successful career to play with Lego steam shovels.

What’s interesting now, is that now, six weeks removed from the job, I can’t get away from the conversation.  I’m slowly realizing that this conversation will probably be a part of who I am and will be for a very long time. I also realize that 1) perhaps the inquisition approach to asking how I’m doing staying at home now isn’t the best approach  since it’s so new and fresh still and 2) a second glass of wine may have helped me craft a wittier response. 

I’ll have to remember to ask the waiter for an extra glass of Pinot the next time I sit down for a family dinner.