The Wife and the Writer's Life

Five hundred years ago today, Martin Luther is supposed to have nailed his 95 theses to the door of the Wittenburg Castle Church, an act which helped catalyse the Reformation. Thinking about Martin and his wife, Kate, I wrote the following piece for Zadok Perspectives No. 134 during a very busy summer!

***

So I got an email asking if I could whip up a column on Martin Luther or maybe his wife Kate sometime in the next week, and I’d love to. I’d love to tell you about the time we went to Lutherstadt-Wittenburg and toured the church and their home. I’d love to tell you about how Martin spent the first three hours of every day in his study wrestling with God and praying before he got down to work—but the washing machine is trilling to say that the next load is ready to be hung on the line, a kid has just come into the study needing her mum, and I don’t have the time.

For I am Kate: the household manager. The Luther household was large, overflowing with children and visitors and servants and paying guests. And Kate made sure that the bread was baked and the meals were cooked and the beds were made and the children were taught and the vegetables were harvested and the beer was brewed. I’d love to tell you more about her, but it’s summer holidays, I live near the ocean, and I’ve had a constant stream of guests. In the last four weeks I’ve cooked over 300 dinners, and made breakfasts and lunches too. I’ve washed countless dishes and sheets and towels, swept and mopped the floors, talked to the plumber and other tradies, and paid the bills, even as I’ve spent time with visiting family and friends. But unlike Kate, I don’t have servants: no cook, no laundress, no maid, no farmhand, no gardener. Instead, I have my husband and me, and what I can wheedle, bully and cajole out of the kids. Yet my husband works in Melbourne and is away three days a week; the kids sometimes refuse their chores: much of the work is done by me.

Because it’s summer, I’ve also spent hours with the kids at the beach. And because I am not just a household manager, but also the sole pastor of a new congregation in a smallish city, I keep bumping into parishioners and others who access me in my role, and so, while standing around in my bathing suit, I’ve had conversations about grace and judgement and calling and forgiveness, and Jesus’ teaching on possessions. And then after I’ve listened and maybe spoken a word of hope or comfort or truth, they say to me, “Are you having a nice holiday?” and it’s true I’m in my bathers but I wonder what on earth they think I’m doing as I take what I hear, pray, read the Word, and prepare the next sermon that will shake them out of their complacency, or make them weep with gratitude and relief. For I’m also Martin: called to wrestle with God and preach and write, and proclaim God’s hospitality in word and deed. Unlike him, however, I don’t have a wife or three hours of solitude every day. Instead, I pray on foot as I slip out alone to the shops and plan the next round of meals. I’d tell you more about it, only I don’t have the time.

The Luthers paved the way for churches like ours, which keep an open table and have visitors every week; people who ask “What is prayer?” and “Who is Jesus?” and “Why do you do this weird ritual meal anyway?” even as they eat the bread and drink the wine and proclaim the mystery of our faith. They come, I think, because I am both Martin and Kate: the professional and the home maker: the writer and the cook. They read the sermons and eat the dinners because they are hungry: hungry for a people to eat with, hungry for a people to belong to, hungry for a shared narrative that is bigger and more generous than any other way of life. And this hunger is so great, and the eating is so central, that I’d love to find where Martin said, “If the good Lord sees fit to provide a nice, fat pike and a dry Rhine Riesling, then I see fit to eat and drink,” only it’s getting on to five and there are guests in the house. It’s time to turn on the oven, open a bottle of wine, put out crackers and dips, and cook dinner, so that this evening the people I love—the man I married, the children I birthed, the friends and parishioners and acquaintances I listen to, pray for, and talk, laugh and weep with—may, through the hospitality we provide in the name of Christ, come to the table and be fed.

Jesus promised that, when we follow him, we will find life in abundance; and life is certainly abundant in this wonderful, overflowing, crazy season of summer. In a couple of weeks, the visitors will go home, the kids will be back at school, my husband will be in Melbourne, and the house will be quiet. Then, I will sit in my study in solitude and silence, and then, I will find time to write.

In which I discover that a lounge room is more important than I thought

Above: My new, streamlined study

In the middle of last year we tried an experiment. We got rid of the lounge room and set up a study in there, instead. It was good for a while, at least for me. I found it easier to work at home, but we missed having a room where people could stay; we missed watching movies together as a family. Then one day my nine-year-old and I were in an op shop looking for a dress when she spied a big brown modular couch, ran over, flopped on it, and ordered me to buy it.

I don’t usually take interior design instructions from a nine-year-old. But when I flopped on the couch, I too was sold. We bought it, it was delivered the same day, and the desk is now in the shed. And I am again without study.

Mostly, it’s been okay. It hadn't realised how much we like to watch movies together; and as my daughters get older, this will only become more important. I love cuddling up to my girls as we laugh our heads off at Inspector Clouseau, or sigh at Elizabeth Bennett and all her pretty sisters. And I had underestimated how much I like having friends come and stay, something they could not do while the room was a study, but can now it is a lounge room again.

As for my work, I’ve been working in public libraries, or at the kitchen table, or, when the kids are home and the libraries are closed, in a nursing chair in a corner of my bedroom, laptop balanced on my knees. Some days I feel like a pushover, sacrificing my needs to that of my family; other days, I graciously accept that, at this stage, the needs of the family and the demands of hospitality are more important, and I am lucky to have libraries, quiet kitchens and nursing chairs to work in. The current arrangement forces me to be streamlined, and that is a blessing to this messy person; all the same, it is frustrating not having anywhere to leave things out. Everything must be packed away before the next meal or when the library closes, then pulled out again at the next opportunity.

So it's a mixed decision. There are times when I fantasise about houses with studies, or extra rooms. Yet we used to live in one of those houses; but other values impelled us to move here, instead. And it’s not that our current house is too small. It has enough rooms. But the big lounge is at the front of the house, where nobody much hangs out; while the small reading room is just off the kitchen, and is everyone’s favourite place. The small room would make the better study, but the family will not forfeit it, even though it doesn’t fit a couch; the big room really is too big for a study, and contains the piano and the telly. If only I could swap the location of the small room and the big room, so that the big room opened off the kitchen and the small room was up the front - then everyone would be happy!

My husband suggests building a studio in the garden where I can write and think. But my kids fight up in the tree house; the little boys next door constantly wail for their mum; and the boys on the other side kick a soccer ball until midnight several nights a week. It’s noisy out there; building is expensive; and I’m not sure it’s a good option. More realistic is to accept that important values led us to this situation, and then do what so many parents do: wait a decade until the kids move out, and take over a bedroom.

Or maybe just move house.

Goodbye, lounge room! Hello, study!

I have a job which calls for a lot of reading and writing. I don’t have an office; I read and write at home. And when I’m not working, I study, which is also all about reading and writing. And where do I do this reading and writing? Well, until very recently, like so many writers, I worked at the kitchen table.

And so every morning I’d clear up the breakfast dishes and dump them in the sink. I’d wipe the butter smears off the table, and push the ever-growing pile of craft to one end, or perhaps add it to the teetering heap on the spare chair. If the crumbs under the table were too bad, I’d get out the broom and sweep, and if the dishes were left from last night, I’d probably do the dishes, too.

Once the space was bearable, I’d fetch my stuff: laptop from a drawer in the little room off the kitchen; papers from the filing cabinet in the same room; books from the lounge room at the other end of the house. I’d set up and start. Five minutes later, my elbow would find a patch of sticky where someone spilled the jam, which I’d missed while wiping the table down. I’d get up, rinse the cloth, wipe the table once more, and dab at my elbow. Feeling exasperated, I’d make a cup of tea, then sit down again. It’s a miracle I ever started work!

At three, I’d pack everything up. Some days, everything would be put away, and I’d pick up the kids from school. Other days, I’d shove what I needed into my backpack and head to the local library, then return in time to cook dinner. Some evenings, after dinner, I’d go through the whole rigmarole of clearing the dinner dishes and wiping down the table, and setting up again, in order to read and write some more; then putting everything away ready for breakfast.

A few weeks ago, though, we had a minor revolution. A friend is setting up her own place for the first time. She texted and asked where we bought our couch. She said that she’s always loved it and had promised herself that, when the time came, she’d buy the same.

Hmm, I thought. We bought it fifteen years ago, pre-children. Being idiotic DINKS we chose an elegant cream linen couch stuffed with feathers. This beautiful couch is mind-blowingly comfortable. It also shows every speck of dirt and requires punching and fluffing after every sit to reintroduce air into the cushions. It has driven me crazy through eleven and a half years of children; at times I became one of those madwomen who tells her kids not to sit on the couch, and never sat on it herself. This couch has been nothing but a burden to this family: yet another job in a household where the work never ends.

I checked with my husband, then “Take it!” I texted back. “It’s huge and grubby and high maintenance: but if you want it, please take it!” Childless woman that she is, she said she’d love it, and set a date for collection.

I looked at low maintenance couches. Nothing grabbed me. Then I thought more about the lounge room and realised that we don’t actually use it. It’s not just the couch. We don’t watch TV; we rarely watch movies; we don’t read in there. The kids like to read up in the tree house, or on their beds, or flopped on a threadbare couch on the front porch where they can see friends and neighbours go by. My husband reads in the small room off the kitchen; it is lined with novels, and furnished with two wing-backed chairs. I read standing up. And I began to realise that, for all the people who come to our house each week, I can’t remember ever sitting with friends in the lounge room. We’re just not a lounge room family.

As I was thinking this, someone who had a big old desk of ours called. They no longer needed it: should they sell it, or did we want it back? Hmmm, I thought. Maybe we don’t need a lounge room at all. But I do need a study. And the desk was available for collection on the same day that the couch was going out the door.

The way things fell into the place, it was obvious. Even to pause and ponder feels a little silly: first world wondering gone mad. I need a study; we don’t need a lounge; the furniture is practically arranging itself. What’s the problem? And yet it feels slightly daring: Australians have lounge rooms. Everyone I know has a couch and a telly. Does not having them make us too different?

I began to realise that I’ve never thought much about the lounge room; I’ve just assumed we should have one. But this doesn’t take into account who we actually are, and what we actually need. It’s taken several years of crazy-making, and one friend taking the couch and another offering the desk, to realise that things could be different. It makes me wonder how else we live that is not about who we actually are, but is instead just a reflection of our middle class assumptions, shaped by advertising and glossy magazines and other people’s houses.

So we got rid of the lounge room. We now have a study. And today, I didn’t do the great pile of dishes in the kitchen: I couldn’t see them. Instead, I worked, and then wrote this. The desk runs into the middle of the room, with a view to the garden. Books form a comforting wall behind me, and on my right is a battered chair. Once it was the breastfeeding and story chair, but since we moved to this house a couple of years ago, it has been crowding a daughter’s bedroom. Now it is back in the common space. As I write, my oldest daughter arrives home. She wanders in and asks how my day was, then curls up in the chair and begins to read companionably. And I begin to think that this tiny countercultural act – no couch! no lounge room! – might just be a success.

Ululating at the graduation ceremony

My little sister has just been awarded her PhD. At the graduation ceremony, most of the audience seemed glued to their smartphones. To my right, young women scrolled through clothes on eBay; in front of me, others updated their Facebook profiles and visited the websites of modelling agencies. I sighed, and settled in for the long haul.

But then, a few rows down, I saw some little kids in pretty polyester dresses and down-at-heel shoes. Grandma kept close watch as they played, gazed round the hall, and peered at the brightly-robed academics sitting on stage. Finally, mum’s name was called, Grandma nudged, and they cheered and clapped. Dad took photos of the stage, where mum stood beaming with her degree, and I was reminded of the powerful effects parental education has on children’s lives. I became a little teary.

The ceremony rolled on. Women in headscarves, men in traditional dress, girls in miniskirts, were all awarded their degrees one by one. An African man’s name was called, and the row behind me erupted. Women ululated, hooting and calling and cheering, while he beamed on stage. A few minutes later, another African was awarded his degree. In front of me, a curvy woman in skin-tight red sequins leapt up and began dancing. Her hips swung in slow, erotic circles; her arms reached out in joy; and her upturned face radiated delight as she swayed.

As an elegant woman of Middle Eastern descent received her degree, all the Facebooking, eBaying, tweeting young people around me looked up from their smartphones to whistle and cheer; her fan club was out in force. A Malay woman in a headscarf received her PhD; an ornate embroidered dress peeked out from under the academic gown. The proceedings rolled on, and children and adults pointed and cheered and took photos. It could have been a citizenship ceremony at Coburg Town Hall, only the people in the ceremony all wore matching gowns.

My sister was third last. For over a decade she has studied issues surrounding forced migration, resettlement, and asylum seeking. She has sought to understand the mechanisms which facilitate the settlement of Iraqi families in Shepparton and Dinka kids in Sunbury; she has interviewed Iranians and Afghanis and Kurds about their experiences in detention. She has investigated the alternatives to immigration detention offered by best practice countries, and has been invited to speak with policy-makers around the world. Her work has been used by the UN and, thanks to her presentations and reports, several countries have released children from detention. Who knows what the ripple effects of her work will be.

I am so, so proud of her. When her name was called, I glanced at the audience. Many may have hailed from groups she has worked with and advocated for, but because her work is in the background, at the invisible but crucial level of policy, and because it is anathema to this country’s current government, nobody knows her name. She walked on stage, and I wanted the whole audience to leap up, whoop, ululate, gyrate, whistle, and take her picture.

Instead, her husband, her father and I sat, grinning like loonies, and politely clapped.

This post, then, is my ululation, my swinging my hips in a tight red dress in ecstatic public celebration. Whoo-hoo! Well done, Rah!

The gift of not striving

It’s my birthday, and has it been a busy year! My third child is finally at school. I am working part time and studying part time and running a household and doing all the things that people my age do. But today, being my birthday, it is time to take stock and reflect.

Yesterday, I met with my professional supervisor. ‘What are you going to give yourself for your birthday?’ she asked. ‘Think about a gift you can give, from deep in yourself to yourself, and tell me about it next time.’

This morning I woke up and knew what it would be: permission to stop striving. There’s nothing wrong with working hard, but there’s sometimes wrong with endless striving. I get up in the morning, organise three kids out the door and ride them to school. Then I turn around and ride home. I work and study for five or six hours, stopping only to eat and pee, then hop back on the bike and pick the kids up from school. We cycle home, I feed them, then I bring the washing in, tidy the back table, organise piano practice, listen to readers, cook dinner, and do all the things every parent does every night of the week. My partner comes home and asks me how my day was, and I say, ‘I feel like I haven’t done anything.’ He asks me what I have actually done, and I say things like, ‘Well, I did a first draft of a book review for a journal, and wrote up the minutes of a meeting and made a heap of phone calls and met with my supervisor and sorted three loads of washing and cooked dinner and actually, there was a bit there after all, wasn’t there?’. He looks at me and smiles, yes.

Because I work in a church, I always work on Sunday evenings; and because I’m often preaching, I’ll write for a few hours many Saturdays, too. Because the kids are at school all week, I feel like I can’t ‘waste’ that time, and so I also work Monday to Friday. Because Easter is a big work week, with services on Thursday, Friday and Saturday night and a gathering on Sunday morning, and because my husband had to work over the school holidays, I didn’t get a break these Easter holidays from either my work or the kids. And so in fact I have worked for some hours at least of very many days in a row; and also been busy with children.

All things considered, I’m hardly twiddling my thumbs. Yet despite this activity, I often feel like I’m not doing enough. There are so many ‘shoulds’ and ‘oughts’ that I find it hard to do the things that aren’t at the top of the list – like write a blog post, for example.

But today is my birthday, and I have given myself permission to stop striving. So I took the kids to school and went to the canteen. I usually work there for an hour on Tuesdays, but today, because I was not striving, I stayed longer. I sat on the deck with other parents and chatted over coffee about trees and gardens. Then I headed into the kitchen, where I made spinach and cheese pastries, and learned how to roll pastry like an empanada. I talked with my friend who runs the canteen: about parenting and housework, meditation and the meaning of life. She gave me a new cookbook, written by a friend of hers. In a quiet moment, we flicked through it and I was so inspired that I went home via the shops to buy the ingredients for a warming soup.

Because I wasn’t striving, I called a friend and had a birthday chat. Then, feeling decadent, I ate my birthday chocolate as an entrée to my vegetable lunch. I thought of ten jobs I should do, but I stood at the window and gazed at the pear tree, instead. The tree is turning from green to red, and the top is crowned in blazing leaves. I remembered a post I wrote years ago, about another pear tree, and dug it out and read it. And then, because I wasn’t striving, I decided to write this.

Happy birthday.

And to all you gardeners out there, yes, the photograph is of a crab apple leaf; the red leaves on the pear tree are too high for a good photo just yet! And this book is my most excellent birthday present - thanks Kris!

Participant observation, with cake

 

My daughter wanted to go to the park after kindergarten. So I walked her over and then, ignoring the knots of chatting parents, went and sat under a tree. I was feeling introverted; I had a crossword in my bag; I thought I could solve a few clues while my daughter played.

Within a few minutes, kids were gathering round. 'What are you doing?' they asked, then 'Look at me! Look at me!' they called. A two-year-old sibling leaned into my side. 'You're her [my daughter's] mother,' she said knowingly. Then she offered me a gumnut.

I thanked her for the gumnut, and we talked about its shape and pretty colour. Then I turned back to my crossword and filled in a few squares. She went for a wander, telling to me to watch her.

'No thanks,' I said, 'I'll do my crossword while you go for a walk.'

'Ok,' she said. A few minutes later she was back, with a pocket full of gumnuts. 'We're making cake,' she announced. I asked what was in her cake. Silence. 'Broccoli?' I asked. 'No!' she said, laughing. 'Beans?' I asked. 'Noooo!' she said again. 'Chocolate?' I asked. 'Yes!' she crowed, 'and sugar! And eggs!'

'Sounds delicious,' I said.

She had a little stick which she was using to stir the 'gredients' in her pocket. 'Mix, mix, mix' she said.

Then she found another little stick and handed it over. 'You stir,' she instructed, holding her pocket open and leaning towards me.

I gave up on the crossword, and gave the cake a good stir. She baked it, cut it up, and gave me a slice. Together, we ate. 'Good!' she said.

***

There are reams written about how to study kids and childhood. There are certainly projects which seek to find out particular things and which require formal methods; but in general I find the suggestion that researchers need special techniques to talk with kids slightly ludicrous.

I'm not naturally good with kids. I'd never make a kinder teacher; I don't like children's birthday parties; and group work will never be my forte. I always find new kids and groups of kids slightly terrifying; and too much time with children drives me batty. Even so, it seems pretty clear to me that kids are just people. They swell up when we remember their names; they like us to speak quietly and with respect; they appreciate it when we join in their games. It's not rocket science – and it's hardly different from adults. I may not mix gumnuts in your pocket, but if I remember your name, take you seriously, and engage in whatever you think is fun – a coffee, a chat, a walk, a joke – chances are you'll think I'm a good egg.

At the park, the little girl and I were just playing; but I have no doubt that, had I asked a few gentle questions while we mixed our cake, she would have told me to the best of her ability whatever I wanted to know. In fact, I didn't need to ask her anything to learn something about my own interests. I'm studying friendships between children and adults; and just the way our interaction unfolded spoke volumes about how kids and adults communicate and share small intimacies.

If I had been wearing my researcher hat, I could have described my role as 'participant observation', and written about the event from an 'autoethnographic perspective'. But she's not a formal part of my project, and I was only wearing a sunhat, so I wrote this post, instead.

How preparing PowerPoint slides triggered a brief existential crisis

 

Caution: Digging out pictures like this can lead to fear of death. Happily, the people in this photograph are still alive and kicking.

As part of my studies, I need to give a presentation to a group of my peers. There I will summarise what I have learned so far and sketch what I plan to do next. The university requires a PowerPoint presentation and so, like an obedient student, I am preparing one.

But a series of zooming bullet points is the surest way to put me to sleep. I can't bear to present like that, nor to talk about my project in such dry terms. I'm studying cross-age relationships, and operating in a narrative framework, which is a fancy way of saying that I get to collect a heap of stories about friendships between kids and adults, and write about them. In drafting my talk I've begun with a story about a cross-age friendship; it will hardly be enhanced by bullet points.

Therefore, I decided to illustrate the themes of the talk with photographs. For example, when talking about mentors and apprentices, or chosen aunties, I will show people engaging in those very relationships.

So I started going through the family albums. I was skimming the pages, thinking about the themes and looking for particular images, when it suddenly struck me just how many people I love have died. Obviously, my mother, my grandparents, and assorted older relatives have passed away – but so many others, too: Barbara, Roy, Keith, Wal, Lance, Soula. Page after page I turned, seeing the father in his thirties who died of cancer; the dad in his forties who collapsed with a heart attack; the mum in her fifties who got septicaemia; the friend who died in a car crash, leaving her daughter an orphan. Page after page after page after page: Michael, Eddie, David, Ross: death was staring me in the face.

There was I, toddler on an earth ball, and the man who supported me, dead. There was I, little girl at a campsite, and the camper next to me, dead. There was I, buck-toothed at the table, and my fellow diners, dead. There was I, inquisitive teenager, and the professor patiently answering my questions, dead.

Just a moment ago I was a child, held and loved by a great crowd. When did I become the adult with children of my own? And how quickly will I too die, and my children, and my children's children?

In the blink of an eye, that's when.

Completely overwhelmed, I closed the albums and hid them away. It was the middle of the day, but I took to my bed, and curled up in a foetal position under the covers. Death shall have no more dominion over us, I muttered, the words of the Christian declaration mocking my fear.

Yeah, right.

***

I lay there for almost an hour, totally panicked even as the rational part of my mind reproved me for being silly. It took me that long to remember the point which, as I understand it, is not that I'm going to die (which I am), but that I'm alive right now. And there are things to do that won't get done while I'm hiding paralysed under the covers.

Then I remembered what my five-year-old said a little while back: if everyone in the world lived forever, we wouldn't have enough beds. Reflecting on her words and the images they evoked, I almost smiled. Then I stretched out in my bed, gave thanks for five-year-olds, got up, and went back to work.

Failure and success

I never feel ‘successful’, whatever that means; instead, a vague sense of failure dogs me. It’s my own doing. Over and again, I have made choices to do what felt like the right thing, and which almost invariably moved me further away from conventional definitions of success. I’ve stayed home with kids for almost a decade; I’ve studied for love not employment; I’ve puttered around on blogs with no ambition or marketing plan; I’ve submitted writing to other outlets only occasionally and have barely tried to get published; I’ve never written a book or something ‘proper’; and now, when my youngest is almost ready to start school, I’m still not looking for a real job. Instead I’m studying again, this time for a higher degree in a field which I find fascinating but in which I see no prospect of further work.

Meanwhile, when I’m not studying, writing, cooking, or hanging out at the playground with a little one, I’m usually to be found in a classroom reading with kids. I’m not a trained reading recovery aide, just one of the countless mums who help out. Or I’m chopping veggies in the school canteen, or writing materials for my church community, or gardening, or doing something else for free.

As the feminist daughter of a professional woman, boy am I a failure. Despite my class, education and training, I’ve joined the great invisible unpaid workforce that keeps the world going. I don’t doubt that this is good work, but I am regularly assailed by the thought that I should have Achieved Something by now. Surely, to be a ‘successful’ person I should be earning a solid income, have results to show for my efforts, have a professional name. And I don’t. This idea of being ‘successful’ plagues me. Time and again I grapple with it, and time and again I reject it. But the rejection is never complete; slowly, the hunger builds once more, and I have to face up to it again. But why?

Perhaps the answer is found in religion. Garry Deverell, a brilliant thinker and theologian, has observed that we live in a deeply religious society. He isn’t talking about ‘Christianity’ or ‘Islam’ or ‘secular humanism’ or any of the other major faith-based observances. Instead, he understands religion to be the upholding of the cultural myths and assumptions that shape our values and our lives. In our society, one of those myths is ‘success’. More precisely, it is to be more successful – more highly educated, better paid, living in a bigger house with more stuff and a nicer car – than one’s parents; and this is what so many of us strive for.

My husband’s family is a classic example. Papa was a milkman who left school at 14 to accompany his dad on the milk run. His wife, Nana, worked as a tea lady to put their girls through high school and Dorothy, my husband’s mum, continued training to become a teacher. She married, and both my husband’s parents worked to put their boys through private school. My husband went straight to university, climbed another rung on the professional ladder, and became a lawyer. By most standards, this is a story of a successful family; and the story has, in fact, suited my husband well.

But when one lives differently, through choice or otherwise, the powers that be try to force you into conformity. Sometimes they attack from the outside, through the snide, diminishing comments of others; through the admonitions to get on board from conservative politicians and pulpits; though the social pressure of a particular milieu. Other times, they work from inside; the dominant powers become internalized, and they can do their most powerful work from within.

And this is, I think, what happens to me. Both my parents had postgraduate degrees. Moreover, my mum was a feminist trailblazer; and I must have been told a thousand times what a brilliant, incredible, gifted, prophetic woman she was. Then she died young: a life cut short, a tragic loss, God’s gift taken away too soon, blah blah blah.

I can’t possibly live up to her standards, let alone exceed them. To step out of her shadow I’d need to have written half a dozen bestselling books by now and have a fan club of thousands, and that sure ain’t happening! So I haven’t tried. I have deferred a career, if indeed I ever develop one, and instead I have tried to become a whole person, ‘living my prayer and praying my life’ as we say in our weekly church service.

It is, I think, a good way to live, but it comes at a cost: the cost of feeling like a failure; the cost of having to face up to that feeling again and again and tell it where to go; the cost of being criticized by others for not being a paid up participant in the workforce; the cost to my self-esteem (a sense of failure can be corrosive even when I understand how and why I feel this way); the cost of negotiating power and responsibilities in our marriage when my husband is very busy very important very paid and I’m not; and, of course, the cost of less household income.

These costs are the consequences of my choice to live in a way that is not improving on my parents’ lot and is not based on acquisition or wealth. I’m hardly a radical hippie, but even my small step off the hamster wheel has its price. A failure? In our society, with my background, how could I feel like anything else?

Yet life is full of paradoxes. The other day I studied for a few hours. I had ordered a book through an inter-library loan; surprisingly, it turned up as microfilm. So I had to re-teach myself how to use a microfilm reader, which was fun. Then I read like a mongrel. Book gutted, I headed to the shops and bought a swag of groceries; then I collected my youngest from kinder and we went home for lunch. Some good ideas swirled round my head as we hung out the washing and she chatted. We picked up her sisters from school, came home again, fooled around, cooked dinner, read stories, and went to bed.

As I lay there, I reflected that this smaller, less successful life suits me well. I move so sweet and fast that I often feel like I am dancing; even as I type, my hands float over the keyboard in swift and skilful play. According to my own lights and that of the world, I may be a bit of a failure; even so, I am surprisingly, even ridiculously, happy.

Work, Study, Housework, Homemaking: Some definitions

 

In my last post, I wrote about work-life balance. I've spent my whole adult life wondering about the nature of work; yet in that post I used the word without definition or clarification. Now I'd like to unpack it.

The day I wrote that post, I used the word to mean 'activity which is not directly related to managing children or the household'; that's what I always mean when I say 'work'. My husband works: he goes out of the house and does stuff which is not related to spending time with children, cleaning the house, washing clothes, or buying, preparing and serving food. Certainly the money he earns contributes mightily to the upkeep of the household, but when he is 'at work', he is not engaged in a hands-on way.

When I say that I 'work', I mean that I am studying or writing. I don't differentiate, when I speak, between all the aspects of 'studying' and 'writing', such as reading, mining bibliographies, meeting with supervisors or other students, attending seminars, collecting library books, sighing over crappy drafts, or gazing out the window wondering what the hell I'm trying to do. Nobody needs to know precisely what I do in those hours, just as nobody outside accounts needs to know when my husband meets with a client, drafts a document, ducks out for sushi, or gazes out the window wondering what the hell he's trying to do, too. Like him, I just say 'work'. It's easier that way.

So for me, 'work' is industrious activity outside the orbit of the household. Because I study, it's not financially remunerative; maybe one day it will be.

Why do these words matter? Quite simply, because language is powerful. I have found that if I say 'it's my study time', someone will always suggest meeting for coffee or doing an errand; and when my study times are measured in three hour blocks, this is disastrous. On the other hand, when I say 'it's my work day', nobody asks anything of me. We take 'work' much more seriously than 'study', even if the person using the word 'work' really, secretly, means 'study'.

It's magic! And it's crazy. Meanwhile, an old friend of mine recently worked out how much time she has spent breastfeeding her very young baby; it was many more hours than full time employment, and didn't take into account the time she has spent changing nappies, washing, or caring for her two-year-old. Yet her activities don't fall into our economic or political models of work, despite being physically and emotionally demanding, very time consuming, and of enormous benefit to society. Why do so few of us describe caring for young children as 'work'?

I cannot count the times I wanted to punch someone when they asked me, the mother of three pre-schoolers, when I was going back to work. If, as regularly happened, they went on to say 'it's such a privilege to be able to stay home', I'd have to sit on my fist. Caring for three young children always felt like work enough for me, especially as I often also cared for an extra child or two. If, however, I had been employed as a childcare worker – and put my own kids in paid care to do it – everyone would have given me a pat on the back for re-entering 'the workforce'.

Many mothers I know privately describe their paid work as 'time off'. When they're 'at work' they can concentrate with no interruption; they can grab a coffee and have a few minutes' peaceful contemplation; they can use their minds and training and see the fruits of their labour; they earn money and status because they are 'employed'; and they can pee alone. Once they collect the kids, they're feel like they're on a hamster wheel of taxiing, cooking dinner, listening to readers, washing dishes, bathing kids, tucking them into bed, putting on a load of washing, sweeping the floor, hanging the washing out, and preparing lunches for the next day.

I used to think these friends of mine were being funny when they described their jobs as 'time off', but now I have more time for 'work', that is, study and writing, I see how right they are. It is so affirming to do things which use a bigger skill set; I am beginning to feel like a fully-fledged adult. Study and writing and meetings and seminars do feel like time off (not to mention that blissfully empty time, the commute); even so, I jealously protect the time with the powerful word, 'work', to describe it all.

So what are the activities I rarely describe as work? Unlike my old friend, I'm no longer breastfeeding or changing nappies, thank goodness, but there's still the cooking (don't run in the kitchen, I'm using the big knife), cleaning (I only mopped yesterday, just look at this floor!), laundry (that's two outfits for the day young lady I don't care if it's dirty you're wearing it again tomorrow), washing up (how many cups did you use today???), taking children to and from kinder (where's your lunchbox?) and school (where's your helmet?) and piano lessons (didn't you practice???), braiding hair (I asked you to brush it), working in the school canteen (no you can't have a cupcake just because I'm here), reading with my kids (use a bookmark, not my shopping list/your shoe/a used tissue for god's sake!) and school kids, organising playdates (no you can't watch YouTube when you have a friend over), telling my kids to sit up straight and chew their food properly and put your knees down at once!, shopping for food and shoes and birthday presents, organising church suppers, pruning the roses, telling my kids to use a tissue and put it in the bin!, changing the sheets, overseeing tooth brushing, scrubbing muddy handprints off the walls, combing out nits (sit still!), calling and waiting for tradies, wiping down the benches, taking kids to the doctor and dentist and hairdresser, planting, weeding and watering veggies, reminding kids to put your damn clothes in the wash/away/does this floor look like a laundry basket?, managing multiple food allergies and intolerances (is that really worth eczema and stomach cramps?), feeding the school chooks and guinea pigs (don't squeeze the poor creature!), doing the family paperwork (when did your teacher give you this form?), fixing things (exactly HOW did you break it?), paying bills (do you think we're made of money?), and a thousand other activities.

Some want to describe all this as 'work' – and there are times when I do, too – yet I am largely reluctant to use that word. It's an uphill battle to reframe language. Most people use 'work' to mean 'job' or 'employment'; it's not automatic to use it for household duties. In any case, all these activities are about our primary relationships, and I don't want to reduce the enormous richness and complexity of running a household and caring for children to a set of economic activities, which is what 'work' usually suggests; family life is so much greater than that. Finally, paid work is not 'time off' or a pleasure for many people; it's the job they do so they can afford a roof over their heads and kids under the roof. To describe maintaining that home and caring for children as 'work' when those activities are experienced as a great privilege and a pleasure is, to many people, bizarre.

So I feel the need for another word. 'Housework' doesn't begin to cut it; to me, the word evokes a low heeled woman wearing a frilly apron and carrying a feather duster, and it completely overlooks all the relational aspects of caring for children and maintaining other household relationships. 'Housekeeping', too, doesn't quite fit because, like 'housework', the word is focussed on the physical structure of the house and doesn't provide for the people within it. If you employ a housekeeper, you also need a nanny; housekeepers don't care for children or anyone else.

Another possibility is the word 'homemaking'. It's a word that largely connotes women's work because of a social history in which women have spent the last however long as the primary workers in the home and carers of the people in it; in fact, some dictionaries go so far as to define it as a role some women (not men) adopt. And yet, on reflection, homemaking is not a verb which is intrinsically gendered: every man, woman and child engages in homemaking in some form or another.

Just think of the child who carefully places a pretty snail shell on a shelf; the man who takes out the garbage; the woman who sweeps the floor; the kids who build a cubby; and the baby who by her cries draws the household near. They are all homemakers, building the place where they live and shaping the relationships they have with the other people there.

So the home includes the place, and the objects and people within it; the members of the household co-create and maintain the place they call home through physical labour and relational work; and I can call this activity 'homemaking'.

I've found a word I can work with. I will continue to call any industrious activity outside the house 'work'; and all the things I do in and for the household I will call 'homemaking', instead.

Re the picture: Query: Are the dishes work? Answer: Not for me. They're homemaking. And I must admit, I rather enjoy splashing round in the sink! But as for scrubbing the loo... blech.

How I came to own the philosophy of work-life balance naked, wet, at seven o’clock in the morning

 

I was in the shower, steam everywhere, when someone walked into the bathroom. I twitched open the shower curtains to peek and there was my four-year-old, sitting on the loo and swinging her legs. 'Hi Mum,' she said, 'we're going to the zoo. Are you coming?'

It was school holidays. My husband had taken two days off work to be with the kids and free me to study; apparently he was taking them to the zoo.

As the water pounded my back, I shook my head and said, 'No thanks, today I'll stay home and do some work.'

'Because it's more important,' she said wisely, then gave me a kind smile.

Such a dagger to the guts. I grew up in a house where my mother's work was more important than everything else, and didn't we know it. As children, we were given to understand that we were highly treasured and highly privileged; as such, other less privileged people needed her time more than we did, and we were never to complain. I often dreamed of having a stay-at-home mum, the sort of comfortable person who enjoyed being with me and who baked cookies. And yet, when I spent time with other people's stay-at-home mums, I often didn't feel very comfortable; and it wasn't actually something I wanted from the woman who was my mother. If she'd stayed home, she would have gone berserk, and driven me crazy in the process. She drove me crazy enough as it was.

But I resented the primacy of work in her life; everyone else knew her better than me. And my sister and I spent so much of our childhoods just waiting. We'd hang round church for hours, waiting for her to be done, and not allowed to leave without her; we'd hang around the house waiting for her sudden gallop through the hall, clutching a pile of papers and yelling at us to hurry up. We'd sit on the back step after school, hot, thirsty, and busting to pee, waiting for her to come home from wherever she was and let us in; for years, we couldn't have a key because she worried about 'latchkey kids'. (As to whether being a 'doorstep kid' is worse, I'm not sure; I certainly was happier when I could let myself and get a glass of water.)

I can see that the stressors on her were enormous. She was a ground breaker in her field and worked far more than full time, yet she was also never able to relinquish the idea of the 'proper mother'. Despite her work hours, she also tried to iron the sheets and make pizza from scratch and pretend that work had no impact on her children. I can see this and I feel sad for her; but I'm still not at peace with her choices. I have no problem with parents working, but they have to make good arrangements for their kids. So when my four-year-old asserted, very comfortably, that my work was more important than wandering around the zoo with her, I felt sick.

Was it true? I wondered. Did I really think my work was more important?

Well, when it came down to it, probably yes. She hardly needed both parents walking her through the butterfly house, and her dad would do a good job. I had spent the last three days fooling around with her, her sisters, and their assorted friends, and now I needed to do something different. On the other hand, working wasn't more important than spending time with her, per se; it was just more important right now. Such old scripts and philosophical knots one has to untangle in the shower while a four-year-old is staring fixedly at one's breasts!

All this reflection happened in a second or two. Then I said that work wasn't more important; but that what was important was to have balance. 'I need to play with you and read you stories a bit, and I need to work a bit, and I need to cook, wash and clean the house a bit. I've done lots of playing and reading and cooking and cleaning and washing this week, so now it's time for some working. And I can do this while you're at the zoo.'

'Okay,' she said, as her eyes travelled curiously up and down. It's too cold for regular nakedness in my house and I realised that it had been a while since she'd seen me undressed. She hopped off the loo, flushed, washed her hands, took one last good look, then wandered out of the bathroom.

So that was how I came to own the philosophy of work-life balance naked, wet, at seven o'clock in the morning. Meanwhile, with any luck, my four-year-old learned two things. One, that balance is important. And two, that some adult women have pubic hair.

Thanks to her dad for the photo of the hand and the butterfly!

From isolation to a crowd

The problem with having three kids is that for eight or nine years you get absolutely no time to yourself. Every moment is spent attending to somebody else's needs and, unless you are disciplined and supported, you will never be alone.

Thanks to my supportive and disciplined partner, we did make time every week for me to read, write, think, study – or just potter round an op shop in the hopes of finding equilibrium, or at least a pretty plate. Time alone was immeasurably precious, and absolutely necessary for me to keep my sanity.

This year, my youngest is in kinder for fifteen hours a week, my partner is still doing some school pickups, and I have more time than I can shake a stick at. Meanwhile, my kids have passed some threshold of childhood and, rather than spend all their time with me in the kitchen, now play together outside or at the other end of the house; and so even when there are kids around I often find myself alone.

You'd think this would be fantastic; and don't get me wrong, I'm not ungrateful. And yet, after almost a decade of feeling mobbed, I suddenly feel quite isolated. I spent so many years seeking out and cherishing those precious minutes of solitude that I assumed I am an extreme introvert – but now I finally have the time I thought I longed for, my own company is driving me crazy. I am going round in circles in my head and am assailed by doubt and when I see friends I feel socially awkward – how anyone can do a higher degree without going right out of their mind, I don't know!

Today I was affected to the point that I struggled to concentrate, and I had to wonder if studying is for me; instead of reading and living in my head for five hours a day – something I'm not sure I'm terribly good at – perhaps I should get a job and interact with people. And yet, I didn't come back to academia lightly; it took six months of conversations and discernment with family and friends to decide that, while it may not be the easy thing, it is the right thing for me to do, for now.

So rather inchoately and desperately I prayed something along these lines: 'God, you are asking me to do this and I have no idea why – but I have agreed and will do it. But how will I cope with the loneliness?'

Five minutes later, my phone beeped. It was an invitation to dinner on Friday night. Half an hour later, it beeped again: do I want to go to a concert on Thursday? I finished reading a chapter and opened my computer, expecting no more than the usual slew of subscriber and advertising emails, but an old friend I haven't seen forever had read my blog, and sent a message; another long lost acquaintance had emailed out of the blue; and a close friend was touching base about our Skype date on Sunday. A bit later, my phone beeped yet again: still another friend, reminding me of a gathering tonight that, while not social per se, promises some dynamic conversation with a group of interesting and thoughtful women. And then I received an invitation to a relevant seminar from a lovely woman I knew last year, who thought I might be interested in going along with her, 'given research is a lonely job'. I haven't seen her for six months, but here she was reading my mind.

From total isolation to feeling ever-so-slightly mobbed: I think God was having a little joke.

Nothing to fear

Sometimes I am appalled by my fear. Take Tuesday. Tuesday is my big study day: I have the whole day to read, write and think. Because I study at home, I don't have to get anywhere before I can start work; and because my husband takes my kids to school and kinder, everyone is out of the house before eight o'clock. I don't want to waste time, so there I am at eight, in my pyjamas, reading at the kitchen table. I read hard, wrestling ideas out of academic articles, and making notes about which school of thought their ideas originate from, whether their arguments make sense, and what theses I can think of that might better fit their observations. I mine bibliographies, and track down articles which cite the articles I have read. I troll academic databases trying to locate research which might be interesting or useful; and I am always searching for the 'wormhole' article which will open up a whole new – but highly relevant – way of thinking, and conveniently list everything I need to read in its references. By noon I'm beat. My eyes are rolling uselessly in my skull; my brain is mush; my tummy is rumbling; and I realise I am still sitting in my smelly old pyjamas, at the kitchen table, yet feeling pressure to do more.

I take a shower, eat soup, and think about what to do next. Often I do read and write a little more, but let's be honest: after a four hour stint, I'm not taking much in anymore. The sun is shining, the breeze has a delightful autumn chill, the leaves are falling off trees and the avenues of our city, even in my suburb, are the stuff of picture postcards. I think sadly that I really must stay inside, reading; I have no right to enjoy this beautiful day…

Oh bother that grey old Protestant who pokes me in the ribs with her pointy umbrella! I am not trapped. Anyway, my brain is porridge, and we have run out of gluten free bread. There is one exceptional gluten free baker in Melbourne, and the nearest outlet is a few suburbs away. I ponder an elaborate scheme: I can get to the university library by bus and tram, thus justifying a late tram ride to buy bread before catching two busses home in time for tea. Then again, we're rather short of cash this year and I baulk at paying seven bucks for public transport… everything feels too hard.

But wait! I have a bicycle! I need exercise! I could take a lunch hour and go for a ride! But what route should I take? And then I am stalled again. Because I don't know how, exactly, to get there; I'll have to make it up. And this is too hard.

Every time I think of doing some even slightly out of the ordinary, my brain leaps ahead to worry about this and that; it shows me how difficult, even well-nigh impossible, it is. I dream up schemes, then block myself. Have you ever wondered what it's like to be naturally conservative? This is it – despite a lifetime of reflection, and despite a deep intellectual commitment to change my behaviour as necessary to reflect my ever-evolving values, I still feel anxious about the tiniest new thing: even riding to a place I have only accessed previously by car or public transport. I'm the person who'll meet you for brunch, and will eat to be polite; I won't tell you that I already ate at 7.30 the way I always do because I couldn't cope with skipping breakfast. And if such little things scare me, imagine how much moving house or changing school or learning about the way different people live make me feel anxious and afraid!

I have great empathy for other natural conservatives, even when I profoundly disagree with their ethics, their politics or their efforts to control the lives of others. People like us feel scared, even threatened, by difference and change; and this is why we can get aggressive about matters that are none of our business. It's no excuse, but maybe it helps if you understand that we are often acting out of fear, even when we are using the rhetoric of love. If you see a hint of aggression, an attempt to dominate, a truth claim brandished like a weapon, or violence, you will know: we are afraid.

The thing we conservatives rarely realise is that when we act out of fear we are doing damage not just to you, but to ourselves. When we box ourselves in time and again, we feel suffocated; yet out of fear we keep doing it, forgetting that new situations might be joyful, or helpful, or life-giving. My own truth claim, which I hope I share gently, is that we are called to act in love: love and respect for others, love and respect for ourselves – and we do this well when we step out of our comfort zones. What could we learn by stretching our wings a little? Perhaps we may learn a new respect for other people and how they do things. Perhaps we may learn that the world is far bigger than us and in that wonderful expansiveness there is room for many points of view. And perhaps we may simply learn that the sun is shining, our bodies are strong, life is joyful and we don't have to sit at the kitchen table in our pyjamas all day; we have time to do more than Get Things Done.

This Tuesday, I finally realised fear was trying to trap me, again; and then I admitted to myself that sore eyes and a mushy brain were not going to help me learn anything more. The sun winked through the window and then poked me in the eye, laughing; the wind called my name. I whistled at my fear, grabbed my panniers, jumped on my bike, and headed off. I rode through quiet streets, surfing over speed humps, then veered off into a great avenue of deciduous trees. For once, I wasn't towing a child; my bike flew through the orange and brown leaves dancing in the streets. I headed towards the creek and trundled along the bike path, standing on my pedals to power up each hill and then cruising down the other side. I rode past a school. All the kids were out, playing, and I grinned as I realised I was having so much fun, I had overshot. I turned off the bike path, and slipped back through a couple of streets to get to my destination.

I was heading to an independent natural foods supermarket. At one o'clock, it was packed, and I was elated to see that not every cent in Australia is going into the duopoly that dominates grocery spending. I roamed the store, greeting familiar staff and picking up bread, cheese, yogurt, cucumbers, and a few other things besides. Panniers stuffed to overflowing, I headed home a completely different, also beautiful, way. I realised I could ride there every day for months and go a new route every time; there was so much to see!

Less than an hour after I had left, I arrived home breathing hard and beaming. The sun on my back had relaxed knotted muscles; the wind had blown away all cares; my mind was as clear as it gets; my eyes were rejuvenated and ready to read; and I was in love with my life once again as I realised that there was nothing, absolutely nothing, to fear.

The State Library and the Great Unwashed

I'm sitting in the State Library reading about public health, but it's hard to concentrate. Something smells, really smells: it is the penetrating odour of the great unwashed.

Stomach-churning tendrils ease their way up my nose and I push my breathing high to bypass the olfactory nerves. I look around, but there is no homeless person to be seen. No dreadlocks, no stained old coats, no sleeper at a desk hinting at the origin of the smell.

Annoyed, I turn back to my book. I have a few hours without my kids, and I'm using the time to learn about health and its relationship to social status; but this stink makes it impossible. How can I concentrate when the room smells of urine and muck? And where is the smell coming from?

I keep reading, and breathing carefully, and furtively looking round. Finally I realise that the person is long gone; only the smell remains. It rises from my chair. As my thighs warm the padded seat, the unleashed odours float upwards.

Revolting.

There are no other seats, and I need to read. My jeans are thick and easily washed, so I curse and turn the page.

There I sit: nice jeans, styled hair, warm leather boots, ethically made t-shirt; my heavy winter jacket is draped over the back of the chair; and I am reading that a poor black man in Washington DC can expect to live 20 less years than a rich white man living a dozen miles up the railway line in suburban Maryland.

As I tut-tut over the dying men of DC, a few real DC faces flash before my eyes. Uri, the lean Russian man who slept on the steps of our church. Miss Rosa, the recipient of a food charity program with whom I often chatted in a putrid stairwell. Melvin, the security guard, shot in the shoulder while patrolling our church car park, an injury so common in his milieu he never thought to mention it to his employers.

What a hypocrite! Here am I with all the money, leisure and opportunity in the world, thinking I have compassion because I will read about the social factors of health; but the latent smell of homelessness makes me outraged. Yet until I recognise that the smell belongs to a real person as individual as Uri, Miss Rosa, or Marvin, and as precious in God's eyes as one of my own children, my readings in public health will be little more than a self-congratulatory exercise; very much worse than useless.

In shame I say a prayer for compassion, inhale deeply, and stay seated.

A sanity tax leads to life in abundance

 

What does it mean when a woman who has been reasonably happy to be home with young children no longer wants to be home with young children, and yet still has a four-year-old at home? How can she be a good parent to the little one? How can she retain her sanity?

I don't know why I post it as a theoretical question. This is personal: these are questions I've been asking myself for six months or more. This year I get more time than I have had for nearly a decade to work, study, and do my thing, but it's still not enough. My youngest is at home a couple of days a week, and by the middle of a day with her, I am ready to scream; instead, I ignore her while she plays, and often say no when she asks me to join in. 'Mummy doesn't play,' I say. 'Mummy reads to you or cooks with you, but mummy doesn't play.' I don't want to sit on the floor; I don't want to pretend; I don't want to converse with a four-year-old for more than half a day. Quite simply, I've had enough.

How I did it for nearly ten years, I don't know. How did I sip imaginary tea and set out bead patterns and chat about the neighbour's cat? And why can't I do it anymore? I've grown out of her life stage more than a year too soon.

I realise it's the first time I've had a four-year-old without a younger sibling around to absorb her attention. Meanwhile, many of our friends have moved on: parents have picked up more hours at work; children are in school or childcare; and even if there were lots of people left to play with, I've moved on too. I want to do stuff, not arrange coffee mornings just so my kid is occupied.

I felt like I should feel guilty that I managed to be there for her two older sisters when I don't want to be there for her. But I'm not guilty. I've stayed home with her as much as I can, but now it costs too much. And if I'm honest, our three daughters have had three different parenting experiences as I moved through my own life stages; this is really nothing more than the next stage.

Realising this led me to think about our parenting model. What do I want my children to learn? What version of womanhood do I want to model for my daughters? Is a woman is someone who subjugates her needs to theirs way beyond the point of her own happiness and health? Or is a woman a person who is engaged in the work that she loves, whether it's in the home or in the wider world? I realised I'd like my girls to see that I'm doing things that stimulate me and give me life. I used to love being at home; now I don't. I love spending some time with her, but not all day. When I clarified that, I realised it was certainly time for a change. Staying home with her more than half a day each day no longer felt like an option.

So I tried to work out how best to care for her. I explained to her that this year she'd be at kinder for three mornings, and then I asked her what she wanted to do on the other days. Childcare, perhaps? Um, no. Adamantly not. She hates childcare by any name. We dipped her toe in the waters of childcare once or twice and she is still furious about it. Kinder good, childcare bad: that's her motto.

'If not childcare, then what?' I asked. Very firmly she said, 'Stay home with you.' 'Does it need to be me?' I said. 'An adult who loves me,' she said.

Good answer – but how frustrating. Secretly, I wanted her to go to childcare like every other kid, and I wanted to be able to tell myself and the world that it's what she wants to do: to spend time with a group of kids running riot. Instead, I realised that I had three options: (1) stay home with her; (2) force her into childcare and betray her trust in me that I will arrange what is best for her; or (3) come up with another solution which respects her desires but also keeps me from going right out of my mind.

I have tried and tried the first option. For more than six months I have sought ways to enjoy being home with her. She is a delightful child, independent, bright, funny, and imaginative. As I watch her games, help her cook muffins, and listen to her made up jokes I don't know why I don't want to be with her. But I'm past that stage.

Option one was wiped out. Given how articulate my daughter is about her need to be home, I couldn't face enrolling her in childcare; that eliminated option two. Option three? I wondered how she could be at home with someone who loves her, and how that someone could not be me. Her daddy is already home with her more time than he can really spare from work; he couldn't pick up any more. We have no grannies. Her auntie works. Our friends all work or have kids of their own.

Finally, after weeks of pondering, I thought of her uncle. He's between jobs. He adores her. She adores him. He's gentle and kind and loves to cook. Perhaps, I thought, he could be with her a morning each week. They could read stories and go to the library, and I could do my thing. The arrangement could last as long as they both enjoyed it, or until he found better work.

I asked him. He grinned from ear to ear and said yes. I asked my daughter. She grinned from ear to ear and said yes. This boded well.

So on Friday morning I went out. I had a coffee and prepared a workshop. I bumped into new neighbours and had an adult chat. I ran a few errands. And I came home full of energy. I found my brother-in-law finishing the dishes, and my daughter snipping paper into little strips and singing. There was a warm chocolate cake on the bench, waiting for me. As I had a slice, he wiped out the oven and I nearly passed out. The cake was incredible – and I've never seen a man wipe out an oven before. He's worth his weight in gold.

One of my friends pays her sister to nanny the kids a few hours each week. She calls it her sanity tax. I'm paying my brother-in-law and I was thinking of it as a sanity tax, too. For us, it might mean less meals out – big deal! Because if sanity comes in the shape of a workshop drafted and a neighbour well met, a chocolate cake and a clean oven, a man with a spring in his step and cash in his pocket, and a singing child: this is so much more than my sanity. This is abundant life for all of us, and is worth whatever we can afford.

The first morning of the first day of the rest of my life

At least, that's what it feels like. Today, for the first time this year, my four-year-old went back to kinder. Today, for the first time ever, my six- and nine-year-olds went to before care at school. Which means that today, everyone else left the house at 7.25 in the morning. My husband took the big girls to school, dropped the little one at kinder, and headed off to work – and I didn't have to pick anyone up until 1.30!

This will be our pattern several days a week, which means that this week, for the first time in nine and a half years, I will have many, many hours to study and write.

Nobody will ask me for a story, or a game, or a visit to the park. It will just be me, sitting alone with a book and a pen, quietly reading for hours. After nine and a half years of nappies and washing and dishes and little toys, and the questions and requests and repetitions of little children, the morning was shocking in its emptiness.

Time luxuriated before me, lolling on my kitchen table and teasing me from my books. Time seductively whispered that I could stretch and yawn and scratch myself. This week, my day won't be broken into the six minute units of lawyers and parents of young children. I can plan in blocks of an hour or even two. Time awaits me.

There was housework, but I didn't do it. There were dishes in the sink, but they were left to sit. The time was for reading and writing, and nothing else. If one can describe an activity that gives one great pleasure as work then, after a decade home with kids, this morning I went back to work.

Usually, when I'm not looking after kids, I run like a bull at a gate. I rush around and get things done and write something quick; I don't want to waste the opportunity. But by 9.30 this morning, I'd read a scholarly article and a government report and taken notes. My eyes and brain were getting fuzzy. I realised that if I'm going to spend the next five years researching and writing a thesis, I might just have to pace myself. And I also realised that tomorrow and the next day I get to do this all over again. My time is not perhaps quite so precious as it has been up until now; for the first time in a decade, I really do have enough.

I thought about how to rest for a while. Should I take five minutes and make myself a hot drink? Should I take ten and go for a stroll around the block? I was feeling creaky, and time kept murmuring that it would wait for me. So with a great sense of decadence, I performed a yoga routine. I bent and stretched and gloated for an hour, because finally I have time. The sheer luxury of so much overwhelms me.

The next book is waiting to be read, but I stole a few more minutes to write this post. As I made notes in my empty house and thought about today, I began to wonder about tomorrow. As I pondered, a tiny voice whispered,

After all these years with young children in the house, is it possible you will feel a bit lonely?

Perish the thought!

The Silence Speaks Again: Next Year

 

Next year, I've been invited to undertake some postgraduate research in a field I am passionate about. I am over the moon. Well, part of me is. That part of me has spent hours reading in the area months before I plan to enrol. That part hears my potential supervisor saying that something I have already written would make a fine start to a thesis. That part has already joined a research group, and met some delightful people doing interesting things. That part of me can confidently say, I know how to structure my time; I know how to write; I am very self-motivated: I can certainly do this.

That part of me can also recognise the great gift of the invitation. After nine years at home with kids, I am more than a little bored. I still have fifteen months before my youngest starts school, and while I am happy to be home with her for some of it, the thought of staying home full time until then is, to put it bluntly, excruciating.

I had been wondering what I could add to next year's mix – more volunteer work? more writing? a course? – when out of the blue I was invited to study. It's everything I could want: a reason to read and write, mentors asking difficult questions and pointing me in new directions, training in how to structure a large piece of work. The project is perfect, the timing is perfect: what a gift! I should be over the moon – and part of me is.

But there's another part of me, too. It's the part which is dragging her feet on the enrolment; which worries about how to fit it all in with a little girl still at home; which looks at the PhD students she knows and wonders how on earth she thinks she can do it; which gets a churning stomach at the very thought. And now that the initial excitement of the invitation has worn off, this part is making itself heard. It is so convincing that I have wondered about turning down the invitation.

I've been going round in circles for weeks. Finally, I decided to sit with the idea in silence, that infinite scary place where things bubble up that are difficult to hear. So I sat, took a deep breath, exhaled, and began to listen. My mind chattered on. I thought about dinner and a new idea for packed lunches, and put the thoughts on a mental shelf. I wondered about a sick friend, and put her on the shelf, too. I had an image of me teaching at a tertiary level. I wondered where that lunatic idea came from, and as I was putting it up next to the food and the friend, a voice came to me clear as a bell: You're almost forty, and you still believe you are not capable of such work.

I burst into tears; as usual the silence spoke truth. I don't believe I can do it. Yet I'm hardly an idiot. I love ideas and people and talking and writing. Most of my friends have higher degrees, more than a few are academics, and among them I usually hold my own. Of course I should be able to study and write and teach at that level.

Even so, the internal soundtrack which says I'm not competent is still very powerful, and it's been reinforced by decisions we made about how to raise our children. I chose to stay home and suddenly I'm a decade out of the workforce. Everyone else has forged ahead, and I'm left with a head full of ideas, reasonably happy kids – and an incredible lack of confidence. Sure, I'm getting pretty good at the washing and shopping, cooking and cleaning. At some deep level, however, I'm not convinced I could do much more.

Now, being competent at domestic tasks and child raising is no shame. These are important things, necessary to a family's health and wellbeing, and there is dignity in sustaining one's household. In and of itself, it is good work. Yet other work is good, too. And here am I invited, by what feels like the right person and at what feels like the right time, to engage in something more, and I am reluctant. I am sure I cannot do it, and I want to opt out.

Thanks to the silence, however, I now recognise my reluctance for what it is: old soundtracks and fear. And so, since a life ruled by such masters is no life at all, I am going to have to listen to the other voices, the ones which recognise what I might be able to do and urge me to give it a go.

As for what I want to do? Well, the silence showed me an image of me teaching. Perhaps it was a clue.