An excuse to type out very long Kristeva quotes
Maybe I'm sliding into a deep depression, but I've been avoiding the world lately, which is probably why I didn't discover this Slate Freaky Friday switcharoo project, called Freaky Fortnight, where a go-to-work husband and work-at-home wife with two little boys switch places for a month, until last Saturday night. I promptly spent the next hour of my life reading the entire collection of posts documenting their experience. It was addictive.
There are a few things that make this project tidier than it could have been: 1). both husband and wife are writers/editors, which makes the wife doing the husband's job more reasonable than if say, Lucy had tried to do Ricky's (if that wasn't an I Love Lucy episode, it should be). 2). they do have a part-time sitter, which (as I am a part-time sitter), many families in NYC have, but when you have someone available to you who knows the routines of children, it alleviates some of the pressure of figuring that out (i.e., made an easier transition for the dad).
The project, whether its original intention or not, becomes primarily focused on the complicated feelings of privileged mothers or potential mothers (i.e., women) in the States: to work, or to stay at home? How to Mommy the best way for your children? Are you fulfilling the expectations, cultural or biological, of your gender or betraying them?
The conclusion of the project is superficially satisfying: father/husband admits that mother/wife has a more "difficult" (because it can be qualified and compared) job: taking care of the children (and freelancing, at that). Mother/wife admits that she likes going to an office--it gives her a sense of place, ownership, pride in her self away from her identity as mother/wife, and it is easier than being at home, but the rewards reaped being at home with children are worth it. See? Everyone wins.
But what does it solve? The questions about gender roles and expectations and social pressures, frustrating in how they haven't seem to change since the 1960s, are still here. And it feels like women seem even more reluctant to acknowledge and deal with that question. The most interesting point, I think, is when Susan wonders if she would feel more strongly about being in an office if she was raising girls instead of boys, as if a daughter would interpret her actions differently than a son. This seems to be a place where we make major missteps--this expectation for women to shoulder the impetus for change. Michael Agger admits that staying at home makes him feel emasculated, which is a step, but how will he challenge that? If Susan Burton does enjoy being in the office, will she and her husband find her a way back to it? And if they don't take those steps, why? It's a pain in the ass to redistribute domestic and professional responsibilities, not to mention hard to find a job in this economy, and it changes the entire familial relationship.
I started reading Julia Kristeva's Possessions, and it was hard not to think of the Slate project when I encountered her pages about Gloria's redirected devotion to her deaf son. "Devotion is a kind of devouring," Kristeva writes.
There are a few things that make this project tidier than it could have been: 1). both husband and wife are writers/editors, which makes the wife doing the husband's job more reasonable than if say, Lucy had tried to do Ricky's (if that wasn't an I Love Lucy episode, it should be). 2). they do have a part-time sitter, which (as I am a part-time sitter), many families in NYC have, but when you have someone available to you who knows the routines of children, it alleviates some of the pressure of figuring that out (i.e., made an easier transition for the dad).
The project, whether its original intention or not, becomes primarily focused on the complicated feelings of privileged mothers or potential mothers (i.e., women) in the States: to work, or to stay at home? How to Mommy the best way for your children? Are you fulfilling the expectations, cultural or biological, of your gender or betraying them?
The conclusion of the project is superficially satisfying: father/husband admits that mother/wife has a more "difficult" (because it can be qualified and compared) job: taking care of the children (and freelancing, at that). Mother/wife admits that she likes going to an office--it gives her a sense of place, ownership, pride in her self away from her identity as mother/wife, and it is easier than being at home, but the rewards reaped being at home with children are worth it. See? Everyone wins.
But what does it solve? The questions about gender roles and expectations and social pressures, frustrating in how they haven't seem to change since the 1960s, are still here. And it feels like women seem even more reluctant to acknowledge and deal with that question. The most interesting point, I think, is when Susan wonders if she would feel more strongly about being in an office if she was raising girls instead of boys, as if a daughter would interpret her actions differently than a son. This seems to be a place where we make major missteps--this expectation for women to shoulder the impetus for change. Michael Agger admits that staying at home makes him feel emasculated, which is a step, but how will he challenge that? If Susan Burton does enjoy being in the office, will she and her husband find her a way back to it? And if they don't take those steps, why? It's a pain in the ass to redistribute domestic and professional responsibilities, not to mention hard to find a job in this economy, and it changes the entire familial relationship.
I started reading Julia Kristeva's Possessions, and it was hard not to think of the Slate project when I encountered her pages about Gloria's redirected devotion to her deaf son. "Devotion is a kind of devouring," Kristeva writes.
In the end the child came to possess Gloria. Her whole world--sex, ambition, personal appeal, professional success, feminine charm, sessions at the gym, riding, visits to the hairdresser, outings, dinner parties, cocktail parties, social contacts of all kinds--virtually everything had gone, disappeared. There was nothing left. But Gloria had hardly noticed. She had no regrets. She was living her life to the full. Posession can take the form of a single love absorbing the entire universe. Absorbing you as well; whether that leaves you in the world or outside it, it makes no difference. When you're possessed you're ruled not by external forces but by inner self-evident necessity.And then this:
Gloria had no partner for the verbal joustings, literary fireworks, and philosophical flights she'd once hoped to enjoy with the people around her. ... She had to cope with the demands of everyday life. An endless series of details, large and small, to be dealt with: social security, school, ailments, doctors, taxes, parking, gasoline, breakdowns, plumbing, electricity, accountants, mailmen, checkbooks, telephone, bakery, butcher shop, dry cleaner's, stationer's, more schools, more doctors, more things to be repaired in the house, a spot of gym, a drop of perfume, a game of tennis, fitness classes, a translation, two translations, three translations, a publisher, two publishers, three publishers, a lunch, two cocktail parties, three dinner parties, train or plane tickets, two one-ways, three round-trips, are you sure, yes, we're sure, please do your best, I am, let's go, we're off. Agencies of all kinds: travel agencies, rental agencies, agencies for hiring staff, for finding real estate, for moving your furniture into it. Buying, maintaining, escorting, earning, spending, coping. Deadly dull? Not really, Gloria had attained the numb efficiency of matter moving at supersonic speed. Once past Mach 2.9, motion is subject to more and more incidents, but there's no surface resistance by which to measure the stress. It was as simple as that: she carried out her tasks with the ease of a robot operating beyond the sound barrier. For in fact it wasn't "she" anymore. But if not, who was it? Didn't such interstellar anonymity conceal disturbance, alienation, even madness? But by some miracle Gloria managed to quell any demons that may have inhabited her, without ever letting them emerge into the light of day.This is the female gendered burden: to bear children or to not bear children. To fulfill purpose? To remain empty? And then after, who to become? It's admirable that the Slate Freaky Fortnight team switched roles for a month--the fact that they would do it, is a good sign. But there's got to be more than this reality. And how to work or write our way out of that? This is what I'm trying to figure out.
Labels: gender, Kristeva, Slate, working mommies
posted by v at 3:12 PM
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