It was an ever-so-romantic Valentine's Day yesterday. I was sick as a dog (still am) and spent my morning going to the dentist. As I sat there, she began with the probing questions about my life...not sure why they see fit to do this when you have got multiple sharp objects probing around in your mouth and can't even give good answers to the questions. But she rambled on about her daughter looking for a college. When I mentioned Grove City as my Alma mater, she laughed and said it was "too academic" for her daughter. The top priority was a school with a really good football team. Well, I tried to interject with how much I loved Grove City and the wonderful friends I made there and how important an academic school is, and she looked me in the face and said, "Yes, but does it really matter? I mean, look at you now." Shock...unbelief...dismay...I cannot believe another woman and mother would say that just because I chose to leave the professional sector and stay at home with my kids.
I want to make this very clear, I loved college and I think it shaped so much of who I am today...it was invaluable both in a professional sense and for personal development. I loved the job I left when I had Carter. I read and reread my final performance review probably 20 times with tears in my eyes because I felt really fulfilled in my job, liked my boss, was doing really well in the company with huge potential for advancement. But more importantly, I knew, and had always known, I wanted to be at home with my babies...wanted to be the one who was raising them. And I am so unimaginably blessed to have a husband with the same values who is able and willing to be the one to work so I can be here.
Yesterday, on a day when Sienna literally kept me on my toes from before sun-up until bedtime, I was a little peeved to be pondering my value to society. We started the day at 6:20 AM with her throwing a tempter tantrum because she saw a lollipop on the counter and I wouldn't give it to her for breakfast. This was followed by me getting her a real breakfast and nearly falling on my face because I slipped on a bead necklace she'd thrown on the floor...this caused me to drop my own breakfast and in the process of trying not to fall on my face, stepping backwards on her cup, which she'd also thrown on the floor, causing it to fly into the wall and pop open, shooting water everywhere. Throughout the day I caught her coloring the wood floor with a pencil, coloring the fridge three different times with markers the kids kept dropping on the floor. We were upstairs in my bathroom where I was trying to get dressed and she emptied out both bathroom cabinets, was ripping open boxes of bar soap from the closet, dumped out a huge box of tampons onto the floor and was tearing them open. Then she heard the phone ring, yelled "Nani", because she thinks everyone who calls is my mom, and ran out into the bedroom to grab it and bring it back in to me. Fortunately she didn't turn it on since it was a work call for Derrick! Later, back downstairs I caught her scrubbing the hallway wall with the toilet brush....ewwww!!! She was into her daily chair climbing routine, emptying my kitchen cupboards of pots, pans, lids, and bottles. She got into the tissues and was pulling them out of the box as fast as her little hands could move. She was begging for the same snack that she saw Reese eating and then proceeded to take it right out to the couch and dump it (cereal) out all over the couch. When the kids were watching a movie, she kept going out and turning the TV off. Reese was sitting in a rocking chair while trying to watch the movie and she kept going over to it and rocking it as hard as she could. And after dinner, she somehow got her little fingers on an extra hamburger patty that was sitting on the table and was walking around the family room with it. She should have had "Chaos" for a middle name....and this was all in just one day.
Yup, look at me now!
Am I a value to society or a drain on it? Does the fact that I am not using my degree (Business) in a professional setting make me lazy or unproductive or less valuable? Or is there perhaps application for the things I learned in the everyday life of being a mom? I always dread filling out forms where it has a space for Profession. Do I put "n/a", "homemaker", "Stay-at-home-mom". I really don't feel that any of those adequately describes what I do.
Someday, when my kids are older, I do hope I'll have enough brain cells left to work again. Or maybe I'll write a best-selling book. Or maybe I'll continue to be at home and look back over these years I've spent with fond memories, zero regrets, and not-a-small sigh of relief that I've managed to survive it all. Regardless of how the rest of my years play out, I will never regret my education.
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