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Among Friends |
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| Say so long to Superwoman Working mother Sarah Palin didn't get the memo: The Superwoman era is over. In today's eco-conscious, downsize-your-McMansion, hybrid-driving America, the Baby Boomer myth that women can have it all and nobody gets hurt is as yesterday as a nine-passenger Suburban. If anybody could get close enough to ask the questions, I bet 17-year-old, five-months-pregnant Bristol Palin would say 1) she loves her high-achieving mother, and 2) she's missed her a lot while she's been trying to navigate turbulent teenage waters without having her mom around very much. A big part of being a good parent is being present and accountable. Every hour a parent spends away from his or her children is one less hour spent teaching, influencing, comforting, understanding, laughing, hugging and listening. The more parents are away from home, the more surrogates -- daycare providers, nannies, babysitters, teachers, coaches, peers -- influence their children. Absent moms and dads are clueless about the impact these surrogates' values and examples will have on the adults their children become. Parents who put work lives ahead of child-rearing responsibilities gamble with their kids' futures. The bumper sticker shouldn't just ask "Do You Know Where Your Kids Are?" but also "Do You Know WHO Your Kids Are?" Far too many in my Boomer generation didn't, and their children's' emotional dysfunction and alienation has been the price they've paid for their inattention. In my young adulthood, I was a vehement champion and defender of mothers who worked outside the home. I fervently believed then, as I do now, in equal pay for equal work, gender parity and professional advancement grounded in merit. I know first-hand that women are capable of doing anything well. But hindsight and the problems of my Boomer friends' adult children have tempered my Superwoman idealism. I now believe that if you're lucky enough to become a mother -- I was not -- that being the best mom you can be is your most important job, because you get only one chance to get it right. Too many women who blew into the job market on the cusp of the feminist movement botched that chance. Their reward for paying surrogates to mommy while they jumped on and off airplanes, put in a thousand late nights at the office and worried more about their careers than their kids is resentful children who may forever feel shortchanged. I probably would have made the same parenting mistakes my friends did, wrongly believing that I could have it all -- perfect career, perfect marriage, perfect kids -- without hurting anybody or sacrificing anything. The advantage of living through these past 30 years is watching the latest generation of young mothers learn from the mistakes of mine. Today's working mothers are successful astronauts, lawyers, pilots, doctors, accountants and everything else they work hard to become, yet seem unafraid to take time out to focus on their growing children's needs. Sarah Palin, who returned to her duties as Alaska governor just three days after her disabled son was born, is still trying to be that mythical Superwoman. In announcing Bristol's pregnancy during the Republican convention, Palin said she and her husband, Todd, "have been blessed with five wonderful children who we love with all our heart and mean everything to us." Not quite. Palin chose to forego thousands of parenting hours with her disabled son and other children in favor of campaigning for the vice presidency. By accepting McCain's offer, she deliberately exposed her 17-year-old pregnant, unmarried daughter and future grandchild to unrelenting global scrutiny and the cruelty of comics. Despite her plea for privacy, Palin can't have it both ways. When she used her family's intimate details to articulate her political positions on public policy, she thrust her kids and her track record as a mother to the forefront of America's Rorschach test on abortion, sexual abstinence and family values and lost the right to blame the media or the voters for making her children the innocent victims of her personal ambition. The mess this one-time beauty queen has gotten her kids into with her vice presidential aspiration is not a pretty sight. It's also a fight Sarah Palin can't win, because no matter how it ends, there are losers everywhere. |
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