Her soft curls spring and bob with each wail as the 4-year-old Australian girl learns that all of her favorite restaurants are closed–the Chinese place, MacDonald’s, Nandos. All that’s left to eat now is Mummy’s cooking. Messy sobs everywhere. This is what I just watched on a shared video from a friend, and what can we say? Some griefs are universal. I could use a good bowl of Mom’s boeuf bourguignon right now.
Oh, but wait…I’m getting Dad and Mary Ellen’s awesome shepherd’s pie and fresh-made sesame bread and spinach salad. Twice a week, they are making dinner for us. I think, all global evidence to the contrary, I am supposed to be cooking and helping my parents, not the other way around. But there you go. I need all the help I can get! (Hugh and I do the grocery shopping, so that’s a pretty good system for the spring of 2020.)
There’s the digital divide, income equality, the North-South divide, and now there’s the parent divide. There are those without kids in the house who are taking these unexpected quarantined days to journal, take up yoga, clean out the garage, binge watch Netflix or start applying moisturizer.
Then there are those with kids in the house.
Working, parenting and homeschooling are three different jobs. Parenting in itself encompasses about 24 different jobs: financial provider, social scheduler, discipline cop, pastor and mentor, cheerleader, safety instructor, keeper of the cultural traditions and values, chauffeur, cook, house cleaner, housekeeper, chore manager, room inspector, party planner, Santa, tooth fairy, etc. To add teacher on top of that seems mildly or grossly disrespectful to teachers (and parents!). To add productivity as a full-time employee into the same day is only possible if you pretend the other two jobs don’t exist.
If it takes a village to raise a child and your village is taken away, all you are left with is a wobbly two-legged stool to stand on. Good luck with that! I wish I had some moisturizer.
@theterrace 