Squawk Radio
Monday, September 04, 2006
ELOISA'S HAPPY LABOR DAY!
It's Labor Day. You know what that means? That means we're supposed to celebrate the fact that we're workers. That we LABOR. Because we do! In honor of Labor Day, I decided to make up a list of all the things that I labor at around the house. Then I made up a list of all the things that my husband labors at in the same place. I figured I would use the list to start a conversation about labor -- and how the household was not my favorite laboring venue.
It turns out that I'm not doing 90% of the work! In fact, it's looking like 50/50. Seriously. DH is triumphant. I'm in shock.
So I made up a list of all the other things I labor at. I'll give you the short version: I'm Director of Graduate Studies at my university, I start teaching Shakespeare and Popular Culture tomorrow to a load of undergraduates, I write romances, I write articles and as of this week, I'm a song writer (back from Nashville, where my song was recorded--more on that at a later date--it was WONDERFUL!).
Oh.
Forgot one thing.
I'm a mother.
Wait!
Forgot another.
I'm a wife.
Is it my imagination, or are American women laboring harder than we ever had before? To be fair, I remember my mother doing work around the house that I would never dream of--say when the pipes froze and she would actually bring in water from the well. To me, that's pretty much like taking over Buffy's job.
So what do you all think? Are American women working harder than we ever have? How many jobs do you have?
Or are we just complainers, and if we time-travelled back to the 18th century we would be lying around utterly exhausted?
Eloisa James, 12:03 PM
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