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The Journey
~PruH
Getting Hired
as a Parent
B ack in the fall, I decided that I should
consider re-entering the workforce. Our
two children are now in school every day,
and although I am a huge fan of—and expert
at—doing nothing, it seemed a bit selfish not
to pursue gainful employment. On the Internet,
I found what would be my dream job; writing
back-cover copy for romance novels, part-time
and online. Lovely. To get paid for reading and
summarizing mindless, bodice-ripping books
while working from home! How perfect. My quali
fications were slim, although my pre-motherhood
big-girl career did comprise writing, often in
a telecommuting situation, and I do enjoy the
occasional romance novel. Furthermore, I have
done my share of summarizing their wispy plots
for my sister Paige, although to be honest this
was only done so we could decide if the novel
warranted shipping up to her house.
Undaunted, I applied. Of course I did not
get the job; I don't think I even got a rejection
letter. No surprise there, but it does pain me to
think that somewhere in North America there is
some lucky cow doing what should have been my
job, getting paid for tearing through such trashy
treats as How to Marry a Marquis and Buccaneer
Bridegroom. I will console myself with the com
forting thought that she probably wears mom
jeans and themed holiday sweaters and hopefully
has carpal tunnel from sending in her romance
novel summaries to her editor. It's fine, really.
Despite the absence of my dream back-cover
copywriting job, I still do consider that I am
working. Any stay-at-home parent knows that
days at home are not days at rest, and also that
since there is no time-clock to punch, one is
never actually off duty. If someone or something
is sick or sad at 3 a.m., or if there is a particu
larly foul mess to clean, or if there is a.box of
crayons melted inside the dryer, the onus usually
falls on the stay-at-home parent. That's fine,
too. I think that, compared to some of my more
heinous paying jobs, rearing boys and caring for
pets comes out the clear winner. I also some
times think that I'm actually doing a good job.
On some days, however, I would give my left foot
to be able to re-enter the professional world,
where there is some guarantee that I won't have
to wipe someone's nose... or worse.
Cubby Hell
Here are some bad jobs I have had the mis
fortune to hold: selling coupon books over the
telephone (one week in 1986); selling popcorn
at a movie theater (several months in 1986);
working at the cosmetics counter in a large chain
drugstore, where the manager warned me of my
fellow employees'jealousy of the glamour of
my position (one horrifying day in 1989); and,
for far too long sometime in the early 1990s,
commercial real estate assistant, a position so
unnecessary that to fill my time I was reduced
to photocopying magazines so they would look
more businesslike, and then glaringly perus
ing them as a ruse to trick my hapless and also
under-employed boss into believing I was doing
very important commercial real estate research.
Fortunately, this was in the heyday of the Carolyn
Bessette/ John F. Kennedy, Jr., romance, so I had
many magazines to choose from. I would nick
them from the lobby, copy them, and contrive to
cleverly cover Bessette and Kennedy's handsome.
Xeroxed faces with very business-like Post-it
notes, so as not to alert my poor boss to the fact
that I had absolutely nothing to do. Happily for
us both, he also had nothing to do, so by tacit
agreement we ignored the fact that neither of us
was serving any purpose at all.
After freeing myself from that particular niche
in the ranks of the employed, I happened upon
another job. The job itself, writing for and edit
ing two magazines, was actually moderately en
joyable. The company, however, defined Cubicle
(or Cubby) Hell. Budget was always at a crisis
point, so acquiring even the most rudimentary
of office supplies required several forms, signed
by several senior editors. Well-stocked cubbies
were frequent victims of office-supply wilding,
which could extend even to the theft of desk
chairs. I worked within a warren of cubicles, sur
rounded by the rank and file, who fell into two
categories: the Pale and Wormy, whose ambitions
and hopes had been dashed by their tenure in
Cubby Hell, and the Young and Perky, whose
ambitions and hopes had not yet been dashed by
their tenure in Cubby Hell, mostly because their
ambitions had nothing to do with employment
and everything to do with marriage. The Pale and
Wormy were sad and mercifully silent, shuffling
beigely through their days, penning features for
magazines like Crop Dusters Monthly or Inside
Your Air Ducts, although I do suspect the P&W
crowd of most of the office supply snatching.
Who can blame them, really? Cubby Hell had
stolen their souls. What are a few boxes of paper
clips in return?
The Young and Perky, however, still simmered
with life,*end the female Yap's would cluster
together at a cubicle adjacent to mine. There,
they would compare their plans to ensnare their
beaux in matrimony. Cubby Bimbo, as I dubbed
their leader, ruled the roost. Usually clad in
flippy skirts with stockings and sandals (!),
Cubby Bimbo starred (with her boyfriend Chuck)
in the ongoing Cubby Hell drama "Marry Me,
Chuck." Cubby Bimbo even had a Marry Me Dress,
which she deployed with toxic and highly vo
cal frequency. The Y&P collected pictures of and
created their own designs for engagement rings.
Sadly, at least for my information-gathering pur
poses, I was already married and was slightly too
aged to join the Young and Perky, so I obtained
all my information via shameless eavesdropping
(a most underrated skill, one which I shall put
on my updated resume). I did make one friend,
with whom I shared a disdainful fascination—or
a fascinated disdain—with Cubby Bimbo, and a
love of good sandwiches.
Two Good Jobs
I departed Cubby Hell for a truly lovely job,
one where I was surrounded by smart and hard
working and sane people. With the notable ex
ception of one woman who shared stories of the
parking-lot, girl-on-girl rumbles in which she'd
participated in her ill-spent, Midwestern young
adulthood, my coworkers were wonderful. And
although none of them could hold a candle to
Cubby Bimbo, the work was interesting and chal
lenging, and I was no longer in danger of arriv
ing at work to find my desk chair replaced with
one of those rolling footstools usually seen in
elementary school libraries. As I was so pleased
with myself for finding such a nice place to work,
I went and got pregnant and began the slow spi
ral towards what I now do.
For me, working and being pregnant is akin
to riding a bicycle in a bathing suit: it's distract
ing and uncomfortable and you feel like an idiot,
but it can be done. My coworkers in this new
endeavor were the Pregnancy Dwarves: Queasy,
Puffy, Moody, Achy, Weepy, Eaty and Drowsy.
Queasy Dwarf left me feeling like I had only the
slightest of hangovers, and Puffy came relatively
late and left after only about 12 months. Achy
was a minor annoyance, as was Weepy. Weepy
was a most unwelcome visitor at work: "What?
You need me to r-r-r-revise this... sniffle, sniffle
gasp." (Eaty, Drowsy and Moody, now, they
came to play, and came to stay; I'm stilt wait
ing for them to leave, and it's been three years.)
Anyway, these tiny, dwarfy inconveniences aside,
pregnancy was work of the nicest kind; it allows
you free rein at the food trough, requires very
little thought, and no one questions your need
for breaks or naps. Perhaps my supervisors did
wonder about my long lunches (spent napping
in my car—underground parking garages are sur
prisingly soporific), nr my mid-afternoon brownie
breaks, but they were kind enough not to say
anything. I guess they knew I was a lost cause,
or maybe they were afraid I'd unleash Weepy
Dwarf on them.
And of course all that follows from that-
leaving a near-perfect job to rear small children
while maintaining a menagerie that Dr. Doolittle
would envy—is also lovely, if a bit on the gamey
side. My sister also has two sons but no animals,
and she lives in a state of disbelieving disgust
at what my days entail. I prefer to think of it as
learning new skills. True, my childhood vision of
my adulthood did not include picking up a front
yard's worth of dog poo using Kroger bags (one
as a mitt and one as a receptacle). My vision
also did not feature the gag-inducing clean-up
required after one of our dogs. The Lovely Maude,
goes foraging in the litter box and regurgitates
her findings onto the seagrass rug. (My husband
Winston calls this unprecedentedly revolting
substance vom-ass.) If I were to list my new
skills on a resume, I might include the following:
removing cat vomit from new suede driving moc
casins; eradicating the stench produced by a box
of year-old dead cicadas from a dresser drawer;
holding a child's almost-severed finger in place
using only a McDonald's napkin; and, removing
a cat's anal-gland secretions from human hair.
Still, I think this might be my favorite job so far,
although it does require more hand-washing than
I ever believed possible.
In Closing
I think that a good job is one in which one's
work is valuable and important, in which one is
challenged regularly, in which one is appreciated,
and in which there is a lasting, positive impact.
My current job. Resident Harridan at what I like
to call the Dander Palace, fits the bill. I flat
ter myself by thinking I am rather good at it.
Of course, I won't really know how skilled I am
at my current employment for years. There's no
real, quantifiable way to measure parenting suc
cess, but I'm awaiting some sort of feedback on
the results of rny child-rearing skills. This could
take decades. What are the metrics of success?
College degrees and thriving careers for both of
our sons? Nice families? Avoiding jail time? If, as
my sister Paige predicts, we are both rubbish at
motherhood and wifehood, we will find ourselves
as dotty spinster-like creatures living together
(having driven off our respective husbands by
ceaseless nagging and talking to each other all
day and night on the phone) and wearing scuffs
and sweatpants in broad daylight, surrounded by
a clutter of cats, drinking wine at noon, our sons
living in our basement. Let us hope this grim
vision never comes to pass, as that would truly
constitute a poor performance review.
Elise White
NEWS & FEATURES I ARTS & EVENTS I MOVIES I MUSIC I COMICS & ADVICE I CLASSIFIEDS FEBRUARY 14,2007 FLAGPOLE.COM 11
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