Friday, September 12, 2014

Truths About the Everyday Housewife


Hey !  You!  You with the kids running around the house teasing one another,  shrieking and screaming:  
"Mommy make Ashley  give me back my Superhero Golly-Bog Transformer."
 "Mommy Billie just hit me."
 "But Mommy, Ashley hit me first!"
Yeah I'm talking to you, the one sweeping up Fruit Loops from under the kitchen table.
This is the life of most moms and especially the stay-at-home mom.  This is reality.   A stay-at-home-mom isn't lounging on the sofa watching daytime soaps and nibbling on chocolate bonbons.  She's lugging a 30 pound basket filled with dirty laundry to the washing machine.  Instead of wearing opera length satin gloves she 's wearing elbow length rubber gloves and is scouring out toilets, scrubbing  bathtubs and mopping floors.  

 Most of all she's tired. 
 

Tired of the cyclic routine that seems endless.   Fix breakfast , wash breakfast dishes, clean-up kitchen.  Fix lunch, wash lunch dishes, clean-up kitchen.  Fix dinner, wash dishes, clean-up kitchen.   Tomorrow do the same thing and the day after that and the day after that and the day after that . . .
In the mornings it's make up the beds . . . in the evening she crashes  into bed, exhausted ... the next morning it's make up the beds again.  Once a week she strips the beads , then makes up the beds with fresh clean sheets and launders  the used sheets,  folds them neatly and puts them in the linen closet so they'll be ready for the next time.  This is repeated weekly;  week after week, month after month, year after year.  The repetitiveness is numbingly monotonous.   There are moments when she'd like to scream or even run away, but she doesn't.  She bears the drudgery out of love and devotion for her family.
 She's not one of those gorgeous, 20 or 30 something  models on TV, posing seductively in a form-fitting, low cut, little black dress telling us that if we used this or that facial cream we too will look years younger, be more radiant and just as beautiful as she is.   While Ms. Beautiful Model  is touting a sixty or seventy dollar bottle of potion that's just one part of a multi-hundred dollar beauty routine,  Stay-at-Home-Mom is worrying about how they're  going to afford their monthly  mortgage payments and also pay for little Timmy or Beth's much needed braces.  It's tough living on  one income.  Yes she could go out and get a paying job but she knows most of her income would go to pay for child care.
As Ms. Beautiful Model 's perfectly manicured hands caress a sensuous  bottle of Firming Lotion, Stay-at-Home-Mom nonchalantly sits on her own hands to hide her chipped nails and ragged cuticles and tries to think of ways to live from one paycheck to the next. 
Do we really need meat this week?  How about a big pot of beans and some cornbread?  Later in the week  I could cook up some rice and add the leftover beans to them, maybe splurge on a head of lettuce and make a salad?  Or I could fix a huge tuna and elbow macaroni casserole.
Always struggling to stretch that paycheck far enough to cover expenses and then, just when she thinks she's  got it made . . . Why the blazes does the car need a set of new tires now ?  What do you mean the washing machine is broken ?   Is it just me or does the refrigerator feel a bit warm inside?   

Sure, I've been there, I know what I'm talking about.   I used to laugh with Phyllis Diller (notice I said with and not at) when she told a joke about how she had 5 children and had her milkman deliver  nine quarts of milk.  Six quarts to drink and three to spill. 
I don't think there was a single day that one of my kids did not tip a glass of milk over and I had to run to get something to sop up the flood of milk with before it ran off the table and onto the floor.  Seems I was never quite fast enough so there was always at least one meal that  required my having  to mop the floor around our kitchen table. 
And living on one income, paycheck to paycheck?   I've been there too and know just where you're at. You get that monthly credit card statement and think; "Just a couple of more payments and we'll have all of last Christmas's gifts paid off."   And then it strikes you, "Oh Dear Lord !  In just a few short months it will be Christmas AGAIN !"
 It's like being on a never-ending merry-go-round.  Round and round we go, like a dog cashing its tail.  Is it any wonder that we have those annoying  little lines at the corner of our eyes or those furrowed creases across our forehead?

16 comments:

  1. I don't think I would have been cut out for motherhood for so many reasons, not the least of which is that I wouldn't be able to take the mess or the noise. When we visit my sister in law, whose daughter and granddaughters live with her, I have to fight the urge to tell the kids, who use their outdoor voices nonstop, to SSSHHH! and pick up all the toys strewn all over the place.

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    1. LOL - yes JoJo children are high energy and it takes all of a mother's energy to keep up with them. :)

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  2. What an accurate description...i'm sure many moms -- including my own -- could relate to this!

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    1. Hi Melissa - thank you for stopping by and reading my post. I've always enjoyed reading your well written blog "Now About What I Said".

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  3. Goodness me Anna....you totally hitthe nail on the head with this post..firstly I did not realsie you had children! WOW!!! I can relate to all apart from being a single mom, though i often felt like it because my husband used to travel so much for work for long periods. Indeed it is drudgery daily..How wonderful it is the hear a blogger speaking from the heart. I am encouraged to do the same on journey as a mother first and artist second. Thank you so much for sharing so openly...I always feel mysef holding back when I am blogging...I wil make more of an effort to break throught it!

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    1. Glad you dropped by Chelsea. Personally I feel it is nice to get a glimpse of the blogger behind the blog, so I'm happy to hear that you feel likewise. :)

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  4. Untimely car repairs, broken appliances, new tires...those things totally blow a budget out of water, and they sure do happen, don't they?!?

    Just swinging over to wish you a happy weekend. :)

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    1. Rosey it seems that something always broke down at the worse possible time . . . and it was usually after the warranty expired . . . naturally !

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  5. I've been there done that too! Even vacations (maybe there were 2 of them) wasn't really a vacation for me. Motherhood, especially for a stay at home mom is a 24/7, 365 days a year job. But I'm glad I did it!

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    1. Hi Annette, I always love your comments. Stay at Home Moms have been and are truly under appreciated and under valued. I hear you about the vacations. Ours was always a camping trip which meant a ton more work for dear old mommy plus lugging home a trunk load of dirty clothes and towels to wash. But my girls all have wonderful memories of those camping trips so they were more than worth all my mosquito and sand flea bites and cooking on a camp stove, boiling water to wash up the dishes with. :)

      I guess one reason I wrote this post was that I would see commercials for the TV programs "The Real Housewives of ..." and I would see these ladies in stiletto high heels and skin tight cocktail dresses pointing their manicured Dragon Lady fingernails and arguing with each other. I couldn't help but think; "Those aren't the real life housewives. Their frauds, fakes and the fluff of Hollywood fiction." So I suppose my rendition isn't glamorous, or filled with senseless bickering or just senselessly stupid . . . but it's real life, not fiction. :)

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  6. Lol! I remember these days! With 4 little munchkins running around at 1 point, there was never a dull moment that's for sure! Despite the trials of it all though, the joy it brings in the end is so worth it. Wouldn't change those days for anything!

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  7. Not being a mother myself, I have the utmost respect for stay-at-home moms! My house is a mess now, I can't imagine it with kids...lol!

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  8. And I'm sure most moms would say it's all worth it, but I'm not convinced and do not plan on having children. ;D

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  9. Sounds about right. Forget PB bunny, Moms I know are more energizer bunny.
    By the way, I'm popping by to let you know that you won my latest random drawing. Please pop by and pick your favorite photo for an 8" print. Then email your fave & shipping address to artsnark@verizon.net

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  10. Hi Anna, I have to admit I laughed a little and then got a little teary eyed. Being a Stay at Home Mom is and has been a mix for me esp. dealing with significant health issues most of that time, but I was destined and determined to do this (I was a Nanny to 30 before I had kids, not in all one family, I hasten to add, lol :)

    But you really never know what you are truly getting into until you experience it and everyone's experience is different. I was 6, 000 miles away from any family help and that was a huge challenge.

    A great blog post and a topic, esp. in this home right now, that is up for major discussion :)

    Thanks for making us think, cheers, T. :)

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  11. I have always admired stay ay home moms for being crafty on top of all the above! They deserve to be worshiped!

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