The Myth of the Lazy Mom

Setup: While Jay was saying the dinner prayer a few nights ago, he said "we're thankful for this food, even though it's just leftovers." 

Then Thursday morning over breakfast (while I was attempting to read my scriptures but getting interrupted every other verse), Rose looked across the table at me and said "Mom, I wish I could stay home all day and do nothing, like you." 

It's so fun being devalued by the humans whom I descended nigh unto death to grow, bear, and raise.

Right after Rose's comment about my lazy do-nothing life, Jay walked in and asked, "Mom, can you switch my laundry over to the dryer while I'm at school today?" The irony hung thick in the air.

This moment highlighted my children's mystical dual assumption that I don't do anything while at the same time they expect me to do everything. Helloooo! All the cooking, planning, cleaning, laundering, etc. etc. etc. that I do is called work and it takes time! And energy. Not to mention patience because it's repetitive and monotonous.

To be fair, both Jay's leftovers comment and Rose's belief that I do nothing all day were spoken truly without guile, but ouch they stung. Being taken for granted is never pleasant. I also don't want my kids to think that stay at home parents in general (and their own mother specifically) sit around doing nothing like lazy bums! Unpaid work is still work. The world already attempts to make me feel like less for staying home rather than working, especially now that all my kids are in school. As adamantly as I refuse to teach my kids that women must stay in the home, I also refuse to teach them that staying home is easy!

After Jay's "just leftovers" prayer the other night, I flicked water in his face and said "Thanks a lot. Just leftovers that I cooked from scratch for you yesterday!" Jeff joined in on my side and Jay was appropriately abashed. Nobody has ever complained about having leftovers for dinner before. We live on leftovers, especially during cross country season! Even though I know Jay said those words with zero malice, (he is far too sweet to treat his mom badly on purpose), I couldn't help feeling attacked and unappreciated. Jay responded to our parental ribbing with one of his classic intellectual pivots: "in our religion don't we believe in repentance and forgiveness?" 

After a pause at Jay's slicing humbling comeback, my defenses rose just enough for me to respond "yes, but I couldn't let you off the hook right away because I wanted to teach you a lesson!" Our dinner conversation moved on, but that irked ill-used taken for granted, trampled feeling lingered inside me, and I could tell that Jay knew I still felt sad and he felt bad that I was sad. I felt bad for making Jay feel so bad AND bad about what he said in the prayer--it still stung. (Bad, sad, sad, bad-- this is turning into a Dr. Seuss story!)

So when Rose made her naïve comment about how easy and lazy my life is a few days later, I raised my eyebrows but said nothing. Control. Forbearance. In the moment I was feeling too peeved to attempt dispelling the Myth of the Lazy Mom. My response would have come out as a snarky or angry retort, and I didn't want that either. While I attempted to focus on reading again, I mentally high fived myself for serving my children yet again by choosing not to scar them for life with an outburst. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. I am calm. I am kind.

I finished my breakfast and escaped to my room, where I told Jeff all about Rose's insensitive unwitting comment. He groaned in sympathy. Then I wrote about the situation to siphon off my frustration before facing the family again. It helped, but as usual, I got caught up in word-crafting and as a result we didn't have time for family scripture before Jay and Jeff left for school. We barely had time for family prayer before they headed out.

It was Jay's turn to pray. During the prayer, he said "please help us all to have a good day at school except mom." He was trying to be more accurate because we've joked with the kids recently for praying that "we will all have a good day at school," since I don't go to school. Jay's fix for that wasn't much better, especially since his wording made it sound like he didn't want me to have a good day at all, school or no. On top of Rose's Lazy Mom Myth comment, I felt beyond taken for granted. My children had crumpled me up and tossed me aside. Tale as old as time, I know. They'll care about me again in a few decades I guess.

After family prayer, I looked hopelessly over at Jeff and he gave me a look that said "I heard that. I've got this." We had family hug time as usual and then Jeff said in a slightly raised, speculative voice that was clearly addressed to all 3 kids: "I wonder what Mom does at home all day. Gorgeous, what do you do while we're at school?"

As much as I generally dislike that question, (the more accurate question is "what don't you do during the day?"), I decided to play along, with a touch of sass. "Let's see... I put away all the things that nobody else will. I clean up all the messes that everyone leaves behind. I even try to do things for myself [uninterrupted] for the first time in 12 years." I paused here, trying to decide if adding to my list of daily work was worth the effort.

Jeff replied still using his obvious voice. "It sounds like you do a lot of work serving others, just like always! It's nice that you get to do some things for yourself now, too." 

The kids kept doing what they were doing. Who knows if our deliberate exchange reached them or not. They're probably too young to understand the nuances of being an adult and feeling like a productive human while also choosing to be a stay at home parent. Whatever. Jeff's defense was enough to smooth out most of my lingering crumpled-ness. 

On his way out the door, Jeff hugged and kissed me goodbye with an "I love you," like usual. As we pulled apart, Jeff gave me a brief look with his light blue eyes that said "I see you and I appreciate you. Also, you're beautiful." My insides warmed and I realized I'd rather have three ungrateful kids and one grateful excellent husband than the reverse.

Once everyone (but me--hah) was at school, I dove into this year's heap of free fresh picked apples (golden delicious, from the orchard of the friend of a friend). I ended up peeling, coring, and cutting 6 dozen apples. I put them in two crock pots, a stew pot, and baked some in a massive glass bowl. I even made granola to go with the baked apples. My 3 hours of apple-ing was not in response to Rose's comment about the Lazy Mom Myth, haha. I would've done the apples that day regardless of what Rose said, because tis the season. It just ended up being an extra productive day for me--the ripe ripe apples demanded it. Whew! Our house smelled like autumnal spiced apple-y bliss. Not too shabby for a lazy mom. 

I listened to "Girl on Fire" by Alicia Keys while I cleaned up the last of the apple mess, because it felt appropriate. Then I listened to it again while I surveyed my apple-rific success.

That night, Jeff made sure to comment on how busy I was in front of the kids, bless him. 

"Actually, while I was sitting around doing nothing all day today, the apples peeled themselves. It was just like magic!" I joked.

We had "just leftovers" for dinner again that night.

Wednesday night sunset on the road home from the orchard where I got the apples. Actually, I didn't even set foot in the orchard, the friend of a friend who owned it had several spare pre-picked boxes of golden delicious apples free for the taking.

So many apples--these boxes are massive. 

My comparatively moderate haul--for perspective, my biggest bag (on the far right) held 88 apples.

Thursday morning, all set up and ready to go. I wear short sleeves, an apron, rubber gloves, and remove my watch when I peel and cut apples because the juice sprays everywhere, and after a while it burns my hands. I also have to tip my head away from the apple slicer when I push down because the juice sprays up onto my glasses if I don't! I ended up with a sticky neck and chin from all of the sprayback. This was an especially juicy batch of sweet sweet apples.

40 apples lined up on the counter, for starters. My largest strip of counterspace is ten apples wide.

The stopping point, 3 hours later: two crock pots full of cut apples, a gallon Pyrex bowl of baked apples, another gallon of applesauce, an apple cake, and a jug of thick syrupy apple juice, poured off of the applesauce. I ended up dumping the applesauce into the crock pots once those apples cooked down some. Those two pots bubbled over night and became divine brown apple buttery goodness. (Not pictured: my large sheet pan of homemade oat pecan granola, which doubles as apple crisp topping for those baked apples. Breakfast of champions!)

These baked apples were so good! A drizzle of maple syrup, several shakes of cinnamon, and a few sprinkles of ginger. Mix it up and put a few slices of butter on top and bake till the apples are soft. This will keep longer than traditional apple crisp because there's no topping to get all gross and soggy. I'm all about food longevity. And leftovers.

Apple triumph: messy hair, don't care. This girl is on fire!

The next morning, the apple butter had cooked down beautifully. Possibly a little too much. But oh well. Yum. Side note: the crock pots and their sticky lids were not very fun to clean.

Jeff, making me laugh by bouncing my head with his stomach while saying HA.

Sunrise: a new day begins.