In defense of work

Phil is an engineer with Metro-North Railroad, and Eli is a 3.5-year-old boy who loves trains, so at our house we talk a lot about how Daddy works on the trains. A few weeks ago it occurred to me that I had no idea if Eli knew what I do at work all day, so I told him.

He rolled his eyes at me like he was 13 instead of 3. "I know you're a writer," he grumbled.

I got a little thrill when I heard him say it, because I don't often give my job description as "writer." It sounds vaguely pretentious, for one — remember how Carrie Bradshaw used to flutter her eyelashes a little when she said it, like she knew writing a sex column for the fictional New York Star wasn't quiiiiite the same thing as writing for the Times? I write for the New York Teacher, so...they're both NYT, right?

But it's a little bit hard to explain to Eli the other things I do: "maintain the website," "send email and text messages," "stop and chat with colleagues on the way to the bathroom." So "writer" seemed like a safe bet.

Every evening I try my hardest to pump Eli for information on his day at school, and every evening his patience for my questions is locked up tighter than Fort Knox. I try open-ended questions — "What's the funniest thing that happened at school today?" and basic ones — "Who'd you sit next to at lunch?" Still every nugget I do get seems like the Holy Grail. (To date the most extensive story Eli has ever told about his new school was about the time that Courtney bit Evie's sleeve and "they are not best friends anymore.")

The other night, to my surprise, Eli asked me for the very first time about my day at work. As it happened, I'd had a bit of an exciting day because this guy stopped by:

(I did not stay after to get a selfie like some of my coworkers evidently did. Darn it.)

Eli somehow knows that Barack Obama is the current president, so I told him that a former president had come to work and I had gone to see him. (His response to this was, "But I didn't see him because I was in your belly," which I think means that he thinks Clinton was president when he was still in utero, which made me feel sort of old because at this point it sort of feels like Clinton was president when I was still in utero.)

Then he asked if I get to eat lunch at work (yes) and if I get to sleep (no, but sometimes I wish I could). "But you have to sleep because you'll be tired if you go to the late-stay room!" he insisted. "At work," I sighed, "everyone goes to the late-stay room."

This conversation made me realize a couple of things. First of all, as much as I'm interrogating Eli for information about his day, I should be encouraging him to ask me about my day, too. (#AskHerMore!) I could be telling him, "Today at work I was writing about a school I visited in Chinatown," or "Today at work someone shared cookies with me and made me very happy." (Except then he'd probably ask where his cookies are.)

Second of all, like any working parent I have a complex relationship with my job. (And I won't really get into all the working mom guilt now because I've written about it before.) But when I was talking to Eli last night I felt something I'd never felt before when discussing my job with him: I felt proud.

I'm proud of the work I do. This week my story about the theater teacher who inspired one of the stars of Hamilton was the cover story in the New York Teacher. I put together a campaign calling on Senate Republicans to do their jobs and hold hearings on Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court. (File under things I'd never thought would be in my job description: Writing mean tweets directed at the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Yes, I did make that graphic myself, thank you very much.)

I don't always like my job, but I do like having a job — and that's the part that sometimes feels like I'm supposed to keep it a secret, like any real mom is supposed to prefer to be home with her kid. I like wearing business casual clothing and tasteful jewelry that no one is going to yank off. (Unless I get mugged/slashed on the subway. Har har.) I like going to the coffeemaker in the morning and logging into my computer and checking things off my Outlook task list. I especially like visiting schools all over New York City and getting to write about the amazing, dedicated, innovative educators we have in our public schools.

(I also like having a wall in my office on which to hang all my race bibs. But I digress.)

I do not love commuting for two hours every day. I do not love racing out of the office at 6 p.m. only to get home and rush Eli off to bed the second I walk through the door, most nights without even changing out of my tasteful work outfit first. And sometimes I feel a little twinge when Eli occasionally by accident calls me "Miss Erica" instead of "Mommy." (I take comfort in the fact that this probably means he spends 75% of his day at school going, "Miss Erica! Miss Erica! Miss Erica!")

I have never missed a class party. Or a parent-teacher conference. When Eli is sick, Phil and I usually split the day so that both of us get to make appearances at our offices and one of us is always home with Eli.

I know that motherhood is about choices. I know that stay-at-home moms get as much grief as working moms do and we should all stop shaming each other and end the mommy wars, blah blah blah. I know that no one out there is actually judging me for working (...is there?) But I've been thinking about this a lot lately — in fact, it's one of the reasons I haven't posted in a few months. (The other reason is I got really heavily back into reading fanfiction after the X-Files reboot. No, I'm just kidding. Mostly.) There's this vibe out there sometimes that if you're doing anything that takes any time away from the time you spend with your kids, it has to be monumentally important or lifesaving or empowering and sometimes my work just isn't. (Mean tweets notwithstanding.) I don't necessarily have occasion to gush about work (although I guess no one really does, unless you're Lin-Manuel Miranda and everyone wants to interview you because you're a goddamn wizard genius), and it can sometimes feel like unless you are Loving Every Moment of your job you should quit because YOLO. But the other day in my Timehop/Facebook Memories there was a status update from six years ago (when I was a teacher) that read: "Rachel hopes someday she'll have a job where she won't get called a stuck-up bitch. By a 10-year-old." So by that standard...I've already won.

When Eli started his new school a few weeks ago, I worried about the adjustment period. His old school was a traditional daycare, where most of the kids were in class together until the bitter end. His new school is more of a school with after-care (or "late stay" as he calls it), and only one other kid in his class stays late. I worried that Eli would feel sad at 3:45 when all the other kids were picked up by their parents to go home and he had to go across the hall to the "late-stay room."

Then I swiftly came up with a parenting move I'm still patting myself on the back for. I told him this: "At the end of the day, all the other kids are going to have to go home. But you get to stay and play more."

His eyes lit up. He actually clapped his hands with excitement. "I get to stay and play more!" he laughed. It made him feel special. It made him feel proud.

The truth is, as working parents we can come up with all kinds of reasons to feel guilty about the effect it has on our kids. But I have always made every conscious effort not to frame it as a negative, not to say "I have to go to work," not to apologize for somehow abandoning him. Going to work, going to school, even going to the late-stay room are just things we do in our family, because they are important. We are important.

Of course, this is easy for me to say now when I've had a good week, when I'm lucky enough to have a job with good benefits, when our family situation allows me to work outside my home. But it's something that's important for me to remember. I have a regular, full-time, outside-of-the-house job, and I refuse to feel guilty about it anymore.