Mom Track Mind

Priya’s and Mystic M’s posts have forced me to attempt some honesty, so here goes. The only reason I’m not a SAHM right now is because I don’t want to be at home forever.

I’m on the mommy track at work. Gave up the excitement and challenge of interfacing with traders and tackling high-profile projects. Scaled down to part-time, not so much because I can’t put in 40 hours a week, but because I’m not fully committed. Waved the London assignments adieu. Try to scramble into work by market open, but nobody really cares because if there’s a fire to put out, I’m not the man for the job. Leave work by market close, and my co-workers chirp, “See you next week!”, instead of the standard, “Half-day? Where are you interviewing?”. And I’m not complaining.

Sure, I’ve never been in love with my job, but I’ve hit record levels of apathy. It’s common, this apathy, at least in the corporate jailhouses I’ve worked in so far…but not for me. I can see lesser-experienced, newer colleagues elbowing their way up the ranks via exceptional diligence and subtle brown-nosing. And though I’ve lost the crown they dangled before me prior to my maternity leave, I don’t give a corporate rat’s ass. I’ll just do the bare minium required to justify the paychecks. And the spot on Wall Street that thousands desire.

Here I am, one foot in the career door, all mind elsewhere. Truth is, I’d love to give it all up in a second, and devote the same focus I once had for my career to my home, to Nibbles. So why can’t I quit whining and just stay at home? Sounds liberating. Sounds scary. Because I know I won’t be allowed back in the tech boy’s club once I’m done. And I don’t really know when I’ll be “done”. And I can’t swallow the idea of staying at home forever.

NP: “Ok, CoHo, what exactly is so scary about staying at home forever?”
CoHo: “I don’t know if I can deal with a permanent shift in dynamics of our home to traditional gender stereotypes”.
NP: “Cut the bullshit CoHo. ’sides, you’d rather fit into a modern gender stereotype even if it goes against what you really want?”
CoHo: *wrinkles nose* “It’s not that simple really. What makes you think we’ve reached a time where one can do as one pleases? And it’s not like I won the fuckin’ lottery”.
NP: “Take your potty mouth back to the trading floor. So you’re saying, you can’t afford to quit? Perhaps you don’t really need to stay in a condo by the waterfront” *snickers*
CoHo: “I stay in a fuckin’ condo by the waterfront so that we have a quicker commute to work and hence more time with Nibbles”
NP: “Whatever. And ordering take-out is a great way for the family to bond together”.
CoHo: “Whatever”

*muffled obscenities*

CoHo: “Ok, it’s not the money. I’m scared to think of what would happen in a situation where Big Byte would not be around.”
NP: “That’s just rich CoHo. If your star-studded resume can’t land a job, what can?”
CoHo: “Corporations don’t shed tears for a returning SAHM”.
NP: “There’s other jobs out there you know. Like start-ups. You always wanted to join one, right? Maybe you could start your own…it’ll be stimulating, fun, you could be your own boss instead of a lowly CoHo”
CoHo: “That would be a much bigger time committment. What becomes of Nibbles then?”
NP: “Forget it CoHo. Scurry away to your dusty corner and I’ll let you know when that dream job comes begging for you while you live your life in morbid fear.”

Wake Up

blahness abounds. Weeks like this make me feel like I’m a WAHM for purely selfish reasons. Nibbles managed to escape some nasty falls, with stitches and scars as keepsakes. He appears bored and irritable, often banging on the front door/yanking his stroller screaming “bye! buh-byeeee!” Poor chap hasn’t figured out how to unlock the door yet, so he’s stuck with this ol’ hag for a bit longer.

My attempts at providing creative stimulation seem forced at best. I flip carelessly from one activity to the next like a jaded grad student selectively stimulating various nodes of the brain: giant animal marker – coloring time, digital drums on punk rock mode – music time, sleepytime stories and rhymes – reading time, slow dancing to fast songs – groovin’ time, soccer with oversized ball – sports time, ten reps on community slide – playing time, crash course on one hand cooking – uh – domestic time. And of course, all of this stuff together could total a whopping ten to fifteen minutes of…of what?

I’ve seen the way his face lights up when he sees other children. He dashes towards them with a brilliant grin spread across his milk-toothed face – only to be hauled away by me because I’m too chicken-shit to leave him alone in a social situation. What if he grabs her pretty curls or pulls her sharp nose? What if she punches back or starts crying? I’ve become the dreaded mama that spawns mama’s boys – the very kind that I’ve always detested.

Dammit Null Pointer! Time’s up. Loosen up those reins or it’s the Dreaded Daycare for your precious Nibbles.

Edited to add: Is tagging a post Post-partum valid after a year post delivery? Fuckit.

WAHM setup

This one’s for me, Poppins and other WAHM hopefuls. It’s a bunch of tips on working from home, coming from an IT dude. He’s not a mom (duh!), but the points are relevant enough.

He does mention my biggest problems these days:
1) Decent chair+desk: I’m the kind of person that sits either cross-legged or hunched over my knees while coding. (Everyone’s used to my scramble to find my shoes when I’m summoned for a impromptu meeting). But somehow, the chair-desk alignment was far more ergonomic than sitting cross-legged on the bed. It’s not like I’m doing my kegels while coding, and my back n’ bones have aged decades over the past few months.

2) Environment: It’s no coffee house when you’re surrounded by laundry, baby goo stained clothes and useless plastic toys. If anything, it is depressing and not the right work environment. I do have issues having Nibbles leave my line of sight, even if there are other responsible adults watching him. I need to work on creating a bigger baby-safe play area where he can explore without my continuous chorus of Nooos and Aaaacks. The playard we have is so tiny, it feels like a prison (doesn’t help that Nibbles peers through the mesh/cage and wails miserably till he’s free).

Some things that I’d add right off the bat:
3) Go on an internet hiatus while working (excluing access to my work machine). Avoid personal sites (e-mails, blogs, social networks) like the plague the gym.

4) Feed growling tummy something tasty to avoid fishing for lil’ somethings to hit the spot.

5) Block time slots for working and don’t do anything else during that time (besides feeding/helping Nibbles sleep); post dinner time slots work best for night owls like me. This is bound to be far more productive than the office, with numerous breaks attributed to production issues or coffee refills.

I’m all pumped. Will attack code with a vengence now. Yeaaaah! 

Working Things Out

“Today I’m certainly getting sacked. Fired. Pink-slipped, cardboard boxes et al.”, mused The CoHo, as she stared into the mirror, secretly admiring the darkening circles around her decaf eyes. After all, how long could she put on this charade? She felt like a fool in her uniform of black slacks, oversized shirt and colorful sneakers, psyching herself silly, “You better kick some corporate butt CoHo. Don’t give up the cause!”

Damn the cause. Whose cause was it anyway? She never agreed to exchange family time for a paycheck (ok, so she never expected family time to mean this much to her either). She didn’t want these spoils of half-won battles. She wanted everything…or nothing at all. Why screw over the previous generations only? Might as well destroy the environment with non-disposable diapers while she’s at it. “YeaaaH”, she screeched, “Talkin’ ’bout my ge-eeeeeeh-neration…”

The CoHo’s head-banging session was soon interrupted by hungry wails and she assumed a superwomanmom pose of breastfeeding babe in one hand and work laptop on the other. In between frustrated shrieks from a squirming baby struggling to get a decent mouthful, she attacked the e-mails multiplying in her box like a nasty virus.

A satisfied burp and series of yawns later, the babe was tightly swaddled and (seemingly) sound asleep. The CoHo then knew she had no excuse to avoid real work, which until the next week or so happened to be making the trading system faster. How progressive of Dream Company to dole out a mission-critical, high visibility, huge impact project to the new work-at-home mom!

The CoHo perused through enddless lines of dodgy code under her control, and felt a sudden sense of power…followed by nerve-wracking fear. A fear that was unlike the usual rush of a new, impossible deadline. More like the fear a drugged out CoHo felt when she found herself alone in a hospital room with a 5 hour old baby for an entire night.

She rushed into the bedroom, convinced that the babe had stirred – nope. He was in that blissful REM stage, flashing a quick grin every few seconds. Dammit. Ah! Laundry. Why not get that out of the way now instead of ruining the weekend? Oh, she’d already had this brainwave yesterday. Fine, then prep for dinner. Now that she’s at home, The CoHo had no excuse depriving her family of a heart-friendly, home-cooked meal. Uh, the refridgerator was still totally cramped with the major cooking spree she’d launched 2 days ago. Perhaps a nice cup of tea would help refresh her a bit.

One chai, one coffee and three dark chocolates later, The CoHo took another stab at the monstrous code. 010110110101010101010 *coredump*

The CoHo sunk into a schizophrenic blur as the voices taunted, “See what they said about a Mommy Brain?”, “You need to switch to a line of work that will fit your new lifestyle better – like testing”,  “This is why part-time workers shouldn’t get key deliverables”, “Girls can’t code anyway, and we’ll find another token female to keep the HR diversity committee happy”.

WaaaaAAH! *pop* The shrill cry was like music to The CoHo’s ears. She rushed to the bedroom, squeezed the tiny babe tight and showered him with generous, slobbery kisses. “Mommy’s here, she’s not going anywhere. Mommy’ll take care of you”.

And the e-mails did flood, the code did break, the phones did keep ringing as The CoHo and her babe spent a lovely spring afternoon finding new pieces of furniture to chew on.

Putting the “dom” in momdom

They say if you don’t have anything nice to say, say nothing – or some such hogwash, as a result of which I’ve tucked my rants under the rugs, alongwith other stray litter I can’t be bothered to clean. But I’m rather nutella-starved today, so I’m bringin’ it.

Being a stay-at-home-mom ain’t no picnic…but it is a non-stop circus with fresh acts everyday courtesy Nibbles. Nibbles is an awesome housemate, and we spend hours giggling and rolling on the floor, destroying anything that dares to stop our momentum. While he moves from one milestone to the next, I delight in undoing my adulthood.

Then we break for lunch – I belt out archaic numbers from those long-lost convent school days to my biggest (and only) fan, Nibbles, who plays maestro with colorful spoons loaded with prunes, carrots and other goo du jour.

Come afternoon, and I decide to be social for a change and join the stroller mommies by the boardwalk, instead of tossing envious glances their way. Of course, by the time I’m done with my annoyingly long pre-outing ritual, a tired Nibbles rubs his eyes and decides to chill in bed, getting drunk on artificial air and breast milk.

Soon enough, my caffeine levels are dangerously low, and I decide to lose myself in a piping hot cup of ginger tea while surfin’ the net. I then see the cyclone of a mess that I helped create, piling sink+laundry and maggi noodle dinner on the horizon – and that blasted guilt sets in.

Now that I’ve traded my full-time job as a software engineer for a full-time gig as a domestic engineer, I suddenly feel like I’ve lost the right to vegetate. At work-work, one could stare endlessly at the dual computer screens, pretending to be immersed in sloppy code, occasionaly scratching one’s forehead, kicking the CPU and sighing audibly on the way to the vending machine for a candy fix.

At work-work, I could leave the bugs, e-mails and unfinished reports till the next day in order to keep expectations at comfy levels while I got acquainted with a bottle of wine.  At home, there really is no EOD (end of day). If I’m in bed, it’s because I’m defeated by the random chores that come at me like one of those automatic tennis ball machines gone berserk. If I’m in bed, it means I really should be glued to my laptop trying to squeeze in my daily 4 hours of part-time work, churning out magnificent code to impress those folks that have my soul. And here I am, blogging my responsibilities away. Bah!

As a domestic engineer, I know I can’t get fired, but my sheer ineptitude at it simply sucks; especially when I read how other mommy bloggers seem to keep at it, even if it means running on an empty tank. For sure, Supermomdom is a necessity not an option.

Big Byte has been perfect though, with well planted words of praise every once in a while, even if my rotis are shaped like the map of Timbucktoo and taste like cardboard. I for one have stopped getting all riled up about the fact that I’m performing traditional duties outlined for a “wife” and a “mom”.

I used to think feminism was about abandoning gender roles dictated by society. I thought that being diametrically opposite to those roles would support “the cause” further. Being a mother – and being sober – has certainly cleared up  the fog. (Can I have my margarita now?)