Who's happier, today's mom or grandma's generation?
Today's mom has learned to adapt to a barrage of digital computerized appliances, entertainment devices, kitchen aids and automobiles, things that would have scared the daylight out of great Grandma. Today’s mom is the family member who sets the digital alarm clock and the automatic coffee maker every night. She operates tiny cell phones, remote controls, VCRs and just about every computerized household gadget and gismo.
Today's savvy Mom carries a cell phone and a pager so she can be located quickly and so she can also locate her family. But even with all this modern technology, today's mass-transit world has made it almost impossible for modern moms to keep a complete track of their mobile family's whereabouts.
And today's Mom must deal with that old bugaboo "peer pressure". In grandma’s day peer pressure wasn’t as strong an influence as it is today. Kids were more afraid of their papa and mama and they never wanted to arouse papa’s wrath which would encourage a spanking. An old fashioned spanking was just a natural part of their punishment.
My Mom (1940s & 50s generation) and Grandma were old fashioned in other beliefs, as well. They believed a woman's place was in the home. "A mother should be at home when the children arrive from school", grandma would often say to her daughter-in-laws. "My mama was always there waiting for her family - the smell of dinner already simmering on the stove".
I've got to agree with grandma. Arriving home from school and finding mom in the kitchen cooking up one of her mouthwatering stews fried chicken dinners or fragrant roast beef suppers drew us home like a magnet. And when we got there, mom always had something for us to do, a chore to carry out. We kids never used the words,"I'm bored" for fear our parents would find a chore to keep us busy.
Recently, I attended a family reunion. I overheard a friendly conversation between older and younger generations erupt into a full fledged debate.
Some of the older folks, born between the 1920s and the 1940s, believed that the mother's of today have it much easier than the wives and mothers of their generation. Naturally, the younger women in the group felt otherwise, arguing that they have a greater degree of emotional and mental stress to deal with, inside, as well as outside, the home.
This wasn't the first time I'd heard this old, familiar, debate. The same question has been argued among families for generations, ever since WWII spawned "Rosie the Riveter" and American women entered the work force filling jobs formerly dominated by men.
In grandma's day, a mother's role was limited to her household duties and to the nurturing of her family. It was papa, the man of the house, who worked outside the home, was the one to drive the family car, pay the household bills, taxes and debts. He conducted all family business and financial transactions.
Grandma had little reason to leave her home during her workday. Most companies delivered her household goods directly to her back door and grocery shopping for staples was done every other month.
Grandma's rambling spring garden supplied her family with fresh vegetables and fruit. What her family didn't eat in the summer, Grandma put up as preserves for the winter. Grandma planned her daily meals according to her ripest vegetables: long zucchini, large eggplants and fresh eggs from the chicken coop. On some days, it was grandma who had to fetch a plump hen from the same chicken coop to cook for the family supper. It’s safe to say, the only chicken dinner today's housewife will cook is one that comes prepared and wrapped at the grocery meat counter.
But today's housewife and mother argues that grandma's workday was a lot simpler than hers. They say grandma had fewer demands put on her time and a lot less responsibilities. "We're expected to bring in a paycheck, run a household and be the perfect mother, too," say the younger generation.
It's true. Today's Mom has a greater role to play in the household. In addition to bringing in a paycheck, she's usually the keeper of the checking account and the payer of all the monthly bills. She drives and maintains her own car and, in most cases, is the family chauffeur, and must face the daily grind and perils of freeway traffic.
By the end of the evening, the debate still raged on. Who has it tougher, who is happier in her role, the grandma or the granddaughter?
Passing generations will likely never agree on an answer. But with the advent of home computers and more and more businesses going on line, more housewives and mothers are working out of their homes, and shopping right from their kitchen computers. The percentage of housewives working from home, while managing to raise a family, has greatly increased in the past several years. Perhaps the job of working mother is coming full circle and the issue will soon resolve itself.
In 1955 working mothers with kids under age 6 represented only 18 percent of American work force. By 1990, the number had risen to more than 58 percent. Working moms with kids 6 to 17 years old soared to nearly 75 percent at the beginning of the millennium.
When I look back on my grandmother's life, to a time when few women worked outside the home, I remember a certain simplicity to her lifestyle, a contentment and uncomplicated enjoyment in her daily routine. Her job as housewife and mother was an admired profession and one that her granddaughters' aspired to achieve.
She was happy living in a world where the only "disk" she knew was the one papa pulled behind on his tractor, a "mouse" was something the cat dragged home, a "menu" was something she ordered from in a restaurant, "windows" were glass panes she looked through and the only "chip" she ever saw was in the back field, left behind by the ranch house cow!
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