The mother of all careers

Women and work. It has never been an easy coupling when you throw children into the mix. Those of us choosing to stay at home are now domestic chief executive officers, according to The Sunday Times. 

Women who handle the family finances, childcare, school schedules, interior design, etc, etc, are no longer content to be called a housewife. I can understand why - it has become a demeaning label. However, to clothe maternal duties in corporate-speak is perhaps a ploy to satisfy our own vanity, or to convince our menfolk that we fulfill a vital role. It smacks of insecurity.

Unlike our mothers, our generation has been brought up to expect and foster a career. I have just finished reading The Best of Everything by Rona Jaffe - the 1950s' answer to Sex and the City. What struck me was the tentative idea that women could actually choose a career over waiting for a marriage proposal. The main character Caroline Bender muses:

"It was good to be able to care so much about work. It must be something like the way men feel... except that men have to worry so much about the money. For her the thrill was in the competition and in the achievement."