Morjes!

Welcome to my blog. I write about fitting in, sticking out, and missing the motherland as a serial foreigner.

WAHM, in a picture

Remember how I abandoned my family for four days to get a job? Well, despite being late to the first day of training, I got it. Though I have yet to receive a paycheck, I did submit an invoice so I think it's the real thing. Let me tell you how it's going.

Or I could just show you. This is what being a WAHM (work at home mom) looks like:

I had set the girls up with a wholesome, engaging, non-DVD-based activity so I could get a few minutes to work uninterrupted. After a while I heard some suspicious noises so I stepped out of my room to check on the girls. The above picture is what I found: a tissue box emptied, winter gear strewn about the room, multiple hairbands being worn as necklaces by Magdalena, cardboard boxes pulled out, etc. What a mess!

But you know what? It was totally worth it. The girls were happy, I got my work done, and it only took a few minutes to clean up the mess later. And that's what being a WAHM is like. It's just a big series of trade-offs. If I work while they're awake, chaos generally (but not always) results. If I work during nap/quiet time, it means I don't really get a break during the day. If I work at night, sometimes that's lame because Jeremy is there and it's nice to hang out, you know? However, if I don't work during those times, then what's the point of having a job?

And it is a wonderful job. It is perfectly suited to my life situation and to my skills. It's not as mind-intensive as editing the dictionary, which is nice, and it doesn't require a lot of attention to the computer screen. I mostly just have to sit there and listen attentively and critically. Of course, that means I can't listen to music like I could with my other job, and that I have to wear headphones, which makes me less alert to growing chaos the next room over.

The other difference between this job and editing the dictionary is that free time is harder to come by these days. Back in the day, I did plenty of dictionary editing with a sleeping or nursing Magdalena on my lap. Now she's old enough to be running around emptying tissue boxes, as you see, so I pretty much always have two kids to keep track of if I try to work while they're awake. I also have preschool treasurer duties going on, which takes its share of time.

All in all, I am very happy to be a WAHM again, though I do think the acronym should work out to be WHAM. It certainly would describe the situation better.

Elsewhere 2010

Baby name castoffs