Perverse

Navigating conversations about family and work is complicated.

When on the job market, I am uncomfortable bringing up my family life to a hiring committee. The semi-legal advice in the US is that "they can't ask, so don't tell them."

When interacting with graduate students and research oriented undergrads, I am more than a subject matter expert. I need to be a model of a woman with a child in my field. If it comes up, I talk about it.

At conferences, I know the common wisdom is to not bring up family, but when the guys are talking about their kids, or when my partner is in town with Epsilon, common wisdom finds its way to the dustbin.

In general, I feel that if I am not willing to talk about my family, then it is unfair of me to complain that this is an uncomfortable issue for women to talk about. ... So I out myself. ... Within limits.

What I try not to do outside of friends circles and pseudoanonymous settings is talk about how hard it is. I expect to be rated on the same scale as colleagues without kids or two body problems. This means that I often expect not to be successful. I fear that sympathy may fall too close to pity. I don't want the baggage that comes with being seen as an affirmative action hire.

Which is hilarious. I believe strongly in the need for hiring under-represented groups. It is good for the students we teach and mentor, and it is good for science. Leave aside any arguments about fairness  and diversity for the moment. As a first level approximation, if we broaden the pool of people who we encourage to do good science, then we have more people trying to do good science, and we get more good science.

But of course, the world is what it is. I don't get cut a break for a difficult pregnancy and a new born. My partner doesn't get cut a break for multiple stints of single parenting because everyone assumes that Epsilon lives with me. We can be bitter, or move on.

So why is it, now that I am faced with a system that legally requires me to be judged differently for my family,  that I still feel uncomfortable participating?

Part of my discomfort comes from the fact that I know men on hiring committees (I've only had this discussion with men) who feel uncomfortable when a female candidate brings up her family in her cover letter, even in a country where I've been encouraged to mention my family when applying to jobs. Part of my discomfort comes from years of habit and advice, some of it from seeing how devastating other people's uninformed best intentions have been for me.

Whatever the reason, I now find myself feeling trapped between the possibility of being judged by standards that are stricter than legally required, or revealing personal information that makes me feel exposed. It is a perverse world where an attempt at legislating fairness elicits a feeling of being trapped.

Acknowlegdments

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I would like to thank my partner for his patience during the writing of this [project] and Epsilon for the hours of playing monsters in tunnels with me he sacrificed, which he knows belong to him by right.

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I do wonder why spouses are thanked for their patience, support and understanding, but not kids. In his own very real way, Epsilon supplies me with plenty of the first two, if not the third.

Blackberries for Epsilon

A while ago, I'd sent Blueberries for Sal for a friend's daughter, A. My friend, B., whose English isn't up to reading that book easily, looked at it, tried to read it a couple times, and then forgot about it. Epsilon was also too young to be interested in books with that many words per picture at the time, so I didn't get a copy for us, and soon, I forgot about the book as well.

When we went to visit B. last summer, my partner started reading through all the English language books we'd sent over the years to A. Blueberries for Sal was a hit with both A. and Epsilon. They'd run around the house saying "kerplink, kerplink" (the sound of blueberries in a tin pail). A. had never seen a blueberry before, but still loved the idea of going to a hill to pick fruit with her mother.

Now that Epsilon is living in the land of blackberry bushes, we have developed a ritual of picking blackberries on the way to anywhere. Sometimes it is the only way we can get him to keep walking instead of wanting to be carried. On Monday, coming back from day care, we brought a "bucket" a large tupperware, and picked blackberries to our heart's content. Epsilon ate as many as he wanted (I didn't believe that there was an upper limit on that, but there is) which still left plenty left over for canning. Unfortunately, the jam making had to happen after Epsilon had gone to bed.

My plan for this weekend involves going to the blackberry bushes with the really sweet berries that is way out of the way of our regular routine (at least for a 3 year old). I've found his halloween bucket from last year. It's not tin, but I can say "kerplink" just as easily.