Strengthening the Family Part 27 - Woman's Role as Homemaker

 

Back when I was a little kid before we had the dairy, my Dad worked as a miner. He would leave Monday morning to work in adverse conditions, drilling holes and setting dynamite charges deep below in mine shafts. When the blast created rubble, they would use equipment to haul out the material on small mine carts. Because of travel times, he would stay up at the mine until Friday evenings. As a 5 year old, I was very excited to see him come home. 

My mom stayed at home on our 80 acre farm and took care of the chores there. We had hundreds of sheep that we would help her feed, and 3 or 4 milk cows that she would milk and we would take the gallon jars filled with milk to various neighbors in our home town to sell. Being in pre-school age, my mom would take us around as she did her chores and we helped out in our limited capacity. I remember we would typically have tuna sandwiches for lunch, then a decent meal when my older brothers got back from school. 

My folks sold the sheep, bought dairy equipment and cows in 1981, the summer before I entered first grade. With that, my dad quit his mining job and began life as a dairy farmer. My mom continued doing chores while we in our increased capacity were tasked with feeding the calves, driving tractor to hay in the summers, and helping out more. 

Around 1983 or so, I hear my parents talking more about financial issues, like having to sell some cows to pay the bills. Then, my mom gets a job working as a checkout clerk at a local store while my dad took care of things on the dairy. 

All of a sudden, my responsibilities when way up. They bought us all laundry baskets and told us that we were responsible for our own laundry now. Not only that, but we had a daily cleaning job. We would rotate cleaning different rooms every day. As an 8 year old, laundry was not a big priority. My clothes quickly went from decent, to all this grey color from me just dumping them all in together and stuffing them in a pile in my dresser and sorting out clothes as I needed them. Also, our food quality went way down. No longer did we have waffles for breakfast, or a decent meal at dinner time. We tended to eat more cereal or snack food. I would fry up a steak for myself and call it a meal. No longer would we have the green vegetables.

That lasted for about 3-4 years until they got the money situated better. After that, my mom came home and painted ceramics to sell. The dinner table was no longer to be used for meals, it was stuffed with fragile uncooked ceramics. We took to eating on the couches while watching TV.  As the dairy herd grew, she stopped doing ceramics, but chores on a dairy are time consuming, so both worked on the dairy. I was hoping we would go back to the meals at the table, but that never happened. We got out of the habit and we continued to eat on couches while watching reruns of MASH. 

 As time went on and I got out of the house and old enough to think for myself, I became determined to have a more traditional married life. I knew this family who was instrumental in my church conversion. The mom was very traditional in her homemaking. She would stay home and see to it that good meals were always made, the kids were all neat in their appearance (the girls were HOT) and there was always this feeling of unity there. I wanted that.

Homemaking is Ambition and Time

As a father of six with a full time stay at home wife, I can tell you that her days are full. Cooking meals, spending time with the kids, cleaning up messes and doing minor repairs is time consuming and energy draining. Just as a man works a full day as a provider, so should a woman work a full day as a mother and homemaker. When I was dating, I looked for women who acted like they were active and had a desire to make things better around them. 

Cooking

Cooking is something I enjoy doing on the weekends. My wife will usually have a hot meal ready for us when I get home. In the 18 years we have been married, and watched the people grow up and out, I noticed that there are real consequences to having home cooked meals vs. quick meals or eating out. The years of nutrition has it's effects. When cooking for a family, reduce the sugars and sweets. 

In addition is the regular meals at the table. It serves as a great time to become more acquainted with the issues your children are going through, improve communication skills, foster stronger relationships and teach values as you are eating.

Cleaning

Cleaning is hardly ever an enjoyable experience. Sweeping up mouse turds or scrubbing out toilets is not the most glamorous job, but it needs done. With 6 kids, it is a rare thing to have the house considered clean, but she tries and I will help out where I can. 

 One thing we do is instead of giving them an allowance as a handout, we pay the kids for a room cleaned. They clean their assigned room and show it to us, we mark it down and pay them weekly. Some kids are ambitious in their chores, many rooms will get neglected however. 

When cleaning, be quick to throw away stuff that isn't being used. Funny how much less entropy a house has if there isn't a million old papers ready to spontaneously scatter. Also, put toys in detention if they are not picked up. Often the kids won't even realize they are missing them. We have a couple garbage sacks full of random toys in the shed.

Attack the filth. The worst stuff is the grimy sludge that nobody wants to touch. Merely picking up and sweeping is not always enough. Regularly do a deep clean in a room to reduce the total entropy as much as possible. 

Decorating

The home should be a place of rest from the world. Hang up pictures and memorabilia that reminds your family of the good things in life.  Even though it may seem like they do not appreciate a family photo or paintings of wildlife, they will look at those and think of the better life. Try not to have so much that it becomes clutter, but have simple decor that invites the spirit into the home. 

Conclusion

Just as a man has the responsibilities of Leader, Protector, and Provider, you as a woman have the responsibilities of  Wife, Mother, and Homemaker. As you two fulfill your responsibilities, you will fulfill the Yin and Yang you need to come closer as a family.