Wishing For A Village
Never was it clearer than yesterday that a village approach to raising children makes so much more sense than our culture's current individualized method.
For the last couple of days I have been laid out with flu-like symptoms and yesterday I was on my own with Laurel. I could barely move and the best I could do was lie on the couch or on the floor and feign interest in her books and toys. A brief outing we made to CVS and the bakery in the afternoon left me exhausted and drenched in sweat.
And while I was completely desperate for help and wished that a fellow village member could come relieve me (particularly when Laurel woke up from her nap an hour early), I was fortunate that somehow Laurel got it and cut me a break. She’s not typically a play on her own type of kid but she entertained herself for a lot of the day while I looked after her with one eye open and at one point she even came up to me and said “It’s okay mommy!” and pulled up the blankets around my neck.
Comments
Here's a book to read about 'wishing for a village' (which I so often do!). It's called Perfect Madness: motherhood in the age of anxiety by Judith Warner. I had to take it back to the library before I was finished reading it, but should get it back in the next few days. It's fabulous and talks a lot about how far we have or haven't come since Betty Friedan's days...amazing actually.
Posted by: tracyp | January 16, 2007 9:15 AM | Reply to this comment