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On Being A Housewife

Being a housewife is the best thing in the world. Or so they told me. Growing up, most if not all, of the women in my life were housewives. That was a very long time ago, back when housewife hadn't yet acquired its present unsavory reputation. At least I presume unsavory, why else would women refer to themselves as Stay At Home Moms (SAHMs)? 

I never quite understood why a housewife was called that though. I know what idea it was supposed to convey, that of a married woman who looks after the home and its constituents, but it didn't make much sense. Men are given titles showing what work they do - not always though, I'm pretty fuzzy on what a VP of social media marketing does exactly, other than tweet all day long (sweet job!). And even when they do no work, they have fancy pants titles after their names. Given that, I always thought a better term for these women would be President of Everything. 

Because that was exactly what they did. Everything. Wake up the kids and husband, make sure everyone is on schedule, supervise the maid, serve tea/coffee to whoever wants a cup, make breakfast, pack lunch boxes (cannot have the same food made for breakfast can we?), pray to god in elaborate rituals, clean the house, get the laundry done, help the neighbor and by that time, the kids are home from school. 

Serve them lunch, make snacks for the evening, help them with homework till the husband comes home, then serve dinner for the entire family with special tiffin for the grandparents. And this is just a regular day, without any extraordinary events such as the maid taking a holiday or quitting, the children screaming because they forgot something, the vegetable vendor doesn't turn up, the power fails or one of the appliances decides to up and stop working mysteriously.

Most men have a 9 to 5 job, plus about an hour for traveling. Most housewives on the other hand, have a 5 am to 10 pm (roughly) work day. I never quite saw the appeal, though many women I know swear it's the best gig in the world. Sure, if you have no dreams of your own. Or your dreams only involve having children and taking care of them. I promised myself I'd never be just a housewife.

How things change! Having married recently and unable to work due to visa issues, I am also a housewife. And I feel like I'm on vacation. No boss, no schedules, no in-laws, no kids, no maid, no neighbor, no politics and I have all the time in the world to do things I haven't had time for before. Like play video games. Read books by the dozen. Write. Learning to cook. Go biking. Learn to swim. Learn to code. It's perfect - for now. Later it'll be time to work on achieving my dreams. Which is finding a job which lets me do all of those things :D

Ahem. Let me try that again. Being a housewife is the best thing in the world. Unless your dream is not to be one!
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Location: Michigan, USA

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