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Over at 
marina's place, on this entry.
It would have been unthinkable for my mom to not have a higher education or not have a job, or, God forbid, quit that job just to raise a kid.
Every once in a while you mention something like this and it floors me. Firstly because, wow, so not the experience of a woman growing up in the southern US in the '70s and '80s. (Kinda envious, me.)
But more importantly because it reminds me every time just how massively awesome my mom is. Despite the fact that she dropped out of college to marry my dad, despite the fact that he left her with two toddlers not five years later, despite the fact that she was raised in about as conservative-traditional-gender-roles an atmosphere as it got back then, one of my memories from when I was nine still gets to be her waving goodbye in a cheap white felt cowboy hat as she got on a bus to go march in Washington D.C. in support of the Equal Rights Amendment.
She managed to finish her Bachelor's, get a PhD and become the head of the most prestigious women's center in the US, all while raising two kids with very little help from anyone else and in spite of intense pressure from pretty much everyone around to find a second husband to "take care of" the three of us.
It makes me wonder what she could have done if she'd grown up in the culture your mom did...
Thanks for providing these fascinating glimpses into a culture I know nothing about and, by extension, into my own as well.
marina's place, on this entry.
It would have been unthinkable for my mom to not have a higher education or not have a job, or, God forbid, quit that job just to raise a kid.
Every once in a while you mention something like this and it floors me. Firstly because, wow, so not the experience of a woman growing up in the southern US in the '70s and '80s. (Kinda envious, me.)
But more importantly because it reminds me every time just how massively awesome my mom is. Despite the fact that she dropped out of college to marry my dad, despite the fact that he left her with two toddlers not five years later, despite the fact that she was raised in about as conservative-traditional-gender-roles an atmosphere as it got back then, one of my memories from when I was nine still gets to be her waving goodbye in a cheap white felt cowboy hat as she got on a bus to go march in Washington D.C. in support of the Equal Rights Amendment.
She managed to finish her Bachelor's, get a PhD and become the head of the most prestigious women's center in the US, all while raising two kids with very little help from anyone else and in spite of intense pressure from pretty much everyone around to find a second husband to "take care of" the three of us.
It makes me wonder what she could have done if she'd grown up in the culture your mom did...
Thanks for providing these fascinating glimpses into a culture I know nothing about and, by extension, into my own as well.