Home Sweat Home by Patton Elizabeth;Choi Mimi;

Author:Patton, Elizabeth;Choi, Mimi;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Waldman’s perspective reflects a generation of children raised by women influenced by Friedan but who did not always feel they could change their lives significantly. This passage economically encompasses the stages of female experience that concerned Friedan in The Feminine Mystique. From her own magazine writing and research, Friedan believed women before and shortly after World War II pursued their ambition without constraints, implying that to reach for lofty goals, such as flying a plane (88–89), were admirable pursuits. But for Waldman and her generation raised with a different consciousness, ambition had to be planned more strategically. Her language in the passage above draws heavily on military imagery, suggesting that to fulfill the hopes her mother has seeded in her, Waldman would have to confront adversaries that her mother recognized but could not resist because of her marriage constraints. For Waldman, and perhaps other young girls also told by their mothers to be ambitious and seek an equal partner, the possibility that “Housework” could be patronizing or “denigrating” was not apparent or, at least, not remembered.

So it would seem to be the case for the creators of Free to Be. Thomas, the eldest child of successful comedian Danny Thomas (1912–1991), grew up in Beverly Hills, California, one of the most affluent areas in the United States. Although she recounts much of her family life in her memoir, little is conveyed of domestic responsibilities beyond slight references to a beloved couple who are suggested to be servants (58–59) and an “ever-rotating nanny” (59). Only after Thomas married and became stepmother to five children, including four teenaged boys living in the same house, did she feel the burden of domestic responsibility and its implicitly inescapable sexism:

“Where are my shoes?” Phil would constantly ask.

What is it about men? They think we women have a radar attached to our uterus. And the thing that killed me was that I knew where they were. I knew where Phil’s shoes were. I knew where all four boys’ shoes were.

How did this happen? Had my mother secretly planted a chip in me at birth that would activate when I said “I do”? I was beginning to understand why there hadn’t been a female Shakespeare or Mozart. There wasn’t room in their heads for symphonies and sonnets—their brains were cluttered with where everyone’s shoes were. (314)

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