Thank you, as always, for your insights into the world. I see a lot of myself in yours and Jon's stories. Also the children fighting/cat throw up thing. Yes.
I also grew up Mormon, and it did a number on me too. I’ve been the stay at home parent for the past 10 years, as I work from home freelancing and my wife works at a hospital as a kick ass pediatric nurse. We have four kids and nothing has proved how much our society hates women and children as being the primary caretaker.
yes, caretaking is the lowest rung, always. it’s pretty bleak.
and when there’s one chief breadwinner in a partnership, it’s also pretty bleak. my partner described it this way: I work for this company, or that company, or that company, selling their product until I’m 60? 70? and it’s so disconnected from what you actually care about, but you have to pretend and have “company vision” and be a team player and answer emails for most of your wild and precious hours.
When Jon was in the corporate world, it was pretty devastating to watch this thoughtful, passionate person do the most inane, soulless tasks just so we could pay our bills and have healthcare. And even now, I’m self-conscious of sounding ungrateful for my partner having a “good” job, but why? who should be grateful to set aside their life’s work in order to sell some product? we need to change the way we talk about and value different kinds of work—for all genders.
Now, Jon and I are trying to get by on both of our passion project incomes (more his than mine, honestly) but it’s still an experiment. Ideally, we’d both be making at least half of one full income, and healthcare would be a given. Maybe some day.
The healthcare bit feels so dystopian to me. Becky was out on a health leave for 6 of the past 9 months. This month, the hospital she works at cut off our health benefits because her period of "protected" leave expired, even though she went back to work this week. Our health benefits will get turned back on June 1st, so hopefully nothing super bad happens until then.
it’s a story, and one i should probably write down! i was riding a bike in central park and almost got smushed between two buses. thankfully, one bus was faster, so when the bus on my left hit me, i didn’t get crushed, only knocked into the street. it tore my acl and i had to be picked up off the street by some polish tourists. i had acl surgery and recovered fine, but it upended our home life A LOT. my youngest was only 2 at the time, so i physically wasn’t up to the task of caring for him. day care, meals, house cleaners, the works. it changed everything.
This essay blew me away. Thank you for it.
Our lives read and seem so similar, which is devastating and hopeful at the same time. Here’s to not passing things on to our offspring 🍻
yes, devastating and hopeful! ❤️❤️❤️
This was, as always, absolutely terrific.
Thank you, as always, for your insights into the world. I see a lot of myself in yours and Jon's stories. Also the children fighting/cat throw up thing. Yes.
we’re in that sweet sweet byu english grad demographic—shifting gender dynamics one generation at a time. ❤️
Rad. Didn't know I need to read a thing like this today, but apparently I did! Thank you 🖤
Just weeping over this. You described so much of my life, but better than I could. Thank you, thank you.
I also grew up Mormon, and it did a number on me too. I’ve been the stay at home parent for the past 10 years, as I work from home freelancing and my wife works at a hospital as a kick ass pediatric nurse. We have four kids and nothing has proved how much our society hates women and children as being the primary caretaker.
I always love your comics!
yes, caretaking is the lowest rung, always. it’s pretty bleak.
and when there’s one chief breadwinner in a partnership, it’s also pretty bleak. my partner described it this way: I work for this company, or that company, or that company, selling their product until I’m 60? 70? and it’s so disconnected from what you actually care about, but you have to pretend and have “company vision” and be a team player and answer emails for most of your wild and precious hours.
When Jon was in the corporate world, it was pretty devastating to watch this thoughtful, passionate person do the most inane, soulless tasks just so we could pay our bills and have healthcare. And even now, I’m self-conscious of sounding ungrateful for my partner having a “good” job, but why? who should be grateful to set aside their life’s work in order to sell some product? we need to change the way we talk about and value different kinds of work—for all genders.
Now, Jon and I are trying to get by on both of our passion project incomes (more his than mine, honestly) but it’s still an experiment. Ideally, we’d both be making at least half of one full income, and healthcare would be a given. Maybe some day.
The healthcare bit feels so dystopian to me. Becky was out on a health leave for 6 of the past 9 months. This month, the hospital she works at cut off our health benefits because her period of "protected" leave expired, even though she went back to work this week. Our health benefits will get turned back on June 1st, so hopefully nothing super bad happens until then.
Wait, wait...you were hit by a BUS!!?
There's a story there!
it’s a story, and one i should probably write down! i was riding a bike in central park and almost got smushed between two buses. thankfully, one bus was faster, so when the bus on my left hit me, i didn’t get crushed, only knocked into the street. it tore my acl and i had to be picked up off the street by some polish tourists. i had acl surgery and recovered fine, but it upended our home life A LOT. my youngest was only 2 at the time, so i physically wasn’t up to the task of caring for him. day care, meals, house cleaners, the works. it changed everything.
I don't know why or how I was somehow unsubscribed, but here I am, again, marveling and loving your words and art.
❤️❤️❤️