Working Mother's Guide to Life Strategies, Secrets, and Solutions

PART I You're on Your Way ONE "Go Pick Up a Hoe" Different Approaches to Working Motherhood Petronila, my friend in rural western Kenya, sits in the shade under a small tree in a congested and lively marketplace in a small hillside village. It is hot and dry. Petronila's hardened, dusty feet are set off by the brilliant patterns and colors of her long skirt wrap and head scarf. Her round face is deep brown; she has a wide, bright smile. She readily breaks out into laughter, particularly with Westerners, who she feels often have odd ideas and notions. Petronila and her husband, Moses, have eight children. They live in a small three-room cinder-block bungalow without plumbing or running water. Petronila squats to cook over a wood fire outside the back door. They have several chickens running in the back of the house, two goats, and a large, well-tended vegetable garden. Petronila spends several mornings each week in the village marketplace selling her vegetables and crafts spread out on a blanket. She uses the money earned to buy needed items for the family and herself. She and the other women merchants are friends or acquaintances. She has known most of them since childhood. They have an easy banter. She and the woman next to her, Esther, like to tease and laugh. This morning they are laughing about their husbands' eating habits. They mimic their husbands, bent over their bowls of ugali, chewing and talking simultaneously. As the women sell, barter, and examine one another's wares, children are seen everywhere. Petronila frequently nurses her youngest child, Litonde, who is two. Her four-year-old leans against her side. Her five-year-old is chasing his friend behind the market. Her children frequently run off, often with Litonde bouncing on a sibling's hip, to play with other children in the marketplace, all of whom they seem to know very well. As I watch Petronila and her small village community, I marvel at how naturally blended their work and family life are. In fact, there is no sense of work life and family life. It is just life. Somehow, Petronila is raising eight children while engaging in the productive life of the community. It is natural and expected. There is no guilt. It seems uncanny to me. Throughout all the hardship that rural Kenyans suffer, their communal structure gives them a great deal of support. There is comfort in the society of women and children. It is a hardworking culture that emphasizes responsibility and contribution to the family and community. All members of the village, male and female, young and old, are expected to contribute what they can through their labor. I spent much of my twenties and early thirties traveling, living, and working in small rural villages in Africa and Southeast Asia. During these years, I became very interested in the life and customs of the women, particularly mothers. I was an active participant in their daily lives. I spent mornings with my Thai women friends in the village marketplace while they bartered, bought, and sold. I walked with them to a little pond where we squatted and fished, holding large "umbrella" leaves over our heads to shield us from the sun; I sat in the shade under their hut on stilts while they chopped, pounded, and prepared food for their extended family. I spent long afternoons in Sudanese family compounds while the women tended their vegetable gardens, wove baskets, fed and cared for their children, scrubbed clothes, and meticulously applied henna designs to one another's hands and feet. Although the cultures vary, there is a strong common thread in the life of many third-world village women. Women play an integral part in many economies. They produce goods to sell in the local market. Many marketplace vendors are women. Families often live together in compounds of extended families where women work together to grow and prepare food, care forMason, Linda is the author of 'Working Mother's Guide to Life Strategies, Secrets, and Solutions', published 2002 under ISBN 9780609807354 and ISBN 0609807358.