The Feminine Mistake
Jul. 23rd, 2007 06:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vollmusRight before school let out in early May, Michael and I wandered over to Borders for a break from campus for a few hours. I had my beautiful pocket sized Moleskine notebook with me to write down the names and authors of anything interesting with the intent of placing holds on all the books on the list with my local library system at home. While slowly making my way up and down the aisles, focusing particularly on the new releases, best-sellers, and employee recommendations, I came across The Feminine Mistake: Are We Giving Up Too Much? by Leslie Bennetts. After reading the description on the jacket, I was intrigued. It went on my list.
It's a popular book, apparently. In retrospect, I must have found it with the best-sellers or new releases, or else it wouldn't have taken so long for me to get a copy. My hold finally came through last week, and it's been staring at me on top of the stack of books next to my night stand ever since. After having difficulties falling asleep tonight, I decided to give up on dreams and broaden my horizons with a good read rather than continue to let my mind wander aimlessly. Surely a popular book apparently bemoaning the choices of modern women would be more interesting than endless speculation about how to help Sammy fix her awful hair?
I was right. I'm only twenty-one pages in, and I'm already a fan. It's odd, how life works; I was just talking to my parents about this issue while on the way to the airport to pick up the Dramatic Duo. As we were driving along, my mom mentioned that two more of our family friends are getting married during summer vacation from college, which brings the total up to four now. I couldn't believe that so many intelligent young women were putting their future education and careers on the line just so they could spend a bit more time every day with their beaux and finally be able to have sex. (You must understand that every couple here is Mormon, and therefore none believe in premarital sex.) My mom brought up not being able to hold back much longer as a reason to get married, which is ridiculous; if they are struggling so much with the law of chastity, they shouldn't be getting married in a temple anyway. It is strictly verboten to lust after what you can't have.
With the sex issue out of the way, the only positives left are spending more time together and feeling secure in the relationship. While I understand completely about wanting some security, I have no doubts whatsoever that the negatives far outweigh the positives to getting married before graduating from college. (These negatives are all doubly potent for the two couples I know who are getting married after their freshman year, the year they met. Insanity!) First and foremost is the temptation to just stop going to school. Why would a girl need a degree, anyway? Her husband is going to provide for her. All she needs to do is take care of the children. If she graduated and got a job, all she'd be earning would go toward childcare. So what's the point? It's just a waste of money, which is something newlyweds don't have much of. If she just drops out, she can focus on homemaking, and, hopefully soon after the marriage, raising a family.
THAT IS SUCH A BAD IDEA. The mere idea of it makes me want to cry. How can women think that this is an intelligent decision? How can they think that dropping out of college could ever be a good idea? It breaks my heart to think of how many people, women especially, drop out of college without the excuse of marriage, let alone with it! My mother went to the University of Washington for a year before she dropped out to move out and get a full-time job. She found my dad years later, they married, she stopped working, and then his company went to hell. For the past six or seven years of my life, I have been listening to my mother complain about how much better she would be able to do for us right now if only she'd stayed in college. She has an incredibly large amount of accounting and payroll experience under her belt, considering she worked through high school and then for eight years in the same type of work before she met and married my father and quit. Simply because she doesn't have a degree, it takes forever for her to find jobs and the pay isn't nearly as high as she deserves. But this situation never happens, it's so rare that a man loses his job or finds his company crumbling beneath him or suddenly leaves for a hot blonde, isn't it?
I am so glad my sister is an intelligent woman. She has a degree in elementary education. She subs during the school year, and she has a job teaching English to Chinese exchange students at PLU to keep herself occupied during the summer and beef up her resume. Sure, she went into el ed partially because she wants to be the best mom she can possibly be, but moreso because children are her passion. She started volunteering in a second grade classroom in tenth grade, and she kept going all the way through high school. She loves kids. When she has children of her own, she plans to stop working to be a stay-at-home mom, but because of the way substitute teaching works, she will always be able to start subbing again on a moment's notice. She has a way to obtain income that will never expire on her. Unlike women in more normal areas, Juli will never find herself desperate for money with no way to earn any because no one will hire her after seeing the decade-long gap in her resume. She's set. She's smart.
Not so with other women! I've seen so many leave their fates in the hands of their husbands. I'm not saying that all women everywhere should start expecting their husbands to leave them for greener pastures, but I am saying that they all need to be as prepared as possible for any future train-wrecks. It doesn't make sense for a couple to rely on one person to bring home the bacon when the two together could bring home filet mignon, or maybe just bacon and a college fund for the kids. It doesn't make sense to put all weight on one person when anything could happen. It's always best to be prepared.
Let's return to the earlier argument about the downsides of getting married before graduation. First: It makes dropping out sound better and better, easier and easier. Second: It is not all that intelligent for two people who have only known each other for eight months to get married, especially if both are teenagers or just barely in their twenties. How can she even know who she is yet, let alone who he is, and vice versa? It's insane. Third: Okay, so there isn't a third.
For me, it all boils down to not understanding the rush. Why hurry into marriage? What's wrong with people waiting until they've known each other for at least a year or so before getting married? Why doesn't it even cross their minds to take care of himself and herself before they become a them, a couple, who have to decide things based on what's best for the family rather than the person? I think every woman needs a certain amount of time in her life when she makes decisions for herself rather than having them made for her, and the same goes for men. College is that time. People grow up during college because they are finally forced to choose for themselves. I don't think it's a good idea to skip that wonderful narcissistic period of life to go straight into making decisions as a team. It doesn't seem healthy.
Please understand that I don't see anything wrong with a woman choosing to be a mother and a housewife, as long as she has a back-up plan. However, the only way I can see myself being prepared for life blowing up in my face, as it is wont to do, is to have a career of my own. So please, do me a favor: Slap me if you ever catch me thinking about quitting school or ending my career in order to be a mother/housewife while my husband wins the bread. I don't want to make the mistake my mother made.
It's a popular book, apparently. In retrospect, I must have found it with the best-sellers or new releases, or else it wouldn't have taken so long for me to get a copy. My hold finally came through last week, and it's been staring at me on top of the stack of books next to my night stand ever since. After having difficulties falling asleep tonight, I decided to give up on dreams and broaden my horizons with a good read rather than continue to let my mind wander aimlessly. Surely a popular book apparently bemoaning the choices of modern women would be more interesting than endless speculation about how to help Sammy fix her awful hair?
I was right. I'm only twenty-one pages in, and I'm already a fan. It's odd, how life works; I was just talking to my parents about this issue while on the way to the airport to pick up the Dramatic Duo. As we were driving along, my mom mentioned that two more of our family friends are getting married during summer vacation from college, which brings the total up to four now. I couldn't believe that so many intelligent young women were putting their future education and careers on the line just so they could spend a bit more time every day with their beaux and finally be able to have sex. (You must understand that every couple here is Mormon, and therefore none believe in premarital sex.) My mom brought up not being able to hold back much longer as a reason to get married, which is ridiculous; if they are struggling so much with the law of chastity, they shouldn't be getting married in a temple anyway. It is strictly verboten to lust after what you can't have.
With the sex issue out of the way, the only positives left are spending more time together and feeling secure in the relationship. While I understand completely about wanting some security, I have no doubts whatsoever that the negatives far outweigh the positives to getting married before graduating from college. (These negatives are all doubly potent for the two couples I know who are getting married after their freshman year, the year they met. Insanity!) First and foremost is the temptation to just stop going to school. Why would a girl need a degree, anyway? Her husband is going to provide for her. All she needs to do is take care of the children. If she graduated and got a job, all she'd be earning would go toward childcare. So what's the point? It's just a waste of money, which is something newlyweds don't have much of. If she just drops out, she can focus on homemaking, and, hopefully soon after the marriage, raising a family.
THAT IS SUCH A BAD IDEA. The mere idea of it makes me want to cry. How can women think that this is an intelligent decision? How can they think that dropping out of college could ever be a good idea? It breaks my heart to think of how many people, women especially, drop out of college without the excuse of marriage, let alone with it! My mother went to the University of Washington for a year before she dropped out to move out and get a full-time job. She found my dad years later, they married, she stopped working, and then his company went to hell. For the past six or seven years of my life, I have been listening to my mother complain about how much better she would be able to do for us right now if only she'd stayed in college. She has an incredibly large amount of accounting and payroll experience under her belt, considering she worked through high school and then for eight years in the same type of work before she met and married my father and quit. Simply because she doesn't have a degree, it takes forever for her to find jobs and the pay isn't nearly as high as she deserves. But this situation never happens, it's so rare that a man loses his job or finds his company crumbling beneath him or suddenly leaves for a hot blonde, isn't it?
I am so glad my sister is an intelligent woman. She has a degree in elementary education. She subs during the school year, and she has a job teaching English to Chinese exchange students at PLU to keep herself occupied during the summer and beef up her resume. Sure, she went into el ed partially because she wants to be the best mom she can possibly be, but moreso because children are her passion. She started volunteering in a second grade classroom in tenth grade, and she kept going all the way through high school. She loves kids. When she has children of her own, she plans to stop working to be a stay-at-home mom, but because of the way substitute teaching works, she will always be able to start subbing again on a moment's notice. She has a way to obtain income that will never expire on her. Unlike women in more normal areas, Juli will never find herself desperate for money with no way to earn any because no one will hire her after seeing the decade-long gap in her resume. She's set. She's smart.
Not so with other women! I've seen so many leave their fates in the hands of their husbands. I'm not saying that all women everywhere should start expecting their husbands to leave them for greener pastures, but I am saying that they all need to be as prepared as possible for any future train-wrecks. It doesn't make sense for a couple to rely on one person to bring home the bacon when the two together could bring home filet mignon, or maybe just bacon and a college fund for the kids. It doesn't make sense to put all weight on one person when anything could happen. It's always best to be prepared.
Let's return to the earlier argument about the downsides of getting married before graduation. First: It makes dropping out sound better and better, easier and easier. Second: It is not all that intelligent for two people who have only known each other for eight months to get married, especially if both are teenagers or just barely in their twenties. How can she even know who she is yet, let alone who he is, and vice versa? It's insane. Third: Okay, so there isn't a third.
For me, it all boils down to not understanding the rush. Why hurry into marriage? What's wrong with people waiting until they've known each other for at least a year or so before getting married? Why doesn't it even cross their minds to take care of himself and herself before they become a them, a couple, who have to decide things based on what's best for the family rather than the person? I think every woman needs a certain amount of time in her life when she makes decisions for herself rather than having them made for her, and the same goes for men. College is that time. People grow up during college because they are finally forced to choose for themselves. I don't think it's a good idea to skip that wonderful narcissistic period of life to go straight into making decisions as a team. It doesn't seem healthy.
Please understand that I don't see anything wrong with a woman choosing to be a mother and a housewife, as long as she has a back-up plan. However, the only way I can see myself being prepared for life blowing up in my face, as it is wont to do, is to have a career of my own. So please, do me a favor: Slap me if you ever catch me thinking about quitting school or ending my career in order to be a mother/housewife while my husband wins the bread. I don't want to make the mistake my mother made.
