Yesterday at the office (ugh yes, at the office on Sunday. I mean uh, yippee! It is an honor and a privilege of doing the noble work of making advertising on the lord’s day.) I had a lovely conversation with a woman I’ve just started to get to know who’s a mom too. She’s about my age -ahem, 29- with a preteen son and she asked me about blogs. Whether I knew any I could recommend.
“I know a few,” I smiled before grabbing a pen and completely filling both sides of a notepad sheet like a crazy person.
I went through the litany – this one is really funny. Oh, and do you know this one? Ooh, how could I forget this one…and this…oh, and if you like design…wait, want to read one from someone who…and hey, wait, scratch those, start with this one first! Then I looked up to see the tears welling up in her eyes, the excitement giving way to pure emotion.
“It’s just,” she said, “I never knew this was out there. All these year I’ve felt so alone. I just…I just didn’t know.”
And I wanted to cry too, thinking of all the working mothers of the world, cosmopolitan and media savvy as they may be, still looking for their tribes. Still trying their best not to talk about children over the cubicle wall. Reluctant to fill their bulletin boards with crayon-etched Valentines. Secretly rolling their eyes when employers try to equate companies with families and knowing that no, a family is a family and a job is a job. Even if you love it. Even if you do it on Sundays too. And trying not to feel like a pariah when you’d rather be home playing Rock Band Lego with your kid on a Friday night than pounding martinis at the fancypants after-work bar of choice.
I thought of all the working women who felt undeniably, unequivocably changed when they became mothers, but repress that side of themselves every single day.
And I wonder what my life would be like had I not sat down at a message board just about four years ago to the day, in time to see someone write, Anyone here read Finslippy? It’s really funny.
Our voices here are strong. They’re powerful. But I was reminded last night that there are still women out there wandering, struggling, looking for their people; even if they don’t know what exactly they’re looking for. Even if really, we were as close as the computer keyboard all along.
I was so pleased to be a part of the Parents Magazine Power of Mom article that just came out in the February issue, and see, for perhaps the first time, the mainstream media acknowledging that our influence goes well beyond corn chip manufacturers and makers of new and improved wet mops. Thank God. We can create change in government. In policy. We can support families in crisis. We can band together over causes we care about. Whether they affect our own families directly, or not at all. It’s a really great article, and I hope you’ll take a look.
More so, I hope that women who are still out there thinking, “What the hell is a blog?” will take a look.
Because first, and above all–and this I think is where a lot of the media, and certainly the majority of marketers miss the point–I think that we are here for each other.
