Bunny Victorious!

“…I’m grateful to be back in the working world again.  It puts me in sync with French society.  That’s because, after boldly not breast-feeding, then reconditioning their minds and bodies, French mothers go back to work.  College-educated mothers rarely ditch their careers, temporarily or permanently, after having kids.  When I tell Americans that I have a child, they usually ask, “Are you working?” Whereas French people just ask, “What do you do?”

- Pamela Druckerman, Bringing Up Bebe

Okay, a little break from all things puppy and sparkly here for something serious.  This book.

I actually didn’t pick it up as a serious read.  We’re starting to talk kids, and I’m always fascinated by parenting “styles,” and this has been all over the news lately.  I didn’t hate the Tiger Mom (nay, I actually compared her to my own, with gratitude), but instead, I was kind of shocked by America’s outrage at what it takes to create the same musical prodigies we spend unholy amounts of money to see at Carnegie Hall and then sign our child up for another series of expensive, but in the long run probably useless, piano lessons.  But when the reports of Bringing up Bebe hit the news, I was stunned by how similar French parenting is to Southern parenting.   Le grande shock.

Here are some important ways in which French parenting bears absolutely no relation to the typical Southern Mama style of parenting:

• A Southern Mother’s world completely revolves around her children.  She sees this as the only way.  It’s not a choice, it’s biology.  A Southern Girl is raised to assume she is an absolute princess (well, she is) and that she should expect every male she encounters for the duration of her life to treat her that way.  She also believes it’s her job to treat her man as a king.  It evens out very well, with lots of gracious car door opening and old-fashioned charm.  They will love each other beyond bounds and with absolutely no rivals until one very specific moment: the moment at which they both mutually agree to love the children more.  Which happens as soon as there are those two little blue lines on a piece of drug-store plastic.  For the rest of her existence, the single center of gravity in a Southern Mother’s life is her children.  They will know this every single day, and while it’s fraught with responsibility and impossible expectations, it’s the thing that keeps society in tact, people good, and life worth living.  If you ask the Southern Mother.  (Or a Southern child, who agrees - it’s pretty freaking wonderful, even with all the moments you rant on about to your teenage friends as exceptions.)
• A Southern Mother would never refuse to believe the science on breastfeeding.  Mostly because she knows not only is it great for your baby, it’s actually great for your body too, and again, this is all about the baby, but you do need to think of your husband.  While it’s not exactly said outright, I think it’s understood you simply have to be beautiful, so there’s no reason to put it here as a reason to breastfeed for you.  Simply because you are a Southern Woman, you are forced to put on makeup and comb your hair and put on some jewelry and lipstick, even if you’re sitting around the house in sweats.  Really.  Even then.
• A Southern Mother does not drop her nine-month old at full-day nursery school if she can afford not to.  This goes without saying.  Even though I was in nursery school full-time at eighteen months and I think it actually did wonders for me, it was not nine months, and I can’t imagine my mother ever thinking that was okay.  My mother, I should add, is my example of all Southern Mothers, because from everything I can tell, she really does fit the paradigm perfectly.  

Here are ways Southern Mothers are exactly like French mothers:

• A child has all the freedom it can possibly desire within a very specific outline of rules.  These rules mostly consist of: it’s your job, as a very little cild, to be polite to adults, well-behaved around company, and a joy in a restaurant.  You do not get to upend sugar containers or tear pieces of bread to occupy yourself.  You, like everyone there, must behave.  Even as a toddler.  Also, you must always greet adults formally . You must say please, you must say thank-you, there is no such thing as “yeah” or “uh-huh,” and you should be frightfully concerned for your life if you fail to address anyone who deserves it with the formal “ma’am” or “sir.”  Additionally: you respect your elders, you do not interrupt, under no circumstance do you question the authority of your parents, and also: it’s up to you to be able to entertain yourself much of the time.  You’ll be at that dinner table for awhile, so you might as well come up with a really good reading habit that doesn’t involve your parents trucking your library with them.  Like one or two really good books should see you through an adult meal, where adults talk, and you, child, quietly entertain yourself.  The french call this the “cadre” and the child has full liberty inside of it.  The Southern Mother calls this “life” and explains should you choose to leave the boundaries, she brought you into this world, and she can take you out of it.
• You must taste everything.  I think this is actually because a lot of Southern food looks kind of gross, if we’re being honest: I mean, have you ever actually LOOKED at pimento cheese before? Or the consistency of a tomato sandwich? Or an OYSTER? You must taste.  You must taste everything.  And just because you didn’t like it the last three times and it’s on your plate again doesn’t mean you don’t have to taste it now.  You taste it every single time.  Your job isn’t to cook dinner, your job is to eat it.  The French espouse the same philosophy for what I can only say is the best reason of all: one day, your child will be an adult.  He may have never loved artichokes, but he will have learned how to appreciate them.  And food is a great passion… you must appreciate it.  Even escargot, which remind me a lot of oysters.
• All Southern Mothers lose their baby weight.  Don’t ask me how, but they do.  We joke that my mother brought me home from the hospital and was back to her regular weight as soon as I was out.  This may or may not be actual, precise fact.  It’s so close the precision doesn’t matter.  Southern Mothers do not worry about weight gain again until their daughters are out of college and dating, in which they point to this very slight, probably menopause-enduced weight gain and act all horrified that it’s there.  They *are* horrified it’s there.  We should also point out they are probably in their late fifties or sixties at this point.  French women, it seems, all lose their baby weight by about three months in too.  This is because the French woman actually doesn’t, post-child, define herself as a “mother.”  She is still a “woman.”  She just happens to have a child.  But society believes that a woman should carry all the aesthetic joy of a woman’s figure, and so as soon as possible, that woman gets to start looking like a woman again.  I see this as a really wonderful thing, because you *are* a woman, and let’s be honest: no one likes wearing drawstring pants everyday.  They don’t exactly make you feel sexy.  (And yes, you deserve to feel sexy.)
• Southern Mother is boss.  There is no room for discussion.  This is exactly true of French mothers.  The buck stops with them in such a strong way that it’s the first time I’m ever reminded of Southern mothers in any other culture.  New York mothers, by the way, are not like this.  They let their children call a lot of the shots.  Southern mothers and French mothers do listen to their children and are very careful to make sure they get to enjoy themselves and do things they love, but they are never the Decider.  The mother is always the Decider.  No French or Southern child can pitch a fight so big this rule is ever in danger of being in even a little tiny bit of question.  This is the cadre, these are the rules, live with it.
• By the same token, Southern mothers and French mothers do not tolerate temper-tantrums.  These are simply not permissible.  And if it’s not permissible… it doesn’t really happen.  When a Southern or French child is about to go into hysterics, the parent calmly talks to the child and deduces what the real problem is, comes up with a solution, or explains to the child the their solution actually isn’t practical, and here’s why.  Both parents believe their children to be rational creatures capable of logical thinking from Day 1.  And accordingly, they are.
• French parents and Southern parents view socialization as very important to a child’s upbringing from a very early age.  This is true for the creche in France, and Mother’s morning out and all manner of other social activities for children in Southern homes.
• “Wait just a minute darling, mother is talking to so-and-so,” is the firm but kind reprimand given to any child who fails to appreciate that mother is having a conversation with someone that does not involve the little precious.  There is no pause for “but,” there is no screaming, there is no pulling on a parent’s arm until they pay attention.  Because this would never go well, so it’s never really been tried.  The cadre is that strong.  This is verbatim true in both cultures.

But for all the Southern Mama wisdom I know, no one has ever put it to me this way about a job: 

When I tell Americans that I have a child, they usually ask, “Are you working?” Whereas French people just ask, “What do you do?”

I know, after years in an all-girls school growing up and an all-women’s college, that this is what American feminism was supposed to do.  It worked in France, but it didn’t quite hit home here.  And what I’ve discovered in Bebe, is this is all a product of how we view ourselves, not our child.  In America, you are supposed to devote your whole self to your child, and that’s certainly what’s reaffirmed by the Southern Mama Cadre.  You can choose to go back to work, of course, but have you ever heard a back-to-work mom *not* make that trivial statement about the Dad being home with the kid instead, or “I wish I could…” or something like that?  We assume someone HAS to be making all these sacrifices for the kid.  We never just assume our early childhood programs should be so good that of course we’d want our child there over our own home.  We never just assume life should go on.  We assume it’s perpetually changed.

I’m kind of grappling with this, if we’re being honest.  I want to write, but I also want a real go-to-work job, and do I want to practice in my field of study, etc, etc, etc? And what happens when we have children, shouldn’t I think about that now as I make my decisions?  

We say that feminism has worked because we can choose now - do we want to work? Do we want to stay home?

But if it has worked, if it can work, if it should, isn’t the real question not, “are you working?” But rather, “what do you do?”

And that mere question changes everything.