Motherload

"A MON TH!" This is the main reaction I received to the news that I was going away for a month to write a book (about motherhood, as it happens).  I couldn't work out whether it was men or women who were more likely to stare in incredulity. As if I was leaving my children on a frozen hillside, or having an affair with a well-known politician. Of course there were some people who got it (I think), who didn't react with a quickly-suppressed cough of scandal in their throats. These people said, “Go for it, just make it worthwhile, get that book written already! How brilliant that you've got a room of your own!” Of course it’s the doubtful  and silent  judgers I believe. Yes yes, it’s wrong to go, I should be safely at home, doing the washing, shopping for the endless routine of children’s teas, monitoring the activities, the homework, the notes home from school, the Forest Schools equipment, doing the Guides run, making inane conversation at drop off...

A Good Childhood is a report for the Children's Society. I'd never heard of it, but my husband got it for work. I think he was in part inspired to buy it by the terrible UN report back in around 2006, which put the UK at the bottom of the heap for good places to raise kids. The report's been put together by Richard Layard and Judy Dunn, although they are really only the final adjusters, synthesizing an absolutely huge amount of research, that has been done on the state of childhood and all that contributes to it (ie the whole of British society, saturated in consumerist capitalist ideology). Richard Layard is the economist who wrote Happiness , and the report is written in a delightful avuncular style, which just makes my heart melt. It's very tough: we hear about the dreadful state of the UK education system, about mental ill-health in children and young people, and the terrible impact of consumerism, substance abuse, violent games, and overworked parents. Yet because ...

December 2009 has proven the first major obstacle for two of my highest-flying female friends. One a Director of a major publishing company, and another a partner at a major accountancy and consulting firm, both of them had not only survived giving birth, one to 3 children, the other to 2, but had determinedly gone back to work, and stayed the course. One had managed to arrange her hours so that she went in at 8ish and left to pick up her children by 2.30, then worked at home in the evening. The other had a fantastic nanny arrangement. Both were up at nights, and never missed a school bake sale. This Autumn, both were called into meetings, one an appraisal, the other to inform her about restructuring, and told that there wasn't room in the organization for them. Both have fought back, through unions, and both have or will walk away with payouts to prevent tribunals taking place to investigate constructive dismissal. Neither woman has ever received anything but the highest praise, a...