My Swiss cheese CV

Recently we attempted a trial departure from TI.  Tony is still on the little island so we haven’t cut the umbilical cord, yet.  But after a month on the big island, I need to find work to cover the costs of fuel, school fees and swimming lessons.  Whoever said TI was an expensive place to live hadn’t lived in suburbia!  Here’s the problem: I’ve been a stay-at-home mum for the best part of 18 years so how the hell do I find a job when I have a Swiss cheese CV?  

     I have always tried to be a good mother; I sent my kids to school each day, I fed them healthy food, they’ve always had lots of sleep and most importantly, I thought, I made sure I was always at home when the kids were there.  I have never wanted them to attend after-school care or worse, return to an empty house after school because Tony and I were working, me pursuing a 'career'. Tony made it clear early on he couldn't cope with full-time parenting and I understood.

    I took my mothering responsibilities seriously and that meant being there for my children … even if I wasn’t actually present in the moment because I needed to be in a nice, silent place in my mind when I made my 3487^th peanut butter sandwich, used Spray n’ Wipe on the 2502^nd ‘accident’ or delivered my 24,295^th smack (including discipline incorporating the use of implements such as the wooden spoon or the more draconian, plastic eggflip).  
     I didn’t work because I wanted to be a ‘good mother’ and to be a good mother I believed I had to give up working in paid employment. I tried part-time work, but with managing two businesses for Tony at any one time and having sole responsibility of childcare arrangements, it was too much.  I couldn't give 100 percent to any job.

     The haze has lifted (my youngest is eight) and I realised sleep deprivation and performing mundane tasks such as cooking pots of bolognaise and pouring glasses of milk, cleaning up body fluids and managing behaviour screwed up my mind and priorities and made me think I had to ‘be there for my kids’.   And not at work where I should have been.

     The truth of the matter is, I did want to be a good mum and I made the mistake of thinking I had to give up work.  It’s time to make a confession.  Giving up paid work wasn’t done with altruistic intentions.  I knew that if I had to choose between spending time at work or at home, I would choose staying at work. My working days in my last legal job became longer and longer.  Why?  Because it was a more pleasant place to be.  Colleagues make their own food and clean up after themselves.  Colleagues don’t need disciplining.  Colleagues are adults and speak in sentences with more than five words.  Colleagues are fun to be with. I found working stimulating, mentally and socially.  I found staying at home with children dull and draining.
     Tony said to me a couple of years ago, 'you try so hard to be a good mother by staying at home, but I can tell you don't like it because you never play with the kids.  You're in another place.'  Oh, those words stung because they were true.
     To deal with the brain-numbing at-home routines I painted on commission and then taught yoga for a bit of pocket money.  It gave me a sense of purpose separate from parenting young children.  A near mental crisis after the full-time mothering of a three and one year old for only two months in 2006 led me to writing.  And later to studying.

     What I ended up doing was performing half-arsed on each of my 'careers' which hasn't been enough to pull a full-time income.  My only grace is that giving half-arsed diligence on say teaching, writing, art and yoga amounts to two whole-arsed efforts.  So I have the potential to devote 200 per cent to one job.  That's a good thing, isn't it? 

    But I am in a dilemma with my Swiss cheese CV.  I wasn’t able to decide how to present it.  Do I put my work history in chronological order so it reads teacher, business owner, writer, artist, lawyer, yoga instructor, commercial fisherman, domestic violence officer? Or do I have teaching in one section, law in another, writer and let go the other occupations which have the potential to show me as indecisive and all over the place?  

     None of my extra-parenting pursuits have earned me more than a few extra dollars and let’s face it, being able to execute a backbend and put your foot in your mouth or knock up a portrait of someone’s loved one or typing out a murder mystery are not skills that have much value in the real world.  

     After all the years I devoted to my children, I haven’t got much to show for it in real- world terms.  I wish now I had stayed in paid work, even part-time.  Unlike Swiss cheese where the bigger the holes, the more intense the flavour, my CV is full of gianormous, humungous vacuums.  Hell, my administrative skills don’t even count for much because I never got my head around MYOB Accounting in 14 years of using the business program. 

     No, I don't have melancholia.  I am being realistic and know other women have felt the same way.  

     One woman said to me not long ago, something to the effect of, 'After ten years at home, the kids don't need me and I have nothing while my husband's career is thriving.'

     Another woman said, 'If I don't work, my family don't respect me because they think I am at home doing nothing.'

     No more whingeing.  I need a CV and a job.  So I asked my friend Pam for advice about my CV and she suggested I elaborate on what my jobs, professional or otherwise, involved.  That added a half page and made a huge improvement.  Then Ashlea said she’d fix it up after I provided more information.

     ‘You’re an artist,’ she said, her voice dripping with exasperation, ‘write about your art and put in an image of a painting. And you're not just a writer. You're a published author. Come on!  You have to sell yourself.’

     She did a fantastic job with it. 

     I have started to fantasise about having a parmesan CV, full and hard, but the future will determine the maturation process.  As the Desiderata decrees, And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.  No, it is not clear at all, but at the moment, thanks to Pam and Ashlea I now have a marscapone CV, full, soft and squishy and without much flavour … and that’s okay for the time being.  Things are unfolding as they should!