Catching up

Here's the link to the Smart Moms, Hard Choices" article in Newsweek that some are talking about. This week our national media doesn't seem to know what to do with motherhood. On the one hand there's this article and that in the NYT, which take more account of social scientific evidence of trends in work and motherhood; then there's the LA Times/John Tierney report that housewives are happier. The reporting on the latter seems to take a gleeful delight in announcing that at home moms are happier than working moms. As one friend said to me, if working moms are getting 3 hours less sleep **per night** than other moms, of course they're less happy. The Mommy Wars continue. No one's winning yet.

Mostly, I want to report that MotherTalk Philadelphia last Friday night was thoroughly inspirational. Our guest was Judy Stadtman Tucker, the editor of Mothers Movement Online. I blogged about it at our MotherTalk blog.

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3.04.2006
Buzzing after Judy Stadtman Tucker's MotherTalk: Philly

It's definitely a rare pleasure these days to stumble home after midnight on a few glasses of wine. Even more of a pleasure, really, when I've spent the last few hours in the company of Judy Stadtman Tucker, Andi Buchanan, and a roomful of thoughtful and energetic women. Judy is the editor of Mothers Movement Online. She's also an eloquent and thoughtful speaker, someone who in the name of a refreshingly new feminism can synthesize all that's going on in the world of motherhood: in our interior lives, in the cultural debates we find ourselves in, in the policy intiatives on the horizon.

All I can say is that she's the kind of person that when she looks around the room at 11.30 pm, after several hours of conversation, and says expansively, "This is the revolution," well, you feel like indeed, you're part of the new century's take on the early 70's famed CR groups. You see yourself as part of history. She has that effect on you.

Andi got this email today: "Thank you for an engaging, enlightening, interesting evening. It was a pleasure to be in the company of so many thoughtful women. I was especially struck by the very personal feel of the discussion -- I came away with a true sense of connectedness, although I only knew maybe a quarter of the women present.

We're loving MotherTalk for the space it opens up for us as whole women, to talk about literature and media, politics at large and the micropolitics of who gets dinner on the table, all in the space of one evening, one living room, one rolling conversation.

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