Better late than never...
Working parents actually have children so that others can raise them. This is a sad statistic in our lives – we see very little of our children because we spend most of the day at work.
The fact is that I see my son about 2.5 hours a day. 1/2 an hour in the morning, which consists of breakfast and getting ready to leave the house for the daycare center/work, and 2 hours in the afternoon which consist of 1 hour play, if he is not too tired (if he is tired he will probably sleep at least 30 minutes) and 1 hour of bath, food and getting ready for bed (I have no idea how we will fit in solid meals that take more time than a fast bedtime bottle...).
My husband has it even worse! He sees Jonathan perhaps one hour a day in the week, and that also only if he gets up extra early for this purpose. By the time my husband returns from work, the boy is already fast asleep. I think most fathers get the poor end of the stick in the evenings. Their only comfort is that as kids get bigger they sleep less…
Yes, yes – some silly statistic freak will tell me that as Jonathan spends the night at home, he does in fact spend most of his time at home – so we need not complain. And yet, we spend most of the night sleeping…and Jonathan sleeps from 19:00 to 07:00 the next day, getting up only for feeding in the night, and even then he is still half asleep (as am I, when I get up to feed him at 3 o'clock in the morning). In contrast to all this, the ladies at the day care center get to spend 8 hours a day with my son in which he is mostly awake!
You might wonder why I am referring in the title to a kibbutz. The answer is simple; traditionally the children who grew up in the kibbutz grew up in a children's home within the kibbutz with their piers. The child was taken to join his age group in the children's home at a very young age, as a toddler still, and the child lived in the children's home – there was his/her bed! (Breastfeeding was not such a high fashion, like it is today, but then again – people in Israel back then were busy building a country and working the fields…) Thus groups of children the same age treated each other as siblings even if they are not. The child hence spent a lot more time with care takers and friends than it did in its core family – and so we come to the point!
This was all part of the idealism behind the kibbutz – to share everything and create a new kind of society in which all members are one big happy family. Today, in the few remaining kibbutzim this is no longer the case and children grow up at home and go to kindergarten just like in the city. But I have friends who grew up this way still (in the 70's).
A week ago, as I dropped Jonathan at the day care center, I went to change his blanket to a thinner one suited more for spring, as the days are getting hotter here at this time of year. As a result of this action, the lady who runs the daycare center and I both left the room where all the toddlers were, to the room where the children sleep. We also reentered the main room together, both calling to Jonathan. The boy was happily situated on the carpet and looking up he fixed himself on the day care manager, smiling to her in greeting and ignoring me next to her, as if I was thin air! Although I cannot tell that Jonathan really meant to ignore me, he is after all only 4 months old, it still broke my heart! And I spend the rest of the day at work complaining bitterly that the day care center staff gets to see more of my son than I do and that dammit! I am the one who carried him around for 9 months, and have the stretch marks and the scar to prove it too! And there is gratitude for you…!
Luckily two days later when I came in to get him from the daycare center an the end of the day, he was sitting on the lap of one of the day care ladies nice and quiet, but as soon as I came in it was obvious that he was happy to see me – he started squirming in her arms and smiling and his whole body was a clear indication of his happiness in my presence and his impatience to get to my arms! Well, there is right and wrong in the world after all…my heart melted with pure satisfaction at this obvious preference, even if tomorrow he might again, momentarily that is, prefer the day care manager…
The truth is that the parent's time as the premier object of their children's admiration is very short. My sister already complains that her 4 year old daughter no longer likes being hugged and kissed that much. My guess is that the hug makes the child feel constraint. We all know that teenagers do not think getting kisses from their parents at all cool, and that today one might even be considered a teenager when one is 8 years old. Puberty comes earlier and earlier… For a teenager the average parent is a human shaped purse and driver. My son is only 4 months old and still very much dependant on my love and welcomes my hugs and kisses with big smiles and laughs! Ahh, I cherish every moment of contact with him, as I know it won't last too long… Now I am waiting impatiently that he will be old enough to really kiss me back!
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