My mother was not adept in the kitchen.
There was always a ruckus of noise before dinnertime — a cacophony of clanking and clattering.
I remember lots of nachos for dinner as a child — tortilla chips with melted cheese on a baking sheet, slimy tomatoes and dry, shredded chicken on top. There was pasta and microwaved Trader Joe’s eggplant cutlets. My personal favorite was when we got to order Panda Express.
My mother would roll over in her grave if she knew that I was sharing her secrets of frozen veggies and fast food Thursdays with the world.
In eighth grade, I was in charge of baked goods for my dance company’s party. I remember catching my mom placing salted caramel brownies she’d bought at the grocery store on a platter in an attempt to present them as homemade.
I’ll never forget the look in her eyes when I caught her: utter embarrassment, with a twinge of devious satisfaction.
I think that was the first time I realized that my mother was more than a mother. She was a human being — imperfect, unsure, a little bit rebellious.
Like all of us, she was just taking a shot in the dark.
It takes most of our early adolescence to grasp the fact that our parents are people, too. Mothers, however, have been confined to a very specific category of subhuman.
In 2014, the American Greetings card store ran a Mother’s Day ad that went viral with a series of interviews with applicants for a job called Director of Operations. The duties of the job were described: unlimited work hours, no breaks, no pay. And then, the big reveal: billions of people already have this job. MOMS!
I am not a mother, and surely there is nothing new about advertisers exploiting the myth of the ideal woman, but I have never seen an ad quite so cringeworthy.
Watching this commercial gave me a glimpse into the unending list of impossible standards we place on mothers. Mothers are expected to form intense, emotional bonds with their children, but they are also warned against coddling and “over-mothering.” Mothers must always be available to their kids — preparing snacks of celery and peanut butter and playing with Polly Pockets — yet they are expected to shift into the role of loving wife and then sexy seductress on a dime.
This unachievable depiction of motherhood does real damage to women of all races and socioeconomic status. It especially harms low wage workers, where taking time off work to “be a mother” in this very particular way can mean risking your job and your livelihood.
Now, mothers are meant to be supreme multitaskers. You can be a successful career woman, but only if you sacrifice enough to make those homemade brownies for your child’s dance show. No store-bought treats allowed.
You can be a successful career woman, but only if you sacrifice enough to make those homemade brownies for your child’s dance show. No store-bought treats allowed.
My mother worked in the male-dominated sports world for over 20 years.
People were always shocked when they found out that my 5-foot-2, 100-pound mother was a sports producer, but could not bake a homemade pie to save her life.
My fondest memories of my mother are of visiting her in her office — this little woman at a giant desk. There was always the low hum of sports radio on and men coming through her door, cracking jokes, asking her how she managed to book some seemingly unattainable sports star.
Even at a young age, it was obvious to me that she felt most in her element at work. It was as if she grew six inches in spirit — confident, lively, present.
We’ve come incredibly far with women’s rights in the past five decades, yet we often still devalue women’s achievements outside of the home and make assumptions that the natural route to female satisfaction is domestic.
Like many women of her generation, my mother internalized the role of “mother” and constantly harped on what she lacked.
As a mother, you are told again and again that you are not enough. Working mothers especially must constantly dodge judgments and questions, always having to prove themselves.
I grew up in an insular Jewish community in the suburbs of Los Angeles, where making a perfect brisket for Rosh Hashanah dinner was a point of serious pride. My mother did not fit the mold.
On car rides to other families’ homes for Shabbat dinner, my mom would waver and then ask me something like, “Do you want me to host one of these dinners?” I’d catch her mumbling to herself, “I should probably teach you how to cook that chicken dish some time …”
Since my mother passed away in December, I find myself turning over her anxieties and insecurities in my mind.
I am 24 years old, yet I find myself seized in my kitchen, mind racing: Oh my god, how do you cook a piece of meat? What does one make for a dinner party? People will think I’m incompetent. Should I change my clothes? …
These anxieties feel outdated for a woman of my generation. Today, it is the norm for women to resist conventions of domesticity thanks to women serving in the Senate, playing professional sports and becoming CEOs. But I think all women can attest that sometimes those deeply entrenched insecurities, perpetuated by unrealistic standards, still rear their ugly head.
In my clearer moments, I think about all of the things my mother taught me without even trying — how to break the mold, persist, resist and be deviant and adventurous, a mover and shaker.
My mother taught me that there is no specific way for a woman to be. She had a knack for making anyone in her presence feel like just being was enough.
How I wish I could reassure her one last time that she, too, was enough.
She was always more than enough.
Rebecca Katz just received her master’s in Journalism from USC Annenberg. She works in audio journalism and is in the works of starting her own podcast. twitter:@rebeccaerinkatz.
