I just finished reading Meg Wolitzer’s latest novel, entitled The Ten-Year Nap. In shifting viewpoints, she presents (among other, secondary characters), the thoughts and experiences of four thirty-something women in NYC who have chosen to stay home with their children. Some of the characters are happy with their situations; some are not. Some are conflicted. They alternately envy and dislike a fifth woman with a child who has returned to work and seems to have everything.

It is an interesting topic, and one that Wolitzer describes elegantly in an interview with Terry Gross as a non-muscly male topic. A seemingly quiet topic, but the elephant in the room for many women in their thirties. Wolitzer said that she didn’t write the book to pass judgment. She says there is “great profundity and great beauty in spending time with children. I think it’s been mocked a lot in the culture.”

All of the mothers have school-age children, and that is a critical point, as this is when mothers really start to feel the pressure and guilt to return to the workforce - most often from other women. The book got me thinking about the occasional divide between mothers with children who work outside the home, those with children who have chosen to stay home, and those with no children. Sometimes it boils down to the old adage that the grass is always greener. In short, jealousy of a world that must be - has to be - easier, less stressful, more rewarding. Perhaps women should worry less about who has it better/harder/more stressful/more enriching and more about who these women are and how they contribute to the interesting fabric of society. In short, no one has the perfect life. There are good days and bad, enriching days and painful ones, times when we feel life is enriching and exciting and times when it is far from it.