Dinner conversation with my mother went something like this:
my mother and grandma ( her mother)
Mother: “Why can’t today’s women be like the ladies of my time?”
Me: “Mom what are you taking about?”
Mother: “Look at how these so called modern girls dress, they don’t keep house well, can’t or won’t cook, and their behavior is out of control.”
Me: “Women of today are exploring what the world has to offer them.”
Mother: “Well, if you ask me, all of this freedom is causing problems in the home. The women who want to have a job over a husband and children is selfish.”
Me: “Most if not all the women from your generation (side bar my mother was born 1943) are living in denial, the world has changed and the nature of what women need and can do has evolved and so have their role in society.”
Mother: “That the problem women have forgotten their place. In my day women understood where we belonged, in the home, tending to our children, cooking and cleaning and making sure things in the home was right when our husbands came home.”
Me: “There are still women who desire to get married and have babies. However, there is nothing wrong with the few women who choose to either delay marriage and children or not to get married and have children. The major difference between your generation and mine is that we have choices, in your day you did not. I am sure that there were women of your time who did not want to get married as young as they did, but they had no choice or say in the matter.
Mother: That might be true but….
Me: No buts, mom, the women of your generation bash today’s women because they resent not having the freedom to explore life and make their own choices. I have heard many of your friend’s say, “if they could start life over, they would make better decisions.” What you see expressed by this generation is a reflection of what they view on reality shows; look around mother no one is teaching the young women of today good values. Look at the four daughters, you raised, you taught us proper valves like, self-respect, being self-sufficient and creative. You showed us how to think for ourselves, to dress and behave like women. Most important you gave and showed us that we are loved. Mom, most of the young women of today never experienced having a close bond with their mother or grandmother like me and my sisters did. The world has changed and it will continue to do so, instead of criticizing the modern women as you called them, show share with them what you have given me, cause at the end of the day, they want to be love, not looked down on.
Mother: Speechless
What say you?
dragthepen 