In the past few months, I've had two stay-at-home mommy friends of mine tell me something along the lines of "my husband said why can't you be more like Kirsten."

They didn't mean my glamorous good looks or gourmet cooking. They meant "work part time from home like Kirsten."

And this makes for complicated emotions in me. I stammer something or try to shrug it off or change the topic. Of course some little, petty part of me is pleased that someone is favorably comparing me, but on the other hand, it isn't for something really important.

Also, it is completely and utterly unfair to my friends.

Why? Well, let me tell you. It takes a village to have mom work part time from home. You would think that it would be easy, right? Mom's at home, she's there in an emergency, it's only part-time, yadda yadda yadda.

Well even the most convenient jobs (such as mine) mean that somewhere, sometime during the day, you won't be available for a pick up or drop off of a child. So really, what my friends husbands' SHOULD be saying is:

Why doesn't your single mother move within walking distance so she can provide free child care and my job allow flexible hours and you figure out a complicated car pool system that allows you to be more like Kirsten and work part time from home?

Because I ain't doin' it alone. Grandma picks girl1 up from school. Grandma takes girl2 to early morning swim lessons. Naoto goes late to work so he can see girl2 off to preschool, and on days when I have long shifts, Grandma just about takes over. The whole house of cards would come tumbling down, however, if I didn't have two separate carpools worked out that pick up my girls in the morning.

So, poo-poo on husbands who stress out their wives with unreasonable demands.