Monday, October 09, 2006

Parallel Universe

I share my office with several other post-docs. One of them is a woman I totally admire. She's my age, married but no kids. I was talking to her when I suddenly got this bizarre feeling that I was talking to myself in some parallel universe.

Here is a woman who has had a similar education to mine, some industry experience like I have, has been in a relationship for about a decade like I have. And yet our careers are totally different.

She does great research. She's published a gazillion papers in the last year. I'm still writing the draft of my first one at this job. She is involved in committees ranging from simple university tasks to multi-million dollar government funding schemes. She does so much and gets lots of deserved praise for her hard work. And she works hard, long hours and weekends and business trips all over the place.

She was telling me about one of her committees, and then she asked me, "aren't you involved in anything like that?". No, I said. I don't have time.

I have to leave at 4:30 every day to pick up my son from day care before I get slapped with a $1 a minute fine. I can't work weekends and nights. I chose a completely different life, and I am a mother first and foremost.

But still, sometimes I think to myself: that could have been me achieving all that.

It would have been nice, but I'm not jealous and I don't regret a thing.

I just have to keep reminding myself that I will have quite a few decades left to invest in my career after the kids (yes, there will be more than one...) grow up enough to allow me the time to work as much as I need to. I guess this is a dilemma lots of working mums have...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

with vs without? with is better...great post...

Mama Wombat said...

You are absolutely right of course! And in 30 years when I look back, what will I regret more? I think the answer is obvious...