Homebase Magazine Issue #50 Fall, 1997
		Homebase Magazine

Table of Contents

Dear Homebase - an expanded edition of letters from our readers

Editorial

In the months since my last editorial, Canadians have been through a postal strike, Ontarians have lived through an education protest and, most recently, the residents of Eastern Ontario, Quebec, and most of Atlantic Canada have been bravely triumphing over a massive ice and freezing rain storm the likes of which has never been seen. Millions of people in Quebec, Eastern Ontario and the northeastern United States have been without electricity for more than a week. For most, that means no heat, no lights, no hot water (or cold for those dependent on wells), no sump pumps and heavy dependence on the kindness of strangers. Luckily, we live in a country where people care about and help each other. The news has been filled with stories of good samaritans and tales of how we coped without our electric tools and gadgets.

For many of us in urban areas, the main dangers have been falling tree limbs, live hydro wires lying across streets and sidewalks, and the stress and claustrophobia which comes from staying in the house for days on end and dealing with hyper-charged children who want to slide down the icy hills, and then come in and "melt."

I have a beautiful crab apple tree in the backyard that was planted to celebrate the birth of our daughter, Rae. For the past nine years it has brought us immense pleasure through the growing season - bursting into fragrant, white blossoms each May, providing much-needed shade for my two red-heads throughout the hot summer and ending in September with dark red apples which we make into jelly. We treasure this tree and we worried throughout the week as we watched it become more encased with ice. The morning after Ottawa had received 30 mm of freezing rain, I bundled up to survey the damage. I was immediately struck by the sounds - or lack of them. No birds, traffic or children's voices, just the creaking sounds the ice-covered tree made as it was forced to move by a sudden gust of wind. As I stood beside our beloved tree, it moved; the sound it made was like an eerie cry for help - unlike anything I'd heard before. Now that the ice has melted off most of the trees (thanks to 24 hours of warmer weather with no precipatation), many of us are hopeful that more trees will survive, and with a little pruning and tender care, will regain their vigour.

This issue of Homebase reflects these recent trials. We have articles on education, on surviving winter with a smile, on political and environmental activism momentarily forgotten and rediscovered, a look at the When Women Count Symposium which was brilliantly organized and staged by Evelyn Drescher and her hard working team, and lots of lighter moments that I hope will bring pleasure to your day. Cheers!

Lisa Menard

MAW Report

by Evelyn Drescher

This past year has been one of growth for MAW especially as we took an important step into the national arena with the When Women Count (WWC) Project. MAW has had a national membership for a long time; Homebase is read throughout Canada (as well as internationally!). But the whole Census process culminating in WWC Project has made us respected actresses in the public sphere. We have come a long way from a special project discussion group under the Ottawa Parent Resource Centre in 1984. As an advocacy organization, we are older, wiser and each year "just a little more dangerous" than we used to be. Watch us now!

As a support organization, we continue to provide you with a forum where you can reach out to one another and feel connected with other like-minded women. The Steering Committee has been very encouraged by the affirmations that have come from our members. Your requests to start up MAW discussion groups, reading groups, etc. and get something started in your own communities are evidence that there continues to be a need for more than just playgroups for our children to stretch themselves socially and intellectually, but also for us as child-centred feminists to do the same. It is important to us on the Steering Committee to know that however "high" we fly, we remain rooted in what counts. So continue to spread the word about MAW... we know that there are more MAWs out there!

Our collective hearts were tremendously proud of our MAW as the opening night of the When Women Count Symposium which was held here in Ottawa on October 17th and 18th.

Gathered that evening were approximately 70 women from across Canada representing 40 organizations. Some had worked on the issue of unpaid work with us and for whom this event was a long time in coming. A number of women had themselves done academic work on unpaid work while others had only a general understanding of the implications of this issue for their own advocacy efforts. Some came with reservations and some with suspicion. Others came with no real knowledge of what was meant by unpaid work and what its connection to public policy was but wanted to begin to make those connections. The energy was palpable.

Among those women were the MAW Symposium team drawn from the Ottawa-Carleton area who responded to a call to share their skills and perhaps learn some new skills in the process of acting as small group facilitators, recorders, speakers, bi-lingual aides, dramatic performers and general representatives of MAW. Much of the credit for the success of the weekend goes to these women who showed tremendous ability, political skill, sensitivity and insight into the process. Without them, the When Women Count Symposium would never have been the exciting, well-executed event that it was.

Our own Marla Waltman Daschko opened the Symposium on Friday evening with a brief herstory of MAW and an outline of our goals as a feminist organization supporting mothers and how we came to this issue. In the next presentation, and setting the stage for the weekend, I as coordinator of the event, offered some context for the issue including points of tension as well as the objectives for our time together. Then we had some fun. In the process of meeting everyone that evening, we also had fun inviting guests to fictional dinner parties (icebreakers), creating "working lives" for imaginary women who seemed all too real to us. We met the CEO with one child, and the nanny with one child and caregiver of another, and a farm woman with three children. Developed in the form of "a day in the life of," we attempted to bring to the surface the commonalities and differences in our experiences of unpaid work.

Saturday was a day of work. It began with a brilliantly inspiring presentation by Lisa Zanyk and a morning session focus on public education on unpaid work... how we come to understand what we already know. For the second part of the morning, I offered a second formal presentation on "The Master's Tools: Measurement and Valuation of Unpaid Work" which directed the participants to an evaluation of the census and measuring as a strategy to place "the master's tools" in our hands. One of the objectives of this session was to prepare us to respond to the release of the Census 1996 statistics in March 1998. My presentation was supplemented by two handouts on measurement and valuation prepared by Kathryn Spracklin from the KTR and Research and Lobby who has moved to San Francisco (and we missed her very much at the Symposium).

The afternoon was organized as simultaneous workshops on a variety of public policy areas related to unpaid work from Canadian economic policy and transnational economics to health care reform, taxation and connections between poverty and unpaid work. The afternoon ended with a teleconference call with the Honourable Hedy Fry, Secretary of State for the Status of Women (calling from Vancouver) who spoke to us briefly and allowed a series of questions from the When Women Count Working Group. The Symposium ended with a chorus of bread and roses in English and French... a symbol of a sense of community and progress for this historic gathering for the women's movement.

Saturday evening found the MAW team tired but elated at positive comments and encouragement concerning the event and the issue. Hopefully many of you saw the article "Every Mother Is A Working Mother" in the Globe and Mail Focus section on Saturday, October 25th,1997, written by Vancouver writer Paula Brook who covered the Symposium: Paula has just released a book Work Less, Live More which will be reviewed in the Spring issue of Homebase. The proceedings of the Symposium will be available in February for those of you who want to read more fully about the event.

MAW has once more agreed to be part of the NAC process of information exchange, strategizing, lobbying and attempting to span the diversity of women in Canada. We are members of the Women and Work Sub-Committee and Women and the Economy Committee participating in regular teleconferences with other women across Canada and bringing the voice of unpaid work to those discussions. In addition to encouraging NAC to prepare a response to the release of the Census statistics on household work on March 17th, 1998, MAW has been working on the issues of workfare, unpaid work and health care reform within the committees. MAW will be presenting the results of the When Women Count Symposium to the NAC membership at the next NAC AGM in June, 1998. We also hope to have some resolutions on unpaid work to put forward.

After general discussion about repeated queries from the National Council of Women to join that long-lived and well-established organization, the Steering Committee decided to apply for membership. The Steering Committee felt that NCW could offer opportunities for further networking, experience with government procedures and the committee process for future lobbying as well as accreditation with the United Nations and the workings of the international system. It is hoped that this relationship will be of mutual benefit to both organizations and we look forward to a sharing of information and resources with them.

MAW member, Kaye-Lee Pantony, provided her professional expertise in facilitating a workshop for us in the Ottawa-Carleton region on how we as mothers learn from and then in turn "teach" other mothers about this process called mothering. Those who came shared their experiences of learning from books, playground friends and other sources especially as we struggled through the first years. Particularly touching were the testimonials of those who received the wisdom of from own mothers; but it was acknowledged that the new mother/mother/mother-in-law relationship was often fraught with tensions. We hope to have this workshop featured at one of the conferences in Ottawa - so for those members who missed it this past November, look for it at the OVCP (Spring) or Family (Fall) Conferences this year.

Hopefully one of your New Year's Resolutions was to get more involved in MAW. "What!?" you ask, "more volunteer work!?" Well, we hope we can convince you to come and give some of your time and energy to MAW.

We are currently looking for someone to be the MAW recording secretary, a position that means that you attend Steering Committee meetings approximately every six weeks and record the discussion and note any action items. It would be best if you had a computer: e-mail would also help - although we may be able to help you get "connected" if you have the computer and modem. The minutes need to be typed/processed and distributed to the Steering Committee members; and sometimes we need special prodding to remind us about some of the action items. Not only would you be working with all of us in a collaborative environment (we're all in this together!), but you also would be working with the administrative chair (who handles the agenda and runs the meetings) and the correspondence coordinator (who gets the minutes across the country to our regional representatives).

This job is a nice self-contained job that would allow you to put some limit on your time commitment. For us in the Steering Committee, it is an essential administrative role keeping our weekly and monthly business on track and maintaining organizational continuity and accountability.

We really do need you! If you are interested in this small piece of the work that Mothers Are Women/Homebase does, please contact the MAW line at (613) 722-7851.

We are still looking for members for the workshop team in Ottawa-Carleton to ensure our MAW continues with its goal of supporting local women who have chosen to be home for some period of time.

New Mother List

by Roxanne Higgins

As a first time expectant mother, I found various lists in books and department stores detailing all I needed to buy for my new baby right down to the number of sleepers, receiving blankets and the rest of the required gear. However, in the excitement before the blessed event and the anxiety of "surely my belly couldn't get any bigger than this" I somehow missed finding the list outlining what equipment I would need to help me as a new mom. While I want to give the world the benefit of the doubt that they would not neglect to care for the woman whom they have lavished attention on for nine months, the absence of the list should have been my first clue to what lay ahead for my new place on our society's totem pole of importance (you can guess that it's not at the top).

So to help those in our sisterhood about to enter into motherhood (or for those re-entering with a prolonged absence) to get through those challenging, hazy days (and nights) caring for a newborn, the following list may help...

A non-spill travel mug as baby is not the only thirsty one at those late night feedings. Also useful in the car while driving around and around the block trying to get baby to sleep.

A nightlight is needed especially if there is a footstool or ottoman in the baby's room lest you do a "Dick van Dyke" in the middle of the night.

Masking tape for re-taping the disposable diaper tabs that won't stick if you get baby lotion or oil on them.

Cushions to prop the mother up so she doesn't fall over if she dozes off while feeding baby. These can be used later as padding for the learning-to-sit-up baby. These should also be washable for the learning-to-spit-up baby.

Densely-filled bed pillow. This can be wrapped around the back of the head covering both ears and secured by tightly clenched arms hugging your head while the baby's father takes his turn calming the wailing little bundle of joy. Caution! Avoid the temptation of placing this over the face of your partner as he snores though the crying in the middle of the night.

A telephone with a "ringer off" switch is needed during the first month after the birth when everyone she ever knew calls to congratulate the proud, exhausted mother. The ringer can be turned on again after the first month because no one calls after that (just when she gets a longing for adult conversation).

Portable tape player with headset because one can only listen to Brahms lullaby so many times before going insane.

Slip-on rubber soled shoes for extra comfort and support for walking the floors (at 3 a.m. probably the only comfort and support you'll get)

Easy-to-open food containers because mothers often only have one hand free to open them.

Glow-in-the-dark clock for precise recounting of the times one was awoken in the night. (Note - no alarm bell is needed, the baby will make sure you don't sleep in.)

Assorted baby carriers and slings: because each baby's preference is different on a different day of the week.

When you ask yourself "what should I bring over to visit the new baby?" keep the above in mind and add your own favourite sanity savers to the list. Pre-cooked dinners, snacks and handmade baby-sitting vouchers are usually welcomed. Remembering the needs of the new mother shows your support for her new role and welcomes her into the sacred community of mothercrafters.

Roxanne Higgins gives full-time care to her ten-month-old son Brendan. She writes in view of the Scarborough Bluffs and Lake Ontario while Brendan naps.

Nap Time - Why Is It So Sacred?

by Susan Robins

Anyone who has lived through toddlerdom or is currently doing so will be able to relate. My child's nap time has become a sacred event in my life. One hour (if I'm lucky) of peace and quiet where I am not prone and practically comatose (i.e.: like at night). Although I must admit there have been many nap times where this is the case.

It is an hour in which I can do what I want, when I want and just for me. It is an hour in which I DO NOT have to do the following work: laundry, dishes, picking "stuff" up, vacuuming, dusting, putting "stuff' away, baking, cooking, or _______ (fill in the blank with any one of the many things you do during your day at home that is "work"). Sometimes I do perform one of these tasks because I feel like it - that's my prerogative. I know many mums who use nap time to accomplish some work unencumbered with babe/toddler. However, I've decided that nap time is my time, because let's be honest it might be the only time I get to myself in the whole day.

This sacred event is not to be disturbed at any cost. Hence, I usually turn off the phone, and hang a "SLEEPING" sign at the top of the basement stairs (my partner's office is in the basement). Forays by him to the bathroom or for food in the past have smashed the quiet interlude and abruptly ended my spinning or knitting moment. Rob now has the "fear of Sarah" on him when he sees the sign and has decided that in the interest of marital harmony, holding it would be the best course of action 'til Brianna wakes up.

Why is nap time so important you ask? Well let's see..........

1. There is no one talking. (B's speech is going gangbusters, so she practises ALL THE TIME. I can't believe how much she talks - to me, to the cat, to her toys, to herself. This is an amazing thing, but one hour of no one talking is also amazing.)

2. There is no one demanding things of me. (How does one get one's child to learn the word "please" and to ask in a nice voice without yelling?)

3. I can sit down when I want and remain sitting.

4. I can contemplate life in single thoughts instead of multi-tasking 25 at once.

5. I can sleep if it was a hell night before, thereby gaining some extra energy to get through the rest of the day. Sometimes this makes the difference between Medusa-mum or Ain't-life-grand-mum.

6. I can focus on my thing, be it a book, the paper, knitting or spinning without interruption. (I think this is the biggie folks! !) Let me repeat that: WITHOUT INTERRUPTION.

Life can be so hectic the rest of the day that it seems to me that setting aside one hour of nap time as time for me isn't too much to ask. A little sacred moment in which to smell the roses, enjoy the sun and actually finish a cup of tea while it's still warm... what will I do when she stops napping?! ! !

This doesn't bear thinking on. Quick before she wakes up, where's my knitting?

Sarah Bagshaw lives in Kamloops, BC and keeps busy with daughter Brianna (now 2 1/2), as well as - gardening, spinning, knitting and doing contract work on her computer in the evenings.

More Reflections in a Bathtub

It could have been a commercial. Take one - Scene one. In a backyard garden. A cute-as-a-button little girl skips up to her mother with her hair shining in the sun and eyes twinkling. She announces to her mother (who is nonchalantly cutting roses, of course). "Mummy, the ****** shampoo has made me beautiful." Mother smiles and touching her daughter's hair says....

Take two. What does the feminist mother (who is in fact weeding the organic carrots) really say to her daughter? Smothering a groan through my smile, I said to my four-year old. "Let me look at you. Well... your hair is shiny and smells like apricots, but YOU are the one that is beautiful. The shampoo only made your hair clean. "NO" came the reply which broaches no contradiction, "****** makes me beautiful! And, I'm going to show my brother now." Turning to the weeds more vigorously, I then wondered, do all daughters of feminists like sweet smelling shampoos, dresses, dance classes, Barbie (shudder) and make up? Or was I somehow failing to model appropriate alternative behaviour? Were the kids watching too much TV? Why did I buy that d#@!* shampoo anyway?

I remember when I first knew I would be having a daughter. I hollered in the ear of some poor lab technician who had phoned to tell me the results of my amniocentesis. There were tears of joy were in my eyes by the time my feet hit the floor. And I confess, shades of pink and purple flashed through my mind. I was delighted.

When pregnant with my first born, I admitted to a male friend (who considers himself a feminist - a coupling I have some reservations about however much I love the man) that I had a basic fear about having a son - a male. I told him that I didn't understand men, how the h#@!* was I supposed to raise one? I had particular concerns that I would be distant from my son - that he would be "the other" and would pass all too quickly into that strange masculine world which both mystified, attracted and abhorred me. First-time mothers talk like that until they hold their babes and then the only thing that matters is the beating of their hearts next to yours.

I somehow thought that with a daughter it would be different; that because of our "sameness," I would know what to do. I thought that I could pass on with mother's milk all the lessons life had taught me - lessons of strength and of survival. She would be a feminist, of course. But I guess I forgot that I would also pass on all the ambiguities and contradictions of being a woman in our society. Now I could point to many high-minded examples concerning our ongoing struggle for equality, but let's take, for example, an everyday episode from the life of a woman - the removal of hair from our bodies, one of the rituals of beauty (and mea culpa.... a mint green "ladies" razor adorns my shower rack).

A dear friend of mine (who lives more as a feminist than admits to being one) recently introduced her and her daughter's friends (aged between 10 and 13) to the ancient Egyptian art of depilatation using honey. She herself had learned this art from a European friend. Her enthusiasm has enticed some of her other friends to try the method. Once a month for the past several years, a group of more or less hairy-legged women gather to chat, drink tea and remove the hair from their body according to preference - i.e. legs, underarms and (ouch!) "bikini line." This thoroughly feminine ritual intrigued the daughters of these women and their entreaties to join their mothers were realized once school was out this June. I have an image of this gathering.

My friend stirs the honey on the stove until it is the right consistency. The tea kettle is on; the lemonade has been poured: no fathers or brothers are to be seen. Occasionally, one of the girls peers at the thickening honey, balancing an expression between adolescent cool and trepidation. The room is filled with talk, laughter and anticipation. Everything is hushed momentarily when the announcement comes that the concoction is ready. One of the girls bravely places her leg on the kitchen stool. However kindly her mother applies it, the pasty white honey hurts as it rips the hair from its virgin follicles. Unbidden tears well up and all collectively hold their breathes. By now I am sure you are aghast.

Is this a positive affirming ritual bonding between mothers with daughters and between a group of young women as they enter one of our standards of womanhood? Or is this a torturous lesson in delusion satisfying a patriarchal standard of beauty that has distorted our understanding of our femininity for centuries?

I remember my own furtive efforts at shaving my legs at fourteen. Having purchased my first plastic razor along with a package of gum and a worldly Seventeen magazine at the drugstore, (did the clerk realize my intent?), I closeted myself in the bathroom. Thus alone and undirected, I wondered if I was only supposed to do it to the knee, above the knee, or higher? And, how did anyone manage that awkward place in the back of the ankle? I emerged (I thought) one step closer to being a woman from that first encounter. My legs were smooth and beautiful (except for the bandage). Unfortunately no one else recognized my transformation.

With children, one lives both for the moment and in anticipation of what will come. Who are they now, and who will they become? Will my daughter face similar passages into cultural womanhood alone as I did? Or is an ownership and affirmation of femininity as part of our heritage of being women something to be delivered as shared gifts to our daughters in such a way as my friend did? How can I teach her to balance her sense of the beauty within her with a sense of pride in the beauty of her body? Finally, how can I help her to tread cautiously in the mire of cultural contradictions (mine, yours and that of crass patriarchal commercialism) about femininity and beauty?

Admitting that "enormous pleasure can be extracted from feminine pursuits as a creative outlet or purely as relaxation; indeed, indulgence for the sake of fun, or art, or attention, is among femininity's great joys", Susan Brownmiller also wrote in her book, Femininity:

"The great paradox of femininity, as I see it, is that a judicious concession here and there has been known to work wonders as protective colouration in a man's world and as a means of survival, but total surrender has stopped women pointblank from major forms of achievement."

What's a good feminist mother supposed to do? There is ambiguity in our understanding of beauty that is more or less honestly come by. We are a culture that praises "perfect" physical beauty (real or manufactured) at the same time that we say we honour the beautiful soul. In a book I bought recently called Growing A Girl: Seven Strategies For Raising a Strong, Spirited Daughter the author, Barbara Mackoff, counsels that "Telling our daughters the truth about beauty means facing our own beauty bias." The truth is that we have our own "beauty work" to do.

Then there is the counterpoint between beautiful and smart and the sense that as feminists we should emphasize ability and intelligence equally with (and some say above) beauty. In this dialogue on beauty with my daughter, I recently and ever so casually, asked her a leading question as she reveled in the smell of a bar of citrus soap while in the bathtub. "Do you think you are more beautiful.... or do you think you are more smart?" She paused and slipped the soap from her hands shooting it up in the air. "I'm more beautiful AND more smart" she answered easily. I smiled and quietly said, "yes, you are."

You go, grrl!!

Elli Double has smooth legs and bandaged ankles in the summer and in the winter her hairy legs help keep her warm. And her daughter wears her "Girls can be anything!" baseball cap proudly to her dance classes.

Education is Not Daycare

Last night I dreamed about Ontario Premier Mike Harris. I'm sure the obvious source of this apparition was that Homebase editor Lisa Menard and I had talked about this article and Premier Harris' response to MAW's letter regarding the provincial government's $40/day scheme. In my dream Mr. Harris was in my kitchen drinking tea (not, as those who know me will quickly realize, a likely prospect). Mr. Harris was being sweet as pie (I didn't serve him any) and I was thinking what a good thing that Peggy had talked me into writing him a polite letter, as here we were, face to face. (MAW writer Peggy Proctor turned out to be an excellent editor and great support, first inciting me to write a very hard-hitting letter and then editing me back to a much more reasonable approach). Then my husband came into the kitchen (still dreaming) and suggested sotto voce that Mr. Harris was "snowing me." I awoke saying, "Oh no, he's not... I'm not fooled for a minute."

For many of us, our motherwork (and our politics) extends into political involvement in our children's education. The Harris government has not exactly been a friend to Ontario mothers. When the teachers were poised to walk off their jobs last October in a protest to Bill 160 (the Education Reform Bill), Mr. Harris announced that the government would pay $40 per day as child care reimbursement to families who could "not have a parent at home."

Feeling the familiar sting of discrimination, and reacting to the inappropriateness of equating school with daycare, MAW mounted the following protest on our website. The letter to Mr. Harris was accompanied by a "Protest Claim Form" asking all families to submit their "expenses" and was distributed as a press release and to the public.

To: The Honourable Mike Harris,
Premier of Ontario
Queen's Park, October, 1997

Dear Mr. Harris,

WORK is WORK is WORK. We are responding with frustration to your reimbursement scheme of forty-dollars-a-day for parents in the paid work force during the Bill 160 protest strike.

The proposal discriminates against the women of Ontario who are the primary care givers of their children; and also all parents who are self-employed, or paid part time, or fully and productively occupied in unpaid and volunteer WORK.

$40/day is another example of governments' devaluation of unpaid work.

The proposal to reimburse so-called "working parents" for the cost of child care arrangements during the school closure makes the assumption that the school strike affects one group of parents more than another. IT ASSUMES THAT THE CAREGIVING WORK OF PARENTS OF THEIR OWN CHILDREN IN THEIR HOMES IS FREE. It presumes a flexibility on the part of parents at home, who, in fact, do need financial support and are also experiencing a disruption in their work. In offering a stipend to one group of parents, you have devalued the work of many other parents who already pay a financial penalty for providing care to their own children. This perpetuates the political attitude that paid work is more valuable than unpaid.

The bottom line is that $40/day equates school (which is a public responsibility) with day care (which currently is not). By paying parents for child care during a school closure, you will be charging us, the taxpayers, millions of dollars in claims for child care in lieu of education. The $40/day could go towards funding the education of Ontario children.

We urge you to reconsider the $40-a-day proposal. Offer the stipend to all parents in recognition that child care is expensive for all parents whether their work is paid or unpaid. Better yet, withdraw the scheme altogether.

We expect equal treatment of all parents, in recognition that every mother is a working mother.

Yours in education and work,
Mothers Are Women (MAW)

When the protest strike ended, the Ontario government announced that the $40 a day would be available to all families. (It works out to $400 per family for the 10 days of the strike). There was much initial confusion as to who could claim the money, as the ensuing form still talked about "eligibility" and "providing receipts."

But Bill 161, which provides for this claim, is very clear indeed: it is not connected to child care, but to "inconvenience," and is, in effect, a sort of "damages" claim which is available to all Ontario families with school-aged children. MAW was on the leading edge of the cause since taken up by many school councils, parent groups, and even school boards, to suggest that Ontario parents might claim the money and donate some or all of it to their school. This action would reinforce the fact that this money was intended for educational purposes, and to take back some of the control of how it is spent. We posted a new document on our website, noting the change in policy, and encouraging families to exercise their options, still calling the initiative "Education is Not Daycare."

At the beginning of the Ontario teachers' protest strike over Bill 160, Ontario Premier Mike Harris offered $40 a day to families with so-called "working" parents. Mothers Are Women (MAW) protested the discriminatory nature of this offer, and its equation of education with child care services. Legislation now entitles all families to $400 for the disruption in school services. While MAW is pleased to have had a voice, we remain firm that no fee should be paid out at all, in the belief that all child care is equally valuable, but education is not child care. (MAW advocates for the recognition of the value of unpaid work, including the care of family and children.)

We are alarmed to see tax money, which could be spent in the education of our children, being spent on appeasing parents, and confused with other family expenses.

Nevertheless, MAW encourages families to claim the $400 promised by the Harris government, and turn that money back into our children's education. While MAW recognizes that some families, though having the best of intentions, may not be able to afford to give this money back, we urge those who can to do so by setting up an "Education is Not Daycare" Fund at their school. The idea is to turn the money back towards educational services that have been, or may be, affected by government cuts to the education budget. The money may be given to the library, to a music programme, or other such service; or towards a student with special needs whose services are not paid for by education and social systems, or some other service in the school which will benefit the children. Alternatively, the money might help to support needy children in their academic endeavours. Ask your school council for help.

MAW welcomes your responses to this initiative. Let us know how you and other families are using the $400. We also encourage you to share your views with the Premier and with your school board.

I was reluctant, at first, to let MAW take any credit for having had an effect on Premier Harris's thinking; I have fallen victim to the Ontario parent's general feeling of helplessness. Nor, as you will see by the letter that follows, does Mr. Harris admit to having been swayed by our argument. Indeed, the letter pretends there was no change, offering only a "clarification." Yet, while this $400 award to Ontario families is clearly a grab for popularity, too, I believe we were effective. By highlighting the issue of how child care at home is taken for granted as a free service, MAW certainly brought to the government's attention the discriminatory nature of its policy decisions. So, onward in public education and solidarity.

In addition to helping with MAW policy and Homebase articles, Lisa Zanyk is Co-Chair - again! - of the School Council at her children's school.

The Premier of Ontario
Legislative Building, Queen's Park
Toronto, Ontario M7A 1A1
December 23, 1997

Ms. Lisa Zanyk, Policy Researcher
Mothers Are Women/Homebase Magazine

Dear Ms. Zanyk:

Thank you for writing to express your concerns about Bill 161, the Fairness for Parents and Employees Act, 1997. Your views are welcomed and I appreciate your taking the time to share them with me.

The Act was introduced to help parents and employees who were adversely affected by the two-week, province-wide strike by teachers' unions. I would like to clarify that the $40 a day payment is available to any parent or guardian of school children 13 years of age or younger; children in child-care facilities or day nurseries located in schools that were closed due to the teachers' action; or special-needs students in secondary schools. I have enclosed a copy of a news release which outlines the requirements for making a claim for child care expenses and provides further information about claimants' eligibility.

I appreciate hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Michael D. Harris, MPP

Bread and Roses

This article is a compilation of speeches from the When Women Count Symposium and reflections of some of the participants and organizers of this wonderful event. I attended the Friday evening get-together and was overwhelmed by the energy and excitement which filled the room. I know that many women worked very hard to make the symposium a great success but I want to take this space to thank Symposium co-ordinator, Evelyn Drescher, for her effort. Evelyn ensured that everything that needed doing was done - and she was (and is) indispensible!

The Friday evening session of the Symposium was great fun. The speakers delivered their speeches with enthusiasm and belief that unpaid work must count, and that public awareness must be raised to show the unfairness of the government's policies on unpaid work.

The table discussions provided just enough challenge to spark ideas for an interesting, stimulating conversation. Unfortunately, I could not attend the Saturday session. However, if Friday night was any indication, the Symposium was very successful in achieving its set goals.

This is an excerpt of a presentation given by me on Friday night of the When Women Count Symposium. Included in the metaphorical kitchen mentioned below is the membership of MAW which has supported us in this work over the years and has always been there with responses to our requests for feedback and direction. However much we have grown as a national organization over the last years, we have remained grounded in our membership - women who both understand and live the kitchen table revolution. Thank you.

I stand here, of course, like a hostess who is greeting the guests at the door for a dinner party. The food and conversation will undoubtedly be wonderful. But I still prefer the kitchen and behind me as the nominal hostess tonight stand the many women who have worked in the metaphorical kitchen on this issue; women who understood the recipe, searched out and added ingredients and flavourings, who have stirred the pot, who sometimes brought it to a boil and those who always kept the stew simmering. These women are: the women in MAW who have worked on this issue over the past five years and who did this work literally at their kitchen tables as part of their own double and triple days; the women who made up the Work is Work is Work coalition who lobbied for the inclusion of questions on unpaid work in the 1996 Census; the women in the Working Group for this Symposium; and then the long line of women (academics, activists, policy-makers in and outside of government and many others who "just" brought the coffee). They all have a hand in tonight and tomorrow. Who says you can have too many cooks?

WOW!! What an experience!! What a job well done!! I know many (all?) of the women feel as I do... that our symposium had a profound impact on them... and on the sense of the solidarity of many amazing women on the issue of unpaid work. I won't gab on... I'm sure you both have tons of post-symposium unpaid work to do... but wanted to let you both know that I was incredibly proud of both of you, and our whole team on the week-end. Can't seem to come down off the 'high'... it is just so overwhelming.

On Saturday night, I went straight to my friend Anne DesBrisay, and crawled right into her sick bed with her, and had a snuggle (and a lovely glass of red wine which her hubby so graciously served), and told her ALL about the incredible women, the incredible energy, and intelligence, strength, and courage, the incredible Evelyn, the incredible Sandra, in that room all working together. And I had my weep with her... the exhaustion, the emotion, and the relief all pouring out. Women never cease to amaze me.

The following words were delivered at the Symposium on women's unpaid work. I was asked to speak on "public education" about our issue. Among the symposium delegates were women whose work goes way beyond the grassroots activism I am familiar with, and I felt awed and intimidated by their courage and experience. I knew that women might be expecting a fiery, rallying speech about shaking the foundations and changing the world. I also knew what some women spoke to me about after: that a woman's lot does not change by meek and quiet means; victories in the women's movement have been won through the courageous actions of such women as those. Nevertheless, here is how I humbly addressed the challenge assigned to me by Evelyn Drescher - with thanks. Lisa Zanyk, October 1997

"How we come to understand what we already know"

[following a short play performed by MAW members] You've just been exposed to a type of education-of a public nature. Guerrilla theatre can be very effective. It startles people into a new frame of reference. It's also extremely risky, and I'd like to give credit to Peggy Proctor, Susi Gruda, Barbara Riley, Andrea Perrier and Victoria Anderson-Selst...the original play was written by Rusty Dixon, and adapted by this group. I've picked a safer method. My name is Lisa Zanyk, and I'm honoured to be a part of MAW's public education and research team. I will have the privilege of working on the Resource Manual, which will encompass many of the ideas that come out of this event. I want to draw your attention again to the public education questionnaire in your package of materials, and request that you fill it out during the symposium, and offer us any feedback you have.

On the weekend at the museum, I was startled to hear a woman say to her child, oh, look at the snake, she's so beautiful. No, the jolt wasn't that someone could call a snake beautiful - I myself have restructured my belief system around that. No, it was that she called the snake she... and the only other people I know who do that are my sisters... some of you... my parents, my kids, and my husband (but not his parents). It's just one word, a little thing, this business of personalizing creatures as she instead of the culturally accepted he. It just reminds us to include - something like updating hymns to include women. I connected with that mom because I've done this since my children were born. I was so successful, earlier on, that my poor children centred themselves out a couple of times by calling a clearly male creature she!...

What I recognized about the mom in the museum was that this woman was politically aware, of something....even if that's all she did as an expression of her feminism. She was doing a piece of public education. I am absolutely sure she could not actually tell the gender of that snake; I believe this was a political choice she made. I don't know how she came to make that decision, but somewhere along the way, she must have said, hey, this isn't right, why should all animals, stuffed toys, and so on, be male, and I'm going to put my mouth where my politics are. Her children will grow up with a different political voice from what others have, just from that one little adjustment. Other people will notice their slightly different turn of phrase. And she starts with the personal...in her own life, with what she can do.

The reason this little thing is so important to me is that I believe consciousness-raising is an act of courage from the heart... no matter how small. If we know in our hearts to do some small outrageous act of every day rebellion, then our outrage may spiral outward...and we may tackle poverty, devaluation, racism, and all sorts of injustices...because we know this isn't right and we're willing to say so.

In a National Film Board film that's just been released about Kathleen Shannon of Studio D, Ms. Shannon talks about a train ride during which she read a feminist book that changed her life. Some of us have had that experience, of being powerfully influenced in a singular way; but for most people, there's not a single epiphany, but rather a cumulative awareness. And that's how it is with educating others, too.

Women have many ways of knowing...not much of which has to do with logic. (Look at how we listen!). We can know things in a very different way from men and from each other. We know our motherwork in a special way, different from our approach to other careers, other aspects of our lives. We come to know, experientially, intuitively, how things are; and then know, maybe not exactly how they should be, but certainly that the way they are isn't right. Sometimes we can't articulate it right away, but we know.

With our unpaid work, we know it isn't right that it isn't considered work. We have a growing sense that something isn't fair. And somewhere along the way, something happens to let us know that we might be right... other people think so too. If we're lucky, we get hooked up with a group that helps us launch our growing awareness of personal politics into a larger ring; or it may be enough to read something that validates our feelings, and share it in conversation with another person; that counts too.

It takes some time to realize that what we are coming to know is, in fact, political. We wrestle with the difficulties of labels... Does this make me a feminist, an activist, and what is my responsibility here?

Then, if we choose to "go public", we have to educate others in a way they'll understand. Other people, politicians, policy analysts, economists, men - know and speak, in a different way - so to spread the word, develop public awareness, we have to struggle to find a common language. Other people don't immediately understand what we have come to know.

We often say the personal is political. Certainly political awareness starts at home. If it has no relevance at home, then it won't seem to us to be a topic worthy of educating people about. Evelyn suggested that I might read a passage I wrote for the Kitchen Table Revolution, MAW's series of publications about counting unpaid work. (It's a section on realizing that cooking dinner should not automatically be part of the decision to care for children, and that the caregiving environment is not at all conducive to cooking dinner.)

This is how we come to understand what we already know: a process takes place whereby an issue transcends "my life and my lot" to become "our lot". We experience certain feelings, which lead us to ask some questions, and maybe take a stand. We start to look outward instead of in for validation. We get the validation and begin to look beyond, and hear what others are saying, see what they 're doing... and we hear a fanniliar voice that connects women around the globe. And way off on the horizon, we might see a piece of activism that moves us - like a woman who has the courage to demand of the United Nations a declaration that women are workers, not slaves... a woman willing to take on the global corporate agenda... women challenging the perpetrators of poverty, or the Alberta government... women with the courage to leave their homes and strike out anew... women with the courage to stay home and make change. Women who fight political injustice while standing in bread lines, or walking from village to village to find food. This is a room full of most courageous women. There's a leap from personal awareness, and changes in our own life, to activism where we want the tools to facilitate cultural change; because the world is a big place with a lot of built-in bias. You can take a room full of women who believe they're overweight, and convince them that they're fine the way they are, and make them happy with themselves, but they still have to go off into the world that values only thin women. We can educate our children about racism, bullying, poverty, environmental issues, but, say what we will, they'll get other messages from their peers and the culture, and it'll be louder than our message. So we have to not just speak it, but live it.

A difficulty we experience sometimes is in identifying who it is we're trying to educate. We can work on publications, workshops, resource manuals, think-tanks like this, and be working in obscurity. We can spend a tremendous amount of energy producing a document that doesn't land in the appropriate hands, and so effects no change. We can make speeches that fall on deaf ears for a hundred different reasons - differing political agendas, bad timing, poor marketing, low budgets - and waste our efforts. Yet sometimes a chance encounter, or hooking a person in at one of these dreaded information booths we do at special events, can result in a lifelong political education for an individual, who will then, in her turn, do some of our best public education work, while becoming increasingly politicized herself.

My children refer to paid work and unpaid work, or moms who work for pay, or moms with office jobs, because I have trained them to do so, and the result is that they verbalize a phrase that's different from what people usually say. "My mom doesn't work, my mom does". You could say I've used my children to voice my politics, I suppose, but I think I've given them a couple of gifts. They can look around their growing world and accurately identify work. But also, they know that we can find new ways of speaking about familiar concepts, and that we don't have to accept the language if the concept it implies is unfair.

I believe we can not underestimate the power of language. Nor the power of starting small and close to home. I recall my father bravely relearning to call women women instead of girls, simply because he heard his daughters doing it.

We can educate each other. Our discussions with each other are so valuable. As we discuss "what is work", and we share outrageous ideas like " breastfeeding is food production work, or childbirth is work" we push the limits, and make people react, and it is only by trying out our ideas, and responding to others', that we come to know where on the continuum we sit, and what we will choose to believe and live.

It is crucial that we make demands on those who are publicizing our issue - writers and journalists, especially, and academics; that we who write about women and our issues not simply communicate an understanding of unpaid work, but write it in language that educates. So it is not enough to use familiar terminology just because everybody will know what we mean; but to use appropriate language to tell the story.

The 1996 Census provided us with a public opportunity for exposing our ideas about women's unpaid work. There were those three questions on the census, asking about "household activities". Many women in this room, now, had something to do with getting those questions there. First there was education in the form of lobbying to be done to convince Stats Canada to include them. Then, women's groups undertook public education, all right... but how much public did we really reach? Only a handful, compared to the thousands of women who looked at those questions, and possibly didn't even connect "household activities" with the work they do on a daily basis; or the thousands of women in homes where filling out a censw is the man's job.

And yet, the questions themselves must have been a seed for political consciousness. If even for a second, women and men wondered, "Why are these here?", then a seed was planted. Look, someone thinks this is a type of work.

The challenge of public education around women's unpaid work is to take the private unpaid work and connect it with that of other women, which moves it from private into public spheres. The connections happen first at home, then outward to community and society; then reaching into government and public policy and law; then connecting globally. To see and feel, and know, and identify, what is work...then to be able to say, yes. This is work, to oneself, one's family, one's peers, and upward. To ask, how does this injustice reverberate? What are the connections here beyond my sphere? (Barbie dolls provided an illustration for the out-growing spiral connections.)

To extend the seed metaphor just a bit....

I grew up with the parable in which a farmer casts seeds into the wind and lets them fall where they may. The seeds that fall on barren soil wither and can not grow; those that fall on the path grow up but are choked by the weeds; the seeds that fall on fertile solid grow and thrive and become the harvest. I believe it's our job to make the soil fertile. We won't do that by combative measures, but by slow tilling, and gentle fertilization... and never giving up. Then, when we throw the seeds around, a few more will take root than would have before. The seeds are our words, our language, attitudes, and action.

For me, I am learning that my best chance at education is by listening - listening for ideas, new words, but also for the right time... that moment when it isn't right, and the moment when it is. I'd like to say I never let the old fashioned language get by me, but I do. Occasionally, I just let it go, because I know, for this person, in this situation, my politicization would be a weed that chokes rather than a seed that grows, and a more subtle approach is better.

I tell my children that it is often better to listen than to tell. This is an admonishment I myself need to be reminded of (so I'll stop talking in a second). I urge you today to listen to each other, and allow common ideas to prepare the soil, so we may cast seeds and reap a better, more tolerant, more fair, awareness of work... Ideas which will become acts of courage from the heart.

Homebase Magazine 1997 ©

We welcome your comments and suggestions.

Submissions and requests for subscriptions or back issues can be sent to:

E-mail: homebase@mothersarewomen.com

Mail: MAW/Homebase, P.O. Box 4104, Station E, Ottawa, ON K1S 5B1 Canada
Phone the MAW-line: 613-722-7851

Back to the top.