Who am I anyways?

Tonight I made a meatloaf for the first time. MEATLOAF? Who am I, Betty Freaking Crocker? I'm certainly not Julia Child or Wolfgang Puck, that's for sure.

I was also lectured for turning the heat up to 67 degrees and forgetting to shut the kitchen window (opened to let in some fresh air) two days in a row. Am I a child?

It's hard for me to define myself beyond "Mama" anymore. A year ago, I would not have envisioned myself making meatloaf. A year ago, if I bothered to cook something from scratch (which was very rare) then it most assuredly would have been more creative than a meatloaf. Meatloaf is such a mom thing to cook. My dad complimented my cooking tonight, saying to Chris what a better cook I've become, meaning since I've been laid-off. He meant it as the highest compliment. I semi-jokingly said that was because they killed the creativity in me. Sure, the food tastes better than it used to, but it's Plain. Old. Boring. Food. That's not me! I subscribe to Gourmet! I buy potato ricers to force ten pounds of potatoes through for Thanksgiving! I adore fancy food and ingredients! I'm a foodie, for crying out loud. When did I become this mom person making meat and potatoes every week? When did I switch gears from outlandish and spicy to bland and simple? When did I start feeling pride at my skill with hamburger????

A year ago, if anything would have been said to me at all for forgetting to close the window before I turned up the heat, it would have been said in a joking and/or loving manner. Because I used to be a respected partner in this home. Now I'm apparently viewed as a sub-par and mildly retarded servant who can only learn through degradation.

Yesterday as I walked into mom's house to drop off Izzy and Sophie so I could go work out, Izzy asked where PaPa was. At work, I told him, just like I do whenever he asks where Daddy is. What the heck is this doing to Izzy's psyche? The most important women in his life stay at home, and the most important men go to work. Is he going to think this is how it should be for women? Does a little part of me think this way too? Maybe that's why it's so easy for me to fall into this pattern of cooking meatloafs and cleaning house, and maybe that's what it's easy for people who love me to talk down to me.

I hope to stay home until Sophie is two. I say that like employers are throwing job offers at me. But I think I really need to get back to work. I'm not a housewife. I am an unemployed worker on a temporary childcare reassignment. Already, after just one year off work, I am scared of reentering the workforce. I'm afraid my skills are maybe a bit rusty and I know how much I'd be missing with my kids now.

But I'm more afraid of who I'll become if I don't go back to work.