COMMENTARY: Get me a wife, please

c. 1997 Religion News Service (Dale Hanson Bourke is author of “Turn Toward the Wind” and publisher of Religion News Service. She is the mother of two boys.) UNDATED _ The breakfast dishes were overflowing the sink, my husband was searching for a lost piece of homework, and I was trying to dry my hair […]

c. 1997 Religion News Service

(Dale Hanson Bourke is author of “Turn Toward the Wind” and publisher of Religion News Service. She is the mother of two boys.)

UNDATED _ The breakfast dishes were overflowing the sink, my husband was searching for a lost piece of homework, and I was trying to dry my hair while helping my youngest son get dressed. Suddenly my son announced he couldn’t wear the pants I had set out because they were missing a button.


As I searched through dirty laundry for an acceptable replacement, I yelled my now-familiar refrain:”I need a wife!” Every working woman I know has expressed this sentiment at one time or another. Wisely, my husband has never said those words, but I know he must have thought them more than once.

In every family where both parents work, the stress of everyday life is simply overwhelming at times. And how single parents cope is beyond my comprehension. Holding down a full-time job while caring for family needs means that both work and family life suffers.

The generation before mine thought they had things figured out. Generally, the man went to work to make money while the woman stayed home and cared for the children, the house, and all things associated with quality of life.

This freed the man to spend his lunch hour making deals instead of searching for school play costumes, allowed him to work later than the childcare facility stayed open, and even offered the opportunity to travel on business and entertain clients without worrying when charges might be brought against him for abandoning his children.

With all this time to concentrate on work, some men were able to make a lot of money. Take Gary Wendt, for instance. As chief executive of GE Capital he reportedly amassed a fortune of $100 million by deal-making, entertaining, and leading his corporation with great focus.

According to articles in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and other business publications, Mr. Wendt was able to think about corporate mergers instead of daycare because of Lorna Wendt, by all accounts a wife extraordinaire. While she cared for the children, the home, and entertained his business associates at the drop of a hat, he brought home the increasingly fat paychecks.

All was well and good until Mr. Wendt decided he didn’t want to remain married. Now Mr. and Mrs. Wendt are involved in a very public discussion over how assets should be divided and what value a wife has to a career. Mr. Wendt has offered a settlement of 10 percent. Mrs. Wendt thinks 50 percent is more like it.


No one has asked me, but I think Mrs. Wendt might be aiming low. After all, how far would Mr. Wendt have climbed up the corporate ladder if he started looking at his watch at 5:45 every day, praying he made it to daycare in time to get his kids? What if he’d begged off business trips so he could help with homework and refused to go to dinners in order to be home to tuck the kids in? I doubt Mr. Wendt would be looking at dividing such large assets if he didn’t have a homemaker wife to take care of life for him.

Clearly, neither the previous generation nor mine has this life-and-work balance figured out.

But now the next generation, having been raised by frazzled or absent parents, has had enough of our foolishness and is charting its own course.

A recent Wall Street Journal article reports that recruiters for major corporations are surprised by the kinds of questions being asked by wannabe executives about to graduate from college.

Even in first round interviews, candidates want to know how much travel is required, if flextime is offered and what support is available for families.

These are, of course, the very types of questions my generation was cautioned against ever asking in an interview and the previous generation never even thought of.

The executives of tomorrow, it seems, want to have it all. Both parents will be involved in work and life _ in raising kids and planning corporate maneuvers. This sounds a bit naive to those of us living the dream turned nightmare, except for one thing: The next generation doesn’t seem to care as much about making big money.


They want to work, but they are willing to trade time for money. They want a career but they want a life, too. They are not willing to sell their soul to their corporation in order to end up with millions, but no family.

The next generation of families won’t need wives. Ideally, both partners will support family life and work life. And corporations will need to accommodate their schedules if they want to keep talented young workers.

Has the next generation found the solution? I hope so. But even if they haven’t settled things once and for all, their push for greater balance is bound to impact our entire society positively.

How we value work and wives says a great deal about our culture. And every time we get it wrong, it is the next generation of children who suffer.

MJP END BOURKE

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