It Got me Thinking…About Family Options

By Kathleen Guthrie Woods 

I was really excited about a book I read recently, a humorous look at life that lauded women’s progress in the working world*. But then. In the last several chapters, the author focused on the trials and joys of being a working wife and mom. As I skimmed back over previous pages, I noticed that she talked about her friends and colleagues and their struggles as working moms, but nowhere did she mention anything about the women (and men) who cover for them while they’re all out on maternity leave. In her discussion about families, the closest she got to including any other kind of family (such as one that resembled my own) was an offhanded remark about a gay couple and their dog.

Now I don’t like to get all politically correct about things, but I would like to open her eyes to other family options. I’d like to introduce her to my neighborhood where retirees are raising their grandchildren, former and new spouses are setting aside their differences to co-parent, cultures and languages converge, couples (gay and straight) live with their adopted and foster children, and couples and single people without children are right in the mix. The old Norman Rockwell model of all-white families comprised of one man, his wife, and their two children is neither the majority nor the norm.

Along with the strides women have made it the world, I think our new definition of “family” is also something to celebrate.

*Can’t recommend the book (for the reasons noted above), but also don’t want to pan it, so I’m not going to mention the title.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She is wrapping up her memoir about being a temporary single mommy and how it helped her come to terms with being childfree.