Falling into the Gender Gap
By Suzanne Fields
Monday, August 20, 2007

So many books and surveys, so little time, and many are still wrestling with Freud's simple question, "What do women want?" The books and surveys are so loaded with contradictory opinions that no sociologist's "cohort" is likely to come up with a definitive answer.

Some women insist that the only thing for an educated woman to do is to work outside her home. Others defend the mom whose satisfaction comes from being with her children. Still others insist that mix and match is the best formula, for staying home when the kids are young.

My grandson, age 8, asked me the other day what his great-grandmother -- my mother -- "did." I wasn't sure what he meant. "Did, did, did," he repeated. "You mean as in 'work'?" I asked. "Yes, work."

Well, I told him, she spent a lot of time with her son and daughter and grandchildren when they were growing up. "She often picked up your mother at school when I couldn't, and she always had freshly baked cookies with her. She enjoyed making your great-grandfather happy." Such a granny sounded exotic to the young man, not at all like the mommies he knew, whose work determined their children's "play dates" and after-school activities. the rest