Yes, women are managing companies but do we still have our egos in domesticity? Readers, I have to admit I love to cook.
Yes, I am a pressure cook (not to be confused with a pressure cooker, which I have never owned. I nearly won one last year, but the alternative prize was a weekend away, and under serious pressure from my husband, chose the latter. It was nice to spend a free weekend in the Midlands, but it didn’t save the enormous amounts of cooking time that I hear a pressure cooker does…)
Back to being a pressure cook – it is a two part definition:
I love to explore new recipes for dinner parties (not that they happen that often any more) and have a definite methodology – 3 course dinner = 1 experiment and 2 tried and tested successful courses. Sometimes the experiment is more successful that the tried and tested, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles.
The second is that I love to throw things together, left overs, combinations of recipes, wrap fillings and create a meal in about 20 minutes that leaves people gasping for more! Of course, it could be more Alka Selzer, but generally those thrown together meals do work quite well.
Our family adds another skill set to home management, pressure tidy uppers. This is an area where my husband, daughter and I are extremely proficient, my son not so much. If we know that we are having guests, we are able to turn our scruffy Roman ruin, (house and garden) into a “professionally distressed” look in around 2 hours. This includes candles, throws, flowers, leaf blowers, great smells emanating from the kitchen (pressure cooking at its apex) and the odd closed door, behind which lurks a multitude of “tidied” items.
I know that the average male executive does not have the same cooking and cleaning issues, but surely a knowledge, and cellar, of fine wine are important, not to mention a high level of braai skill.
We might not all be housewives, but our homes are still a part of our identity, and whether we know the best caterer, or have access to the ultimate home industry store, there is still a very real expectation that CEO or not, you will need to be a domestic diva every now and then.
I have to admit that I glued school badges to blazers instead of carefully sewing them on, that I cannot wash a glass and make it sparkle, nor make a bed that you can bounce a coin off.
So, in a world where 22.2% of parliamentary positions are held by women, and that is progress, we are not yet in a world where home, business and politics are shared equally.
I might not believe that my ego is in my cooking (maybe just a little), but I do think that our many gender based roles and perceptions are slowly blurring around the edges……
Links, References and Notes
http://www.accsys.co.za/payroll-qualification
Note
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