“Find a job you love ...

... and you’ll never work a day in your life.”

To do a good job, and do it right, takes a lot of time and love for what you’re doing. When I was younger, my father once told me something I’ve never forgotten: “Find a job you love, honey, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” 

I have only had one job that fits all of those parameters. That’s the job of being a mother. Having children will take up most of your time; at first, it takes all of your time; and a tremendous amount of love for what you’re doing –-that was the easy part.

When I had my first daughter, I realized right away, if I didn’t have to work, I wasn’t going to. I didn’t want to get generic notes from daycare saying, “Today she took her first steps”, or “Today she had her first taste of solid food.”  

No daycare. To raise a child, I will have one chance —a once in a lifetime chance to do my best to get it right. There won’t be any do-overs, or edits. But I also know the deck is stacked in my favor, because I have love. Everything I do will be through love.

As her mother, I wanted to experience those things, myself. I wanted to hear her say her first word —and encourage it to be “Ma ma”. I wanted to be the one who potty-trained her. If she fell, I wanted to kiss her boo-boo and hold her if she cried.

I knew I wanted to be the one who taught her to play “Patty Cake” and “Peek-a-Boo” and to make a bunny nose. I wanted to read her a story before naptime and tuck her in with a kiss, a hug and an ‘I love you’.

Maybe I was being selfish, but if someone had called me selfish, I wouldn’t have cared, because I knew. No one anywhere could ever love my child as much as I love her.

The feelings were even multiplied further as each of my other two daughters came along.

“Find a job you love, honey, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” You know, that quote was right on the mark. There is no job anywhere as important, as challenging, as much fun, as difficult, or as rewarding as being a parent –being a mother in particular.

I was and still am, proud to be a mother and now, a grandmother …”I found a job I loved and until they went to school, I never ‘worked’ a day of that time.”

Once my three daughters were all in school, I went back to work. I worked jobs with mother’s hours so I would be there for them when they came home from school.

The job that worked best for me during those years was driving a special needs school van. I worked the same hours they were in school; had the same holidays, vacation days, snow days, and summers off so I could be with them.

If you don’t have to go back to work after having a baby, then don’t. You’ll never be sorry.

“The soul is healed by being with children.”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky

Poet/Writer/Author of 5 books.
Quora Top Writer 2018.
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