Women’s History Month: Vivian Castleberry, Part 2
This is the second part of a post regarding Vivian Castleberry in honor of day 13 of Women’s History Month.
In the 1950s, trailblazing Dallas women’s page editor Vivian Castleberry had to find her own way of balancing being a journalist with being the mother of five daughters. She told the male editors who she worked for to allow her some flexibility. She would do her job and meet her deadlines. But she would do it her own way and on her own schedule.
As she said in her oral history: “When I went to work for the Times Herald I said, “I will do a great job for you. I want this job. I can do this job, and I will do it better than anybody else can do it, but you must let me do it on my own in my own way of doing because I cannot afford to have a disaster at home. You cannot afford to have a women’s editor who is a disaster in her home life. Therefore, I must do both of these things and I must continue to do it as a whole and I must continue to do it well. So there will be times that I’m not going to be there on the spot when you may look for me.”
When I chose to become a journalist and then a professor, it was partly for the flexibility of the jobs. I knew I would work nights and weekends. That meant I would have to find balance. For me, that was Friday. Sometimes it was a chance to write without interruption and other times, it was the chance to go to a movie.
Now, as a professor and the mother of two young children, a flexible Friday is even more important. Sometimes it is for practical reasons – pregnant women and young children go to the doctor a lot. In other instances, it is a mental health break at the pool. The weekends are no longer your own once you become a parent. If you want some times to relax – you have to carve out your own times.
It is also about finding dedicated writing time for a professor. Class lectures will get written and papers will be graded. It is easy to let research slide in the midst of a busy week. Dedicated writing time each Friday has been incredibly helpful to my research process.
The realization of the need for flexible Friday came out of a colleague’s statement that as a grown up, I should be available to go to meetings on Fridays – a practice I have spoken out against in the past. In part, I chose this profession for the flexible schedule that allows me to do my work when it is best for me.
The statement reminded me that as a working mother, I rarely explain that my life is fundamentally different than those without children. As women we are largely socialized to act as though having a child does not impact our professional lives. It has been going on for decades now.
Like Vivian noted more than 60 years ago, I will meet my deadlines and get my work done. I do scholarly reading during the two-hour trip as my husband drives the children to the petting zoo. I write after my boys go to bed. I work through Spring Break.
There needs to be a broad discussion about how women can be both good parents and good employees – and not from the CEOs with nannies and a nursery next to their offices. This discussion should begin with ways that employers can meet the needs of working mothers, as the mediated discussion regarding Yahoo’s policy banning working from home pointed out. And, as a FB friend just pointed out, this is an issue for academic dads, too.
I am very much a grown up but I also want a flexible schedule. It was the advice that Vivian Castleberry gave in the 1950s. It still makes sense today.
