FOLLOW-UP TO YESTERDAY'S POST: MOMS AND BABIES

            Thank you, everyone who responds respectfully to my posts.  I learn an incredible amount from you; I feel like I have a broad community challenging me, encouraging me, and giving me perspectives I'd never think about on my own.

             This communication thing is hard work, and probably the most important thing I've learned is how we never read or listen with a blank slate.  Certainly some folks just want to disagree.  Others just want to agree.  But none of us, including me, dialogues from an unbiased perspective.

             I'll use yesterday's post to make the point.  First, I don't intend to confine my posts to farming.  I could have mentioned that the work-at-home revolution is also driving a cook-at-home movement, but I have to pick tiny slices of topics or these posts get too long.  My whole goal is to stay within a 2 minute read.  Furthermore, I have--as I know you all do--far more interests than just farming and I intend to cover a broad range of things.  So sorry to lose you if you think all I can talk about is farming, but I'm not putting on that shackle.

             Second, my post clearly keyed on moms and infants.  Not school-age children.  This is called reading into a conversation more than is being said--because we don't listen in a vacuum.  We're always entertaining our own thoughts and we're all guilty of running beyond what a person says.  I'm guilty too.  We all need to work on this.  And are some kids in abusive relationships?  Of course, but does pointing that out nullify the positives for the thousands of moms who can stay home with their infants?  I don't think so.

             Third, I was taken aback with the umbrage against Elon Musk and Steve Jobs as folks who imagined things not yet visible.  I didn't say they were good to work for.  I didn't say they had all the answers.  I only said they were people who could imagine something that did not yet exist.  Nothing more, nothing less.

             Fourth, I did not say I want everyone to be on a computer all day.  In fact, I would say that working at home enables moms with infants to take more computer breaks than they would were they in an office.  As to office collegiality, yes, I get that.  During my lifetime I've seen the work place replace the home place, and I don't think that's a good trend.  Certainly lots of positive things happen in social settings, including conversations around the water cooler.  What this new paradigm offers is more home time.  For moms with babies, I think that's a good thing, even if they need to go to the office occasionally for the stimulation that naturally occurs when folks converse.

             Fifth, I certainly didn't intend to disrespect folks who can't work at home.  And I'm well aware many can't.  But the fact that our culture and business climate are finally really beginning to embrace this option is positive for those who can.

             And finally, I was pleasantly surprised that nobody crucified me for saying "moms do infants better."   And yes, I'm also glad many dads are able to work from home.  But again, my post was about moms and infants specifically so the fact that I didn't ditto dads on it was not an oversight; it was not the point.

             I'm smiling while I'm writing this hoping that nobody thinks this is a scold or a wrap on the knuckles.  On the contrary, I want to stimulate thoughtful conversation around important topics and I find how folks take things to be as fascinating as the actual point of the discussion.  So keep 'em coming, dear folks.  We're all learning; what we don't want--me included--is a twitchy trigger finger.

             What is your hardest idea to convey to someone?  Or another way to ask the same question:  what idea do you find yourself most commonly misunderstood?