A Fighting Chance

The white phone was on the wall in the kitchen, and it had a long spiral cord. I said hello, tucked the phone expertly between my ear and my shoulder, and walked back over to the stove.

“This is Eugene Smith from the University of Houston,” said the man on the phone. “We got your letter and I’d like to ask you some questions.” And off he went. Subject areas? Scholarly interests? Teaching philosophy? Holy cow. I’d never had a job interview as probing as this one, and I was completely unprepared. I tried to sound smooth and relaxed, even as I jiggled Alex furiously in the hope that he wouldn’t start crying. And I kept looking at those damn pork chops and thinking, If you burn, I’ll throw you through the window.

Somehow, it never occurred to me that I could offer to call Professor Smith back later. I figured it was now or never. It also didn’t occur to me to turn off the heat under the pan. At least this time I didn’t set the kitchen on fire.

Finally, Professor Smith stopped asking questions and said good-bye. I put the pork chops on a plate, then sat on the kitchen floor and put my head in my hands. That interview had been my golden opportunity, and I had blown it. I wasn’t ready, I hadn’t worked hard enough, and now my one chance at a good job was gone.

About a week later, Professor Smith called back. Would I fly to Houston to meet the faculty?

I got the job—a full-time, tenure-track, all-the-bells-and-whistles teaching job. I would teach contract law and run the legal writing program. I’d have an office (wow!), and, unlike at Rutgers, I’d be called “Professor.” When I called my parents, my mother reminded me how hard this would be—two little children to care for, a house to manage, a husband to keep happy. I shouldn’t jeopardize all I had by reaching too far. But my daddy gave me no such warnings. He just said, “That’s my Betsy.”

Jim agreed to ask IBM for the Houston transfer, and by late spring we were heading off again on a new life. We bought a nice house in the Houston suburbs. We had two adorable little children, and at twenty-eight, I was about to become a real live law professor. I wished I knew how to do cartwheels, because I would have flipped over and over.

The best I could do was say my prayers every night, always starting with a heartfelt, “Thank you, Lord, for these Thy blessings.”





Smacked Down by Child Care

There was only one other full-time woman on the faculty at UH Law School, and she had landed the job a year after her husband had been hired. In that first year of teaching, I was mistaken for a secretary, a student, the wife of a student, a lost undergrad who had wandered into the law school by mistake, and a nurse (blood drive day).

I headed straight for the money courses. I started with contract law and over time added business and finance courses. I loved the idea of mastery over money. Besides, these were some of the most technical, complex areas of law. I figured that if I could manage this, no one could question whether a young woman with two little children belonged here, even if I looked like someone’s idea of a school nurse.

That first year of teaching law school took my breath away. I loved the classroom. I watched faces, and it felt like a victory every time I saw the click! as a student grasped a really hard idea. I was doing my best to stay just one step ahead of the students, and new ideas seemed to race through my head a million times a second. We were making something happen in the classroom. We were growing brains. We were growing futures.

But the new job was hard, and at home my world was stretched to the breaking point. I traded car-pool duties, took my turn as a Girl Scout leader, taught Sunday school for the fifth graders, and made cookies for bake sales, but I could never catch up. I kept a calendar in the kitchen, and I hated to look at it. I felt as though I had this giant pile of duties balanced on my head as I rode a wobbly bicycle on a high wire stretched across a canyon. The slightest mishap—the dog got loose or the car wouldn’t start—and we would all go crashing down.

Jim and I never argued. He didn’t say much about my job, but he always looked at his watch when dinner wasn’t served on time or when I sat up late at night grading exams. I thought he felt I had reneged on our unspoken deal that he would work and I would take care of the house and children. I also thought he was right.

I kept pedaling faster, but child care brought me down.

It was a Tuesday, winter in much of the country but warm and sunny in Houston. My classes were over for the day, and I hurried to the car. I needed to get to the child care center in the strip mall to pick up Alex. It was a little past five, but the center was still full. Alex was sitting on a small cot. When I saw him, he didn’t run over to me. He just sat and looked at me. I felt my chest tighten.