家务活

武夷山

在我小时候，同学当中似乎没有不做家务活的，只是干多干少而已。现在，随着家庭收入水平的提高，随着独生子女政策的实行，城里的孩子做家务事的习惯与能力日渐低下（据说某些农村地区也一样），这可能会害他们一辈子。

不独中国存在这一现象。2001年2月26日的美国《时代》周刊发表了Michelle Slatalla的文章Chores，Anyone？（谁来干活？），文中说：

现在，家长们越来越多地雇人来干家务活，长此以往，孩子们会不会丧失责任心？

几天前，家中出现了这样的对话：

我说，I’m afraid these dark socks will bleed on the shirts.

（博主注：中文意思大概是，（在洗衣机里）这些深色袜子恐怕要掉色，把衬衫都给染了。Bleed常见的意思是“流血”，也含有“印染的渗色”等意思。）

11岁的女儿问：出血？

9岁的女儿问：袜子有血管吗？

3岁女儿问：我可以看一眼袜子的血吗？

也就是说，孩子们不仅不干活，而且连与家务活相关的词语都听不懂了。

 原文如下：

I'm no Martha Stewart, but as a child I did learn how to sort laundry, and I mean the right way, with none of the slipshod mixing of the pinks and the reds that I see creeping into our culture these days. If called upon, I can also execute a crisp hospital corner on a top sheet. It used to be perfectly ordinary to learn these household skills from chore-savvy people like my mother, whose idea of recreation was to wash down the walls.

I am bringing this up because of a troubling conversation I had the other day with my own daughters.

Me: I'm afraid those dark socks will bleed on the shirts.

Eleven-year-old: Bleed?

Nine-year-old: A sock has veins?

Three-year-old: Can I see the blood?

This sort of exchange is becoming common in households as today's time-strapped and affluent parents increasingly hire help to do the chores they used to do themselves. Since both parents work at least part time in the majority of families, it's not surprising that nearly 20% of households hire help to clean, a percentage the Federal Government says is growing.

Speaking as one of those harried workers, I long ago vanquished any guilt about having other people scrub the floors, wash the clothes or chip the baked-on crud off casserole dishes. Like most of the 273 participants in a 1998 University of Maryland study that found mothers spend slightly more time now with their children than they did in 1965, I cut back on housework to protect time with my kids.

But speaking as a parent? My kids learn to do the things they see me do. So I worry about the consequences of raising a generation that may never learn through observation that the best way to remove dust from carved chair legs is with a Q-Tip. More than dreading a world in which it is considered O.K. to leave globs of toothpaste to dry in the sink, I fear the repercussions of never learning to be accountable for your own mess. Call me paranoid, but I started to fear that children who never feel the need to make their own bed would grow into adults who don't feel responsible for making their own happiness.

Luckily, at about the time I was getting myself really worked up, I phoned Nancy Folbre, an economist who studies how the use of time affects the well being of families. She reassured me. "Decide what forms of work are important to your identity, then do them with your children," she said. "But personally? I don't particularly care who cleans my toilets. I don't feel ennobled by that job." Of course, Folbre has done it enough to know it's hard, honest work you can be proud of doing well. Kids armed with a scrub brush will learn too. But for you, the ennobling work may be chores like baking with children or helping an ailing neighbor with yard work. Folbre had a special message for parents of daughters: Think twice before teaching them that housework is an essential part of their future. You want to avoid imposing a higher standard on girls than on boys, Folbre said, "because women already do the vast majority of the housework."

At least I think that's what she said. There was a lot of noise in the background because her husband was doing the dishes.

  出处：http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,999320,00.html。