"I just have to say that I really, really, really do not think that Kim Clijsters winning the U.S. Open is some great step for motherhood," my friend N. said as soon as I answered the phone this morning.
She did not bother with a hello. She did not wait for a response from me. Her voice was in the pinched place it goes to when she has a lot of thoughts and not enough air to explain them. "I mean, is it great that she won after taking two years off? Yes, it's great. She's a phenomenal player. But I am sick to death of people calling this a win for motherhood! As if we don't have enough on our plate. We need a new gold standard?"
Just to be clear, N. is not a killjoy, cynic, underachiever, spoilsport or grump. She's not someone who goes out in the world looking for disappointment and/or something to whine about. She enthusiastically works a high-pressure job and just as enthusiastically deals with the joy and confusion of having a young baby at home. But the media coverage of the event in pieces like Aol's "Kim Clijsters scores Grand Slam win for working mothers in her second career" and the Guardian's "Kim Clijsters seals the mother of all comebacks" had hit a nerve.
It's an opinion that I haven't heard a lot in the sunnier, symbolism-rich reporting of the event. And while I am just as smitten with a great woman-comes-from-behind-to-take-the-gold story as anyone else, after I hung up, I found myself wondering: What does it mean when we frame Clijsters win as a "win" for motherhood? It's an event to be celebrated, absolutely, but a "win" in the context of motherhood, or even working motherhood, is a conspicuous thing. Does that mean that a working mother that can barely keep her pre-baby pace at work is, in essence, losing? Did anyone else feel funny about this kind of coverage?
