When I was a child, I was never taught to do my own chores. Despite working full time, my mother always washed the dishes and did the laundry. My parents sort of had an agreement that my dad would be the cook and he would be the one to clean and maintain the car and mow the lawn, while my mom would do everything else around the house. Even during my teen years, my mom did my laundry. It was only during tenth grade when she finally asked me to do my own laundry, and even then she would still do it most of the time.

Because I was, essentially, never taught to clean after myself, it was an overwhelming experience for me when I came to live in Japan.

I don’t want what happened with me to happen to my daughter. I want her to understand, from this early age, that house chores are an everyday thing. With the right attitude, they can even be fun. I want her to grow up and realize that a woman shouldn’t have to bear all the house chores just because she’s a woman. I want her to see that the entire family should be involved in maintaining a happy home because, well…that’s my philosophy and I think it’s a fair one.

I took a picture of Miyu today helping us with the trash. Our (Japanese) neighbor was surprised to see that she was helping us carry a few bags. When we got to the trash shed, I was shocked to see that Miyu had remembered from our last time throwing the trash. She already knew where to put the pet bottles! So now, whenever it’s trash day (or night), we’ll be giving her the pet bottle bag and Ken and I will do everything else. 🙂