Modern parenthood had changed. Why haven’t our tools?

Or: where's my machine for the very real work we do for our homes and families?

Over the past two weeks, there have been a series of NYT articles that talk about the work of our home and families and, who (or what) should do it. 

This one highlighted the trend of couples using tools like Notion and Slack to bring process and sanity to their relationships and home lives. Another talked about the incredible value of ‘kinkeeping,’ the emotional labor of being the family glue — and lamented how it largely falls on women. And closer to home, another considered products trying to solve for the logistics and invisible load of family life, concluding that because there is purpose and acts of love embedded in the busywork, that perhaps products could not (should not?) help. 

As a founder, and more importantly a parent, who has devoted the past decade of my life to this space, I’ve thought a lot about these topics.

Here’s what I think is missing in these conversations:

Over the weekend, I’ve been reflecting on some of the discussion happening around my role as a parent. I know I’m supposed to put my phone down. Be present. Have boundaries. It’s just that there are 4 unread emails from the school waiting to be deciphered in my inbox. Swim registration is coming up and I have to figure out when and what I might need to do to actually secure a spot. This weekend we have a track meet and birthdays and tennis, and looming too close on the horizon is summer “break”.

I want to put my phone down. I want the noise in my mind to be quiet. I want to sit with my kids and play a board game, unencumbered by all of it. 

And yet. This is all work that needs to be done. In the margins and cracks of our days.

As it is, I’m writing furiously on my phone while my girls pick out birthday presents at our local bookstore for the 4 parties over the next couple of weekends. I couldn’t agree more - it might be busywork, but it is also how we show love.

It’s because I value the humanness of being a parent that I’ve devoted the past decade of my life, my children’s lives, to figure who we all get to do more of it. 

These are complex problems but solvable problems (we just haven’t invested in it).

I understand that it has to be done right and it has to be done all the way. That's why it’s taking so long. These are complex human problems. The worst thing we can do is to build surface solutions that skim the top and make things worse.

But one thing is abundantly clear to me: where there is work, humans have always built machines. 

The story of human progress is intertwined with the stories of the machines we’ve built. From the wheel to the printing press, the steam engine to the computer, we have always seen ways to abstract away the parts of the work we’re called to do, given them to machines built specially for those purposes.

Only - these inventions have not been evenly imagined and created for all of us. The work of the home, or the work traditionally done by women, has been woefully underseen and therefore underinvested in. And what you do not see, do not measure, do not put into words, you cannot lift and alleviate.

Where is my machine to let me get back to humaning? 

It isn’t an either / or - technology can play a role. 

Where there is work, there must be machines to support us and allow us to rise to higher value tasks. It’s not either/or. It doesn’t need to be either technology OR humans; products OR people. Complex, nuanced problems demand complex, nuanced solutions.

We have to turn our focus from if there should be machines, to what are the right machines to honor and support this human work of care. How are they designed? What do they solve and how?

For my part, I’ve chosen to focus on the constant overwhelm and panic I feel being the single point of failure for my family. If I miss one email or one notification. If I don’t get it on the calendar or see a conflict. If I don’t remember in time. It’s exhausting and it’s not something I get a vacation from, ever. There is no good way to share this load with my husband without downloading my brain and it pushes us into the same fights that communication and division of labor isn’t solving. 

At the end of the day: my brain is being used as the computer to run a whole complex organization - from holding the information to running the calendar to anticipating what’s next.I’m not asking for technology to replace me in this work. I’m asking, and now building, the tools to support me in it. To give me a chance at being a better human because I’ve been shielded from the busywork. 

And let’s be clear - there is no nobility, no greater meaning, in my spending 20 minutes adding soccer dates from an email to my calendar, manually adding all the locations and jerseys and snack duties. There is no satisfaction or fairness in having my husband do it instead. And I’m trying to find a way that the answer isn’t asking another human to do it for me - virtual or otherwise.

My work in caring for my family demands to be seen, and demands to be honored with tools that do justice to my service.

Just because we haven’t gotten there yet though, doesn’t mean they shouldn’t exist. That we should stop trying. Instead, we need to turn to the hard work of: what does the beautiful, messy work of our homes need? Where are we most challenged to deliver that? How can we creatively overcome that?

It can be true that we want and need better ways of doing things - products and processes - and it can also be true that we haven’t built the right ones yet. Many of the criticisms Ms. Hess shares are the very reason building Milo has been a 5 year journey and we’ve been in a closed beta. Because we’ve seen all of those limitations and more. And until it’s good enough, it’s not good enough.

But the story to focus on is: these problems are finally worthy of investment. Of valuing a woman’s minute as much as a man’s and building the right machines to support it. Of seeing the work of our homes as worthy of innovation as that of our jobs. 

We can’t have it both ways - we can’t say it’s a deeply uneven, gendered problem and then say, but only humans (but really women) could solve it. Or, we can’t say we’re deeply overwhelmed by the rise and realities of a modern tech existence and then not be open to solutions that might alleviate it. 

Let's not succumb so quickly to the easy narrative that just because it’s not right yet, that it will never be right. Or worse: that it's silly or wrong to try.

Let’s be patient while being urgent. Optimistic while being skeptical. Discerning while being generous.

Hold our technology, our products and our builders to the highest standards. But then come imagine with us or other builders what's possible when we free parents, and yes women, up from the drudgery that keeps us from the good stuff, the human stuff. 

Not having the answer yet is not a sin.

Not trying certainly would be.