IDEAL WOMAN: Look to the ’50s

It may have been seemingly a rough life for women in the ’50s. You know, shopping with curlers, kids, sampling the new products, chatting with friends, and just finding out what’s going on in the world. Coming home, washing, cooking, cleaning house, diapers and just making peace. After a few calls to other wives, including the grandparents, the school-aged children would be debriefed coming in the door.

You see, being a housewife was a noble profession, before God, the children and the world. America was truly a “great” superpower. America was the envy of Russia, especially its women. American women were not forced to work outside the home or in some sleazy, unsafe factory with no respect and little pay. Back in America husbands were paid well; enough to keep their wives from selling themselves to the workforce. Husbands as heads of households kept inflation down and American standards of living up.

By 6 p.m. it was time to greet the guy who made all this possible. That’s right: Curlers off, looking her best, well aware of the trials of public work, welcomed her husband at the door — a true defender of the family.

JIM VALENTINE

Post Falls