????女人們到底應該出去工作，還是應該為了孩子當全職媽媽？這個話題觸及到了我情感深處一塊最柔軟的地方。每次我讀到跟這個話題有關的文章，都忍不住潸然淚下。

????十年前，麗莎?貝爾金的大作《退出革命》（Opt-Out Revolution）讓我開始關注這個話題。我對那篇文章很感興趣，因為它關注的對象主要是普林斯頓大學（Princeton University）畢業的女性，而我自己也是普林斯頓的畢業生。而且當時我剛剛成為一個母親，那篇文章發表的時候，正趕上我第一個孩子的1歲生日。

????這些年來，我已經多次讀過貝爾金的著作，包括她的文集《人生的工作》（Life's Work）和數不清的文章。上周日，朱蒂絲?沃爾納在《紐約時報》（The New York Times ）上發表了《退出革命》的姊妹篇——《“退出”一代希望回歸》（The Opt-Out Generation Wants Back In）。它與麗莎?貝爾金十年前描寫的是同一批女性，因此引起了我的強烈興趣。

????這個話題雖然觸碰到了深埋在我內心深處的某種情結，但是，我從來沒有為打拼事業的選擇后悔過。我也從來沒有選擇過“退出”。1996年，我從普林斯頓大學的英語專業畢業，2000年在哈佛大學（Harvard）獲得了MBA學位。之后我從管理咨詢行業跳槽到了獵頭行業。這十幾年來，我先后有了兩個孩子（女兒格蕾斯今年10歲，兒子惠特今年8歲。）

????在我的孩子們還小的時候，我做的是兼職工作。現在他們兩個都到了上學年齡，我開始從事全職工作。不過我的辦公室就是我的家，大多數時候我能管理自己的日程，所以我不會錯過孩子們人生中任何重要的事情。

????當我回首自己的職業生涯的時候，我能看到有很多運氣和偶然的因素促成了我現在的工作狀態，但同時我也實現了自己當初的目標：擁有一份靈活但又有意義的工作。

????但我其實不太明白，在我職業生涯的早期，我是怎樣產生這樣一個特定的目標的。當年，我從哈佛商學院畢業后，選擇了一個邊緣、但又非常幸運的角色。直到現在，我的內心有時也會泛起波瀾，一方面為我才剛剛25歲就“靠邊站”而灰心喪氣——當時我甚至還沒有孩子；另一方面，又對我當時選擇了具有靈活性的工作而暗自慶幸，因為它對以后的這么多年來說實在太重要了。

????首先，我可以肯定一件事，那就是如果你有能力選擇究竟是在家帶孩子，還是出去工作，可以說這就已經是個了不起的特權了。有時我經常會感到沮喪、甚至是驚訝，因為關于這個話題的討論甚少顧及到一個基本的事實，那就是大多數美國的母親甚至沒有選擇的權利。

????2010年9月，我發表了我的第一篇文章，當時還很幼稚的我在文中設置了這樣一個場景：因為難以在家庭和事業上做出抉擇，一屋子焦慮的哈佛MBA畢業的年輕媽媽們抹著眼淚，事實上她們面臨的是一個“幸福的困境”。我在文中寫道，我被這些人批評了一頓，然后開始討論我的選擇——也就是一邊工作，一邊堅持照顧孩子。

????這種做法當然是有缺點的——首先我總有一種揮之不去的感覺，那就是如果我什么都大包大攬，那我什么都不會做得很好。我不確定這究竟是我事業和家庭兼顧的必然結果，還是一種基本的天性表達，但不管怎樣，我都傾向于后者。不過這種看法也說明，事業與家庭之爭給我帶來了情感的波動，無非是說我內心深處希望我的孩子們做正確的事情。但當孩子們在學校的時候，我幾乎無法給他們的表現施加任何影響。或許我讀的書、我寫的文章以及我對事業和家庭之間的思考之所以如此糾結，只是說明了我對孩子們的期待和夢想，以及我多么希望做好一個母親的簡單愿望。

????The topic of mothers working or staying home touches a well of emotion in me, as deep as it is inchoate. Every time I read anything about the debate, I cry.

????Ten years ago, Lisa Belkin's seminal Opt-Out Revolution introduced me to the subject. I was curious about the article because it focused on women from Princeton University, my alma mater, and I was also new to the arena: it came out on the first birthday of my first child.

????Over the years, I have read Belkin's piece several times. I read her book of essays on the topic, Life's Work, and a litany of titles and articles longer than I can list about the debate. Judith Warner's follow-on piece in The New York Times this past Sunday, The Opt-Out Generation Wants Back In, about the same women profiled by Lisa Belkin a decade ago is the latest in the canon, and I read it with tremendous interest.

????The thing is, while the topic touches a knot of something buried in my chest, the truth is it never makes me regret my choice to work. I have never opted out. I graduated from Princeton in 1996 with a degree in English and earned an MBA from Harvard in 2000. I moved from a career in management consulting to one in executive search and had two children along the way (a daughter, Grace, now 10, and a son, Whit, now 8).

????When my children were small, I worked part-time, and now that they are both in school all day, I work full-time. My office is in my house and I am able to manage my schedule, most of the time, so that I don't miss anything important in their lives.

????When I look back at the path I have taken, I can see all the chance and luck and randomness that have shaped it. But I can also see that I have fulfilled my original goal: to have flexible yet meaningful work.

????What is less clear to me is how I came up with this particular goal early on in my life. When I graduated from Harvard Business School, I chose a role that was at once marginal and extremely fortuitous. I oscillate between being frustrated at my 25-year-old self for so immediately "leaning out" -- I didn't even have children yet -- and being profoundly grateful that I sensed back then that flexibility would be vitally important to me years down the road.

????One thing I am certain about is that the choice to stay home with babies is one of huge privilege. I'm constantly frustrated -- amazed, even -- that the dialogue about mothers working or staying home so rarely acknowledges the simple fact that most mothers in America don't have this choice.

????The first piece of writing I ever published, in September 2010, began with a scene where my then-childless self pointed out to a room of angst-ridden Harvard MBA moms torn between careers and babies that theirs was a dilemma of privilege. I described the way I was flayed by this crowd, and went on to discuss the downside of my choice to have a foot in both worlds by working but also by refusing to cede primary responsibility for the day-to-day lives of my children.

????There are certainly downsides -- mostly a lingering sense that while I'm doing everything, I'm doing it all poorly. The thing I'm not sure of is whether this is a result of my choice to work and have children or whether it's a more fundamental and innate orientation, and that I'd feel this way no matter what. This latter point of view, which is the one I lean towards, also suggests to me that the emotion all this discussion triggers in me is a deep-seated desire to do right by my children that has almost nothing to do with what I do during the days they are at school. Maybe the knot that my reading and writing and thinking about working and motherhood touches on, that prickly tangle of feelings, is as basic as my hopes and dreams for my children and my fierce wish to do the best job I can as a mother.