Family

The conversation might go like this, in a setting played out in countless homes each night:

Mom and Dad gather 'round the kitchen table, a single light overhead, for the rest of the house is pretty much shut down.

Dad's away a lot. Mom's new job pays well, twice what most people make, but she travels a lot, too, when she's not at the office or jogging 10 miles a day.

There's a new baby sleeping down the hall, born eight months into a high-risk pregnancy. Mom flew six hours to a meeting, then six hours back home — following a speech — for another drive to the hospital to delivery this little boy, who needs and deserves extra attention from … somebody.

As everyone knows, the deepest Family Values talks happen around the kitchen table, in a soft cocoon of light with the refrigerator humming in the background.

Their oldest daughter is pregnant at 17. Her boyfriend, soon to be a daddy and role model, has told the world on his MySpace page that he's a bleeping "redneck" who doesn't want kids. Two more daughters are careening toward adolescence and the emotional rollercoaster that comes with it.

The talk centers on a new job opportunity and whether it's worth it for the baby, who'll be trotted out to every job interview like a show pony after a ribbon. Going back to work three days after he was born was easy. It might be tough in a new job with The Organization, but she'll make it work, because opportunity knocks and ambition answers.

Speaking of the grandbaby, well, the parents must marry. They'll adjust to creating a marriage under the scrutiny this new job brings. The interviews are public, you know, and some might wonder why Mom is grasping for this spotlight now while her children are so young, her oldest daughter so vulnerable.

But the children are nice images while she seeks this post for The Organization. Her top qualification: She's a mom, by golly.

But, Mom says, if anyone wonders how she's able to do it all, be it all (and do it all and be it all better than any whiner mom out there)…. well, they'll be dealt with the same way The Organization deals with any of its critics.

She'll smile, sneer, ridicule people for being educated or having questions. She'll pummel them with a verbal tire iron pulled from her purse, secure in the knowledge that no one — NO ONE — would stand up to Mom.

If the questions get tough, she'll cry foul to the boys in The Organization and hide behind her lipstick and windblown hair.

She's figured it all out. Everyone — especially moms — must fall in line. To do otherwise would betray the sisterhood. She's them; surely they can see that.

The question is what moms will actually be looking for.