My Mother Never Worked Summary

"My Mother Never Worked" by, Bonnie Smith-Yackel My reader response to this essay, "My Mother Never Worked" by Smith-Yackel, was that, I was shocked when the family did not get the death benefit check. Apparently, Smith-Yackel’s mother worked very hard during her life, but all her hard work was not considered “labor” because she did not bring-in money from a public job to her family. Just because the government does not consider her time and labor to be equivalent to “employment”, it does not mean she did not do anything to provide for her family, just by being a mother is a job itself. She had to work really hard for her farm and family to live. All the animals and children needed attention and the only way for this to happen was for Smith-Yackel’s mother to work forcefully on the farm and in the house. To the social security office,

The narrator appears to have a positive and loving attitude for her mother; she has a lot of respect and pride for her and wants to stand up for what her mother rightfully deserves. I think this was very unique; she uses irony repeatedly in her essay. It keeps you interested throughout the essay and even after I finished. I wondered what her response was to the person at the Social Security Office after they said, "Well you see-your mother never worked." Even though she didn't express her feelings about not getting any benefits from her mother's death, I can tell that she was upset and shocked that the government overlooked the work, her mother did daily. Smith-Yackel uses the telephone conversation as a frame for the essay, which is very interesting. It makes the story a little more realistic and it ends the essay well. Being a mom is one of the hardest jobs in the world, this paper helped my belief of this