After reading the New York Times Magazine story on women who “opted out,” Gay asks her mom about her own experience:

Sometimes when people talk about women and the workforce, they say a woman cannot truly be equal to a man unless she has her own income. What do you think?

“Well. Equality. What a word. When we choose go outside in the world, when we come home, we’re still mommy. The second shift starts. Equality doesn’t exist, period, even when you share the chores. Some days it can be 70/30 and other days it is 30/70. I don’t think that’s what we should be fighting for.

What should we be fighting for?

“Men participating more in the home, but it’s petty to say 50/50, because life doesn’t allow that.”