Working From Home

6How to Corral the Kids

“I'm not a rocket scientist. But I work with a few of them,” Patricia Moore explains from her home office. She lives just a few miles away from the Johnson Space Center, south of Houston. The mother of two is sitting next to her husband, Jack, at the kitchen table. We're on a Zoom call, chatting about her youngest daughter, Evelyn, who can be, well, kinda demanding. How demanding is kinda demanding? I ask.

“We call her ‘the Honey Badger,’” Patricia shares, explaining that the Honey Badger takes what she wants and doesn't take no for an answer. The name comes from when she was a toddler: They would tell her “no” and she would just go on and do whatever she wanted, as if her parents weren't even there.

An adorable little girl with a twinkle in her eye and a pixie haircut comes into frame. Evelyn is nine years old, wearing a swimsuit and carrying a towel draped over her left arm.

She doesn't look like a honey badger to me. What kind of unreasonable demands will this sweet child in a beach outfit bring to our conversation?

She marches over to Patricia, who leans down to hear her whisper an important question into her ear. Patricia turns to her and explains that they will be leaving in just a few minutes. Evelyn smiles at her dad and leaves as quickly as she entered. Their exchange was so polite! Was that the Honey Badger, or Miss Manners?

Sometimes it's easy to feel like juggling homeschooling and work from home can be a no‐win scenario: you're always doing ...