Open Letter to Katie Holmes

The scuttlebutt is that you may not return to films for some time, what with your new baby and all. Despite being offered a 3-film deal for the new Batman features (excellent), the word is that you may give up acting, for a while anyway, in order to be a mom.

Now, before I begin, let me go on the record: Let there be no "mommy wars" here! That tired concept is media-hyped bullshit of the reality television variety. All we moms really want is for the Other Moms to listen.

And I won't pretend that I hear you. Its ridiculous to think your voice would be audible through the "TomKat" furor. Should I pretend to know the first thing about you when all I REALLY know is tabloid pap? Your personal logic is out of my reach.

But let me say this - let me say one thing I believe from the depth of my experience as a mom, whether I know you or not: don't give it up.

Don't do it. Just don't. Don't get me wrong, now. Every mom knows the temptation. Its our mantra: how can this creature NOT be the center of my universe? Or, hey, you're married to Tom Cruise! Maybe you're looking at your checkbook thinking, "Well, but I don't have to work..." Oh to have that problem.

Here's the thing: there are a million invisible fibers that attach us to the being that grew inside of us, from zero to 8 lbs. in 40 weeks. Each step we take to introduce our children to the world beyond Mom cuts at those fibers. And it hurts. It doesn't indulge that feeling of realization - or completion or bliss or whatever - that we get from being mothers. But the sooner your child is able to reach beyond the warmth of mom, to find out that there are other warm, caring people out there to love and protect you, well, isn't that the gift we really want to give our children? The ability to trust and open up to the world?

So the long and the short, Katie Holmes, is that you have, from all early indications, what it takes to be a luminous film star. I've never seen Dawson's Creek so, admittedly, I don't know from whence you came. I have seen Pieces of April and Batman Begins and, while I admit that I too have my opinions about your personal life, I think your film career has more potential than any I've seen in long while.

You have the resources to take your child to work with you. Most moms do not. You have the opportunity to shine as an actress, make wonderful cinematic art, and be with your child at the same time. What could be more illuminating for a child than to watch her mother engage with the world and shine?

For starters...

An exercise: sit down and think about your life - your career, your marriage, your relationships, your finances - and think about your troubles... Thought of something? What is your top three? What's really making you worry or stressed?

Was one of them the notion that some gay people want to get married? That one causing you and your husband to fight? Probably not. How about whether or not we burn flags? Or is it all the abortions happening everywhere that is keeping you from spending more time with your kids? And lets be real: is the repeal of the estate tax going to make it easier to pay off your credit card debt?

My point is that the things that are really important in our lives are not the things that our government cares about. They aren't the things that the media investigates. Non-issues clutter our political landscape and the result is that government does nothing - no, NOTHING - to make most American lives better.

Our issues? Debt. Family time. Education. The legacies we leave the next generation: a home, a meager inheritance, a budget surplus, an art scene, a planet. Time for us to refocus. And to take our culture with us.