Motherhood can be a stressful experience and it can become even more complex when fraught with guilt. In the short story, I stand here Ironing, Tillie Olsen transcribes a mother's reconstruction of her life to frame her guilt properly and possibly purge herself of the same. The physical action of the iron as it goes back and forth is juxtaposed with the mental process of reflection on the past and the present. "I stand here ironing, and what you asked me moves tormented back and forth 1 with the iron." (p. 12) A guilt-ridden mother reconstructs her past to understand her daughter's present behavior, blaming herself for possible neglect as Emily was growing up. As mother goes back to fetch her past life, we as readers get a glimpse of Emily's childhood. There are few intrusions that bring her back to the present like "I put the iron down" (p. 12); "Ronnie is calling. He is wet and I change him" (p. 17); "She is coming." (p. 19). But this journey of recollection ends on a positive note, "At the end she comes to understand that she'd done the best she could, given the circumstances-but this simple insight, and her journey toward it, are quietly devastating." (Disher, 2001: 91)
             Emily is a nineteen year old in the present. She is confident woman and has found the art of self-expression through mime. But occasionally she can behave erratically and her sense of self-worth gets dented. That is when she wants to be assured of her beauty and her attractiveness. Emily would insist on being told, "over and over how beautiful she had been--and would be, I would tell her--and was now, to the seeing eye. But the seeing eyes were few or non-existent. Including mine" (p. 10). That was when her alienation, her isolation and her mother's helplessness and guilt became obvious and grew more intense: "the unsureness, the having to be conscious of words before you speak, the constant caring--what are they thinking of me?...