(no subject)

[rm]

I just went digging about for a post I felt sure I made over a year ago, because I remember thinking about it so much and I wanted to see how I worded it, but I never did apparently. And it's interesting to me, the few things I meet with quiet.

When I was much younger and wanted children for myself, from myself, it was the sort of thing I viewed with solemnity and awe.

Now when friends announce pregnancies and intents, I mostly just shrug and go, "wacky," because in many ways, I simply just don't get it, my seriousness and solmenity having drifted to other things, and my fondness for my body and life having arrived at a point where I feel literally horrified at the notion of so altering it with a pregnancy of my own. This is most likely partially the result of no longer wishing to be claimed by anything or anyone.

But every once in a while, I get banged on the head with that former feeling of awe, and it is a perpetually strange feeling, this recollection of those first moments when I really found a way to understand my quiet, sly and status obsessed self.

I remarked to someone on the phone last night in a ranging discussion of society and psychology that perhaps so many men have such odd relationships with their children because unlike women, they are not used to being defined by others -- in the larger societal picture, regardless of what an individual might think, a woman is defined by her husband, parents and siblings far more than a man is. A wife stereotypically reflects on a man like an accessory, but a husband on a woman like an overarching title. And so when couples have children, men are faced, often for the first time (at least in perception outside themselves), with being defined by another being, often by no more than the mere staggering logistics of a child, and it necessarily must bend the whole notion of self around a tree, sometimes gracefully, often not.

I know I did write once, surely I remember writing this, how we reward men for being even halfway decent fathers ("oh that's so sexy, he's carrying his baby") and really only acknowledge acts of motherhood when they fail, even by the smallest incriments ("I really think that maybe should have a hat on, it's cold").

Children are strange signifiers, and I adore them, but where I should have a biological clock, I have an academic fascination and a quiet admiration too rarely triggered. I'm not a cold woman, just over-ritualized.

Comments

[orien.livejournal.com]

My biological clock went off very badly at the beginning of the year because I was on the verge of signing the paperwork to largely finalize its inability to ever carry a child. That was all very disturbing. I never thought I would have such a purely physical impulse to have children. I was glad when it finally stopped.

[hightekvagabond.livejournal.com]

I completly understand your feeling on having or not having kids. I am often ashamed myself of how often I think "Wow, if I was single with no dependants my life would be so much simpler and I could do all the things I want to do" but those thoughts are generally put aside when I have one of those magical moments you get with children from time to time. And now that I'm not a single parent anymore and the efforts of caring for my daughter are shared it's alot easier too... I can make to my Eskrema class and Actor's Forum and such. The scary question for me is the question of "If I could do it all over again would I still do it the same" and the honest answer is "I don't know".

Also, once you are past the Baby phase and the kid is old enough to take on some of your interests life gets much more active again :)

As for the Father's thing I think it's much more a matter of priorities and what children are taught. Boys are given cars and soldiers to play with, girls are given dolls and taught that taking care of babies is important. Generally, when someone tells me I'm a good father I don't usually vocalize my thought but it's usually the fact that my father was a horrible father and I promised myself I'd not be him that keeps me in line. So, not fucking up my child in the way my father fucked me up reordered my priorities quite a bit and I don't think many men have that revolation in thier life.

Being a Parent is a learned thing, it is definatly not instinctual, Someone has to teach you to want to be, and to care. Socioty teaches it to girls more then boys. Not saying that is right or wrong, it just is.

Thats my two cents *shrugs* take it or leave it.

[lachupacabra.livejournal.com]

where i should have a biological clock, i have a deep-seated fear
& hatred of the parasitic infection that is a fetus & a hideous, awful
loathing of all things child-related.
when i hear one of them cry, my eye twitches & i want to SHAKE them.
im not sure what made me feel like this but i always have & i honestly cant help it.
im not thrilled about it but i thank goodness that i know better than to ever have one.
:)
sometimes, if they belong to friends, theyre ok ... even kinda cute

[rothko.livejournal.com]

i know you wrote that too, i remember it. perhaps it was on the list that shall not be named? *snort*

i never thought i had a biological clock, but i was never 33 before. and we know people with kids here, whereas before, all my friends were either single or if not, had no kids. so it's weirrrd. now that i'm around kids more often, i sorta wonder. but i just can't do it, so i play with the little ones and then give them back, and that's that.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I'm really sure it was here, because I remember the triggering event, but ah well... I probably wrote it there too in repsonse to some other bit of randomness as well.

Glad I'm not going insane though.

[czarchasm.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad The Lady has the job she now has: Her clients more than satisfy any maternal instinct she may possess.

As for men being defined by others: I feel that the man is defined as equally by society, but not through their blood ties. Rather, men tend to be defined by relations more commercial. Males tend to give a human equivalent to the business/company/industry they represent, far more than females do. Ken Lay is Enron. Josh the Mac Genius is the face of Apple service. Tony the Tiger is Kellogg's. Most men are aware of this generalization, and spend much time fretting over this. The awarkdness you describe in fatherhood is, I feel, stems from the fact that this is now a being, related by birth, that will look up to you (at first) unconditionally. Many men I know are not comfortable with that level of power.

[purrjian.livejournal.com]

I find that, now that I'm nearly through menopause, my thoughts seem to direct themselves to the "What If?" scenario. You know the one: what if I had found a man I wanted to raise children with? what if I had borne a child or children? would I have been a good mother? All those questions that will never be answered. Perhaps, in some alternate universe, I found a life partner and became a parent.

All I'm wanting to know now is when my thoughts will stop directing me to that subject.