What I've Learned From Being Childless - Lesson 1

Being childless means that whatever romantic relationship I'm in will last based only on mutual love.

There are many couples that stay together "for the kids." As they look upon the beautiful faces of the human beings they are responsible for raising, and understand the love their children have for both their parents, they find reasons to keep on keeping on even when they are ready to move on.

And many times it works.  In relationships that have a decent foundation, shared core values and where both parties are willing to put their children's needs above their own... it works. Sometimes for 20 years, 30 years, or even "forever." The children, the grandchildren, the family - it's what they worked towards, made sacrifices for, invested in.  Their relationship with one another changes over time, and they like each other enough to ignore their own need for true companionship.  They have a partnership that works towards keeping the family "together."

Sometimes they figure that it's better than taking a risk and finding out that the grass isn't always greener on the other side.  Why bring stress to the family if it will only result in personal disappointment in the long run, etc. etc.  In some cases as soon as the kids are old enough or off on their own, the marriage or relationship disintegrates on its own, without much effort because the glue that kept the family together - the children - are no longer an issue, or the parents feel the children are old enough to adjust to a different version of "family."

Childless couples do not have this "glue".  We must rely on the integrity and value of the relationship with the other.  As anyone who has ever lived with anyone else knows, it is not easy making "glue" with someone who was a stranger for most of one's life.  Two people from two different families, two different life experiences, two different value systems, two different everything - come together to start a whole new family, life experiences, value system - a whole new everything - based only on love for the other.

After almost 10 years of marriage, it turned out that the glue my husband and I had used to build our family had dried out and wasn't sticking anymore.

Have you ever broken a vase, ceramic pot or plastic container and glued it together but used the generic all purpose glue? It stayed for a while, but eventually the glue doesn't adequately form the chemical bonds with the material to hold it together.  The glue dries and as soon as you find the need to move the container around, the thing falls apart.  You then go and try to glue it together again. Sometimes you use the better glue, but the residue of the old glue is still there and the thing holds together for a while but it doesn't last long.

That's what sort of happened with my marriage.  There was a lot of good there, but not enough. The residue of the cheap stuff got in the way - making it difficult for the bond to hold fast.  There were no hard feelings (eventually) - but the container could no longer do it's job, so we took the pieces and we threw them away.

Children may have made our bond hold for 20 years, 30 years, maybe until one of us died, but children didn't happen for us.  We were left with just the other to contend with. When it came down to it, we just didn't have the right stuff to keep it together.

In about 3 months, it will be one year that we are officially divorced (we were separated and living apart for 18 months before that). I don't have children that I can look at and say, "it was worth it because I have them."  I also do not have all the headaches that come with co-parenting children with someone who you are not living with! What I do have is good memories, lessons learned and a future to look forward to.  I hope someday to find someone who I can form a solid long lasting partnership with. I know what to look for now - but I am positive that I will still make some mistakes along the way.

The one thing I do know is that whoever that person is, our partnership will be based on what we share with one another, not on external or internal expectations from society or from family or from children.  It will be based on shared expectations, mutual respect, really good communication, similar core values and faith systems, compatible outlooks and goals... and of course love. Love - the ability to want the best for the other, be our best self for the other, putting aside selfish motives and agendas for the sake of the other.  One plus one equals one - that is the equation for a strong bond.

The Little Old Lady

I left off on the subject of time. And that brings me to aging.

A few months ago I celebrated the big Four-O, as in "Oh my goodness, I'm 40!"

For me, it has been a time of reflection and reassessment. During my 20's I couldn't fathom turning 40. During my 30's, the age 40 stood out there like a marker. I'd tell myself, "I have to do this and that by age 40." If I didn't get this or that done, there was always the next year since I wouldn't turn 40 yet. Until I turned 39.

Turning 39 was like a slap in the face. The whole year I was trying to hang on to the little bit of youth lingering behind because in my mind I would soon lose it forever. I would look in the mirror (I was a relatively young-looking 39) and see a little old lady lurking behind the still smooth skin. I caught a glimpse of her in a wrinkle by the corner of my eye; in the new stubborn grey hair that Ms. Clairol was unsuccessful in masking; in the stiffness in my hip when I got out of bed in the morning; and when I had to run back in the house because I not only forgot my car keys but my entire pocketbook.

I called on friends so we could "hang out", going out for drinks and dancing only to pay for it with an achey head and body the next day. I bought too-tight jeans and shiny tops then paired those with high heals. It was so uncomfortable but I was determined! We'd go to these places filled with beautiful 20 somethings in the prime of their life and full of energy.  So much fun, so much life - but after a couple of hours I was rubbing my sleepy eyes and waiting for the appropriate amount of time to go by to get out of there! I'd get home and quickly peel off the too-tight jeans and the shiny shirt then happily put on my soft pajama pants and t-shirt and jump into bed. Ahhhhh!

Then I turned to self-improvement. I paid a visit to the lasic surgeon to see if I was a candidate for eye correction surgery (turns out my corneas are too thin). I think I single handedly kept my fertility doctor in business during the worst economic crisis the country has faced since the great depression (our health insurance carrier raised our rates, but I don't think I had anything to do with that - - two other topics for future blog entries - fertility and health insurance). I started to work out (a good thing) but took it down a couple of notches after attempting to do 100's reps of squats, lunges, crunches and push ups resulting in days of sore painful muscles.

After a while I just started getting tired of trying to hold on to my ever-fleeing youth. The little old lady wasn't so scary anymore. In fact, she was sort of cute. Little by little I started to feel comfortable around her. She was sort of spry and not bad looking for an ol' gal. I began to look forward to my evolution. My mom is 60 and she is still fly. My grandma is 80 and she still has "it." Why not me? Maybe I'd live past 90! All grey hair tied up in a bun, smiling wise eyes, strong sense of self, unafraid - I liked the little old lady. She is me. I am her.

Coming to terms with the fact that I was no longer a spring chicken wasn't new to me. At age 34 I had faced and won a battle with cancer (which in and of itself deserves a blog entry), and because of that battle I am very much aware that aging is a privilege. But this was different, it wasn't the idea of my own mortality that I struggled with, it was and is the business of living with my mortality.

I guess that's why they call it "middle age crisis." One finds oneself smack in the middle of one's life (if lucky enough to live until 80 or more) and asking, "what do I do now?"

I am very lucky to have a job that pays me to make a difference in the lives of others and in society in general. My goals in life have always been altruistic. Serving others has brought me pleasure and peace. In everything I sought to do, this was a requirement. But now I want to do something that makes me happy. It's not like I want to stop doing the work I am doing, just that I want to spend my spare time doing something simply because it brings me joy. Anything else is a waste of time. Time that is precious in my old age.

One of my guilty pleasures is reading about vampires, and not just the Twilight kind. I have found myself at the library on a monthly basis borrowing books from Anne Rice's entire vampire series. The last book I read was Blood Countess, by Andrei Codrescu, a fictional story based on the real-life Countess Elizabeth Bathory of Hungary, upon whom much of vampiric mythology is based. This spring I will, once again, try my hand at gardening (although my thumb is far from green, in fact, it is closer to black since I kill every plant I get my hands on). As I discover a new-found love of cooking - even my husband has benefitted from my aging.

By far the thing that brings me the most joy is spending time with my husband, step son, parents, brother, in-laws, family and friends, but especially my nieces and nephew. When I look into their faces I see the sun, the sky, the stars, the whole universe emanating from them. Being on the other side of the country from them makes me sad sometimes, and after I visit with them I count the days until I see them again. My hope is that one day we will live closer to one another.

In the meantime, I am looking forward to traveling, painting, hiking, sunbathing and my priority is to make time for that. In these uncertain economic times, I don't know if I'll still have my job next year, but while God is willing, I will still have life.

So this ol' gal will continue to look forward to getting older and finding joy wherever it resides.

False Construct

So, where did I leave off? Oh yeah - the subject of time.

Aside from the subject of aging, time itself is perplexing to me. Time seems only to exist in reference to something else. In and of itself it really doesn't have any meaning. The sun rises and the sun sets and then it happens all over again, and again, and again. It's the same sun and the same sky. The planets revolve around the sun and then it happens all over again, and again, and again. The same planets, the same universe.

So why does it have such an effect on our daily lives. Why does time seem to control all of human history? Are things happening at the same time, is time cyclical or is it linear? I guess it all depends on how you look at it.

On a weekly basis I am supposed to hand in timesheets at work which delineate every thing I did every day for each day of the week. Unless I am working on a specific project and doing a specific thing, similar activities are lumped together. This is how it usually works in most offices and for most jobs. But it is not a true gauge of the work that is being done. It's a false construct.

Time is a false construct. For example, I can work one hour and do the same thing one person takes two hours to do, or another takes half an hour to do. There are all these variables that cannot be accounted for. If for example I work 8 hours in a day and I'm supposed to be at work at 8, but instead I get to work at 9 and work until 5 - was I late? The person who came in at 8 and left at 4 and I both worked 8 hours. Or did we? If someone can do the same job in half the time as another person, but put in the same amount of time, did they work the same amount? Probably not.

Does it matter when the work gets done? The answer is that it only matters because of the nature of the work that needs to be done, not the time itself. If part of my job is to be someplace at 8 or I will miss something important, then what matters it that I will miss something important, not that it was at 8 or 9.

I use work hours because it is easy to relate to, but this applies to all aspects of our lives. Does it matter that someone graduated from college when they were 21 or if they graduated at age 51? It doesn't matter what a person does between age 21 and 51, whatever it is, it is valuable.

I refuse to be governed by time. Maybe it's cultrual. I grew up with what we called "CP time." Today a more PC term may be "PC time" - people of color time. Because of the hotter climates where people of color originate from, it seems that how long it takes you do something is less important than getting something done. Since the sun is so hot in the middle of the day, you can't rely on the hours between 11 and 3. Things get done when they get done.

As we celebrate the end of a year and the beginning of a new one (both of which are false constructs), I hope to remember not to worry so much about planning what I will accomplish in the next year but of appreciating each accomplishment as it comes and in rejoicing in whatever lessons are learned in each moment that I live my life.

My resolution is to put any anxiety I have about time into a deep hole in the ground and say good bye to it as I say goodbye to the old year and to the last 4 decades of my life. I will hold a private memorial service to commemorate all the wonderful and not so wonderful times. And thank "time" for it's refining effect on my life.

As I look forward to the new experiences time will bring. I promise not to worry so much about what I plan to accomplish but savor each accomplishment as it comes.
What needs to get done will get done sometime.

Chasing Mice

For about five minutes I sit on the couch staring out in front of me. I then scratch my head and look down around my feet and stare at a speck on the carpet, then let out a long sigh. My husband who has been pacing back in forth, trying to get my attention, says to me, "Chasing the mouse around in your head again?"

He has such a way with words. He doesn't say much but when he does speak he uses his words with efficiency and very little waste, his arrow never misses its mark. I am envious of his ability. I never quite thought of it that way, but that is exactly what I am doing when I'm in my head. It's like a Tom and Jerry episode. Sometimes I catch the mouse, sometimes I don't. Even when I do catch it, it usually slips away to plan its revenge. The mice, of course, are my thoughts. So I say, "Yeah, that's exactly what I'm doing."

My husband rolls his eyes. He doesn't comprehend how someone can waste so much time just thinking. He's an action-motivated person who plans his day to the minute. I envy that too.

But it had to be this way, he is the yang to my ying or vice versa.

So here I am, chasing mice again. I usually reserve all my useless musings for a handwritten diary that I have kept since I was about eight years old. The oldest one I have laying around dates back to 1981, when I was 11. I guess I'm proud of that fact, but then I think it may be slightly narcissistic. There goes that mouse.

On this very cold December day, I have decided (as part of my procrastination efforts) to start a blog and go public. The idea came to me when I was viewing my sister in law's blog. For a while, my brother has urged me to start one of my own but the thought of bearing myself to the world was too much for me to... uhm ... bear. At this point so many people are doing it that I have justified this action by convincing myself that my humble blog will be lost somewhere in cyberspace and no one really cares about what I think anyway.

I took the day off from work to actually get stuff done. I have even devised an hour by hour schedule. My husband would be proud. But I'm already behind an hour. Right now, I should be dying the roots of my hair to get rid of any evidence that I am aging at a much faster rate than I am comfortable with. Where does all the time go? I guess I'll save that mouse for a later blog.