No Kidding, Seriously; Absence Is Presence; Presence Is Absence

In my mind, I have often walked in the moccasins of a tribe I am not part of in this lifetime:  Parents.  This time around, having children was not part of “the plan.”  Why?  Well, that’s a discussion for another blog post.

When I was in my 20s, a very wise man, who at the time had a very sick young daughter, said to me, “There is only one thing that divides the people of this world.  And that is the experience, or not, of being a parent.” 

That statement alone prepared me well for what I was just beginning to witness at that time:  Friends, family members, and acquaintances becoming first-time parents and, thus, their lives instantly changing focus and trajectory.  I sensed that these peers who I had known in one way had passed, and who was reborn in their stead was never going to be accessible to me quite in the same way again.

Having and raising children, I have both heard and observed, is both potentially greatly challenging and deeply rewarding and fulfilling.  While it may be difficult at times raising kids, please consider for a moment the scenario of not having had them.

Moving through life in, shall I say, a “child-free” state, one must necessarily acquiesce to the needs of other people’s parenthood.  Consequently, I’ve become adept at a social life alone or with friends who also happen to not have children and whose schedule better allows for availability and social access.  Now, don’t get me wrong:  Plenty of my friends are parents.  But gathering socially is a much different experience when kids factor into the equation.  By necessity, the topic of kids in conversation and thought becomes an understandably dominant theme among parents, one I can only connect and engage with to a limited extent.  So, as a child-free adult, I have learned to accommodate and accept the social tweakings that accompany discernment of parents and non-parents along my path and in my circle.  It’s all part of the village.

Admittedly, as a Western woman, while it is much easier these days to live a child-free life (as it is now essentially regarded as a lifestyle choice rather than as a default status stigmatized by lack and/or judgment), moving through life reinforces the separation of experience between parents and non-parents.  Because once you are a parent, you are a parent for life.  That fate is sealed.  There is no return policy, there is no “going back.”  No matter if a child is somehow removed from one’s life, one has still parented a child.

A while back, a friend of mine who is a mother asked me if I regretted not having kids.  The question surprised me a bit and felt heavy with assumption.

“The absence of one thing is the presence of another,” I replied.

I really liked my response.  Not just because it sounded good, but because it was true.

So what is present in a child-free life?  Fundamentally, a particular kind of freedom.  And there’s the rub.  This is probably the most coveted aspect of a child-free life.  Believe it or not, it took me many years to really embrace this huge opportunity for nurturance, self-care, and personal growth of a different kind without feeling “wrong,” “insecure,” or “guilty” about it.  I endured the gauntlet of both my own perception of people’s judgment about my not having children as well as the occasional reality of such judgment, and I have emerged stronger, relaxed, at peace, and finally embodying the conviction that not only am I entitled to the same joy as every other human being on this planet, kid and adult, but that I have equivalent and alternative means by which to create and manifest that joy in my life and other people’s lives.  

Silver Spoons; Wooden Spoons; Passing the Buck

In college, I majored in economics.  For a lover of words and the literary arts, this seems an unlikely move.  I made the choice for several reasons.  One, because it was the ‘80s; two, as someone with five planets in Capricorn, practicality was big on my radar.

The third reason, however, was the most compelling.  I knew even back then that money drives much of human behavior and the events of our world.  I wanted to understand this dynamic more deeply, and I thought a greater focus on studying econ would facilitate that.

Well, it sorta did, and it didn’t.  What I did take away from delving into the very dry and theoretical world of econ (except for the class on the economics of the Plague) was the awareness that because we live in a capitalist society, when looking at any societal dynamic, to always “follow the money.”  In other words, to look for and at the economic driver of anything because there usually is one.  

Cynical?  No.  Realistic?  Yes.

Yet as I moved on in life and life became much less theoretical, I came to see and experience the complexity, paradox, and challenge that is money.  The human relationship with money does not correlate so cleanly on an X-Y axis.

I wandered far off “the grid” that is theory and entered a whole new world of sticky, angst-ridden, real-world inquiry about money.  Here is some of what I’ve gleaned.

1.    We are each of us born with different spoons in our mouths – silver, wooden, metal – and many with no spoon at all.  If we are to live in a world that values the dignity of all people, it is vital for the “haves” to remember that they had help and whatever financial security they have attained was not solely of their own making.   

2.    Money is energy.  Flowing healthfully, the system within which it circulates is balanced.  When energy is overstored, it leads to imbalance, a “fattening.” Unregulated capitalism has wrought severe imbalance in our society.  An obese few hoard at the expense of a malnourished many.  Properly stored energy is healthy.  Overstored energy is not.

3.    In this society, value is assigned to people based on how much money they make or generate.  A thriving society requires goods and services of all types.  Innovation, service, creativity, social good, and productivity are all facets of a vibrant economy and, in my view, should be valued with more parity and dignity.

4.    Let us expand our consciousness and realize that there is far more to an economy than money.  Buying and selling is only one form of transaction.  There is also sharing, borrowing, gifting, bartering, re-using, and volunteering.  The worthy challenge is to embrace and encourage the integration of all of these transactions and exchanges into our economy.

5.    We assign price to that which is priceless.  With less and less social oversight by dysfunctional and compromised governing centers at all levels, capitalism has reduced virtue to a commodity and relegated the cornerstones of human welfare (i.e. health and education) to a callused and rigged marketplace.

Not only are more and more people being rendered precipitously vulnerable by our economic system, but we are incentivized to concern ourselves only with ourselves at the expense of the welfare of the collective.

The time is now to deeply and consciously discern what, as human beings and as the human race, we want and need and to take personal and collective action toward making new choices involving money.

Halloween Hollowing

I suspend my flow of prose this week to bring you a poem that woke me a few nights ago, asking to be written.  I happily complied.  I know it’s not quite Halloween, but both I and the poem could not wait for it to be shared with you.

                                            Halloween Hollowing

                             We are pumpkins.

                             In the darkness, under the moon,

                             We are hollowed clean.

                             Our carved, curved

                             Smiling faces of joy emerge,

                             And the flame shines brightly

                             From within

                             For all to see in the dark

                             While the spirits dance

                             In celebration

                             And the coyotes howl

                             With delight.

                                                                   2014