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Category: raising kids
We Are Born Racists
We are ALL racists. Every human being on the planet is BORN a racist.
NO! you’re screaming at me. BULLSHIT, you whacked-out bitch. I am not a racist!
Racism is taught, not inherent to our nature is the common wisdom. And while it’s true racism, hate, fear can be taught by parents, community, schools, religious leaders, and conservative media, we are all born, to varying degrees, racists.
Mammals, the genome to which Humans belong, are born with an innate FEAR of THE OTHER — anything outside what is familiar to us. And this fear manifests as RACISM, and SEXISM, and NATIONALISM.
“FEAR of THE OTHER” should be the universal definition of racism. And humans manifest our fear in a variety of ways. Some, their fear is so overwhelming, their ignorance so great, it aligns with HATE, and they are violent against THE OTHER.
But sometimes, when our fear is acknowledged, and then examined, it motivates us to learn about THE OTHER. Only then, do we discover that regardless of color, or even gender, we are not so different. We all FEEL the same feelings.
BULLSHIT, you calling me out again. You don’t know how it FEELS to be Black.
You’re right. I’m White. But I know what it FEELS like to be dissed. I grew up overweight in chic L.A. I was the butt of fat jokes through elementary and middle school. I never got asked out on a date until I dropped the weight in my senior year of high school. And while I am now in “good shape,” I will go to my grave feeling fat. I will never fit in to the world where thin is the only way to be “in.” And I know what it FEELS like living forever on the outside wishing to be in.
So what if you were fat, you say. You lost the weight. Skinny or fat, I can’t stop being Asian, or gay.
And I am a woman. I know what it FEELS like being judged as lesser than because I am not a man. I know how it FEELS to be making two-thirds the salary of the guy next to me doing the exact same job. My first job out of college as an art director for a major jewelry manufacturer, the CEO of the company came into my first big meeting and grabbed my breast instead of my outstretched hand. He squeezed my tit like it was an orange and said, “Nice!” I know how it FEELS to be objectified for my body alone.
Being disrespected makes me FEEL valueless, ashamed, awkward, angry, mystified, enraged, scared, small, sad. And all these negative feelings manifest inside each of us when we are dissed. The fact is, Black, White, Fat or not, we’ve all experienced each of these feelings independently, or simultaneously, regardless if we are consciously aware of them. Each of us may react to our feelings differently, but most all of us are intimate with feeling dissed.
Most of us are also intimate with feeling happy, engaged [in a pleasing activity], safe, content in moments. Our reasons for feeling these things may vary, though not as much as you think. The love of a parent, guardian or friend, the comfort of a home, full bellies from tasty food makes most of us FEEL good. The intensity of our feelings varies wildly from person to person. Some enjoy positive feelings far more often than others born with internal angst, or into external misfortune. But the feelings of HAPPY and SAD, GOOD and BAD, PROUD and ASHAMED, EMPOWERED and DISSED are common to all of us.
Being alive means FEELING. The enormous, complex range of feelings we get to experience, both body and mind, is exclusively Human. The capacity of our brain power is what separates us from every other living creature on this planet. And while we all have different experiences, feeling the same things provides a natural bridge to unite us, a window for empathy, even camaraderie through our shared feelings.
We are all born racists. You, me, all humans are born with an innate fear of THE OTHER. Once again, we are standing on the precipice of change, Racism and Sexism the topics de jour. Perhaps this time, we will get off the politically correct train, admit we are all racists and choose to fight our innate fear of THE OTHER. We’ll acknowledge the benefits of integration and globalization as an opportunity to learn from the best of each other. We’ll not only believe in, but practice equal rights.
Stand up, or take a knee, but SPEAK OUT against hate, and educate the ignorant that there really are no substantive differences between us — not color, not culture, not gender, not religious or sexual preference, because most all humans being FEEL the same things.
Boy Scouts of Faith-Based America
Friday night on the short ride home from his Boy Scout meeting, my 11 yr old son was quiet and sullen. I asked him what was up. Had anything happened at the meeting that he wanted to talk about? I saw him looking at me from my rearview mirror, gauging how to tell me disappointing news.
“I found out tonight that I can’t become an Eagle Scout.”
He’d never been all that enamored with Boy Scouts. He didn’t much care for camping, or the tough kid role so many of his contemporaries played out with the survival skills training and competitive war games. He’d decided to ‘bridge’ from ‘Webelo’ Cub Scout to a full-fledged Boy Scout to become an Eagle Scout for the prestige sold to him by his troop leaders. ‘Presidents, senators, and successful icons like Bill Gates, Steven Spielberg, Neil Armstrong were Eagle Scouts,’ the BSA marketing touts.
“College admissions officers recognize the award and consider it in their decisions. Eagle Scouts are eligible for many scholarships. Many employment recruiters look for “Eagle Scout” on a resume.” These are just a few of the perks on an Eagle Scout information page for the Boy Scouts of America, and one of the reasons we agreed when our son said he wanted to stay in their program.
I stopped at a red light and again we made eye contact in the rearview mirror. By his furrowed brows and slight frown I got that my son wasn’t sad, but bemused, bordering on angry. “What do you mean you can’t become an Eagle Scout?”
“Mr. Baker told me tonight that even if I get all my merit badges, and fulfill all the other Boy Scout requirements through middle and high school, I’m not qualified to become an Eagle Scout.”
I felt my heart pounding, reverberating in my throat. “Why?”
“The new scoutmaster said in order to achieve Eagle Scout, or any other rank, Boy Scouts must live the Scout Oath, which means we have to believe in God.”
My husband and I introduced our son to scouting when he was 5 yrs old. Fourteen Christians and one Jew, and our kid was the only member of his Webelo troop being raised without religion. Most of our neighbors, and our kids’ classmates attended the local church. My husband and I are Atheists. Our kids are not privy to the benefits of participating in this tight-knit religious community. Scouting seemed like a positive way for our son to meet other boys his age in our area.
We didn’t consider the Boy Scouts an exclusively religious organization. We’d heard stories, of course, and knew of the lawsuits for discrimination against gays, transgenders, atheists, virtually anyone who falls outside the Christian racist dogma. It motivated me to ask the women at the Cub Scout table during kindergarten school registration if their troop was religious, and if so, how. Both women assured me their Den had several different faiths among its members, and their policy was to keep religion at home, not practice it in scouting.
They were true to their word during the five years our son belonged to their Den, participating in most events from hikes to community drives for food banks, and even popcorn sales. He earned quite a few merit badges along the way. Religion, even prayer, was never practiced or promoted in any way.
This was not the case after he ‘bridged’ to full Boy Scout.
A few months back, on the drive home from his first official Boy Scout meeting, my son informed me the troop leader held a prayer at the end of their meeting. He had the boys hold hands in a circle and bow their heads while he said stuff like, ‘Lord, bless our troop with your mercy, bla, bla, bla… In Christ’s name, amen,’
I felt my blood start to boil but kept my voice even and calm when I asked him how he felt about that.
He looked at me in the rearview mirror and practically winced. Then he confessed he’d already branded himself a non-believer. The scoutmaster asked him to lead the prayer at the end of that first meeting. He’d refused, stating he wasn’t sure there was a God, and he thought praying was a waste of time because he was certain there wasn’t anyone listening. He was publicly labeled “misinformed” by the scoutmaster at that first Boy Scout meeting, marking my son as ignorant in front of the other boys.
“Do you want to quit the Boy Scouts,” I’d asked him on the ride home from that first meeting months ago.
“I wanta be an Eagle Scout, Mom, to help me get into a good college.”
I assured him good grades, participation in extracurriculars and such would get him into the university of his choice. The Boy Scouts’ branding would be unnecessary. We discussed finding a non-religious troop, if there was such a thing, but my son didn’t want to be with a bunch of kids he didn’t know since most of the Webelos he’d been with the last five years had bridged to this new troop. He just wouldn’t recite what he didn’t believe, he’d told me.
That wasn’t good enough for advancement to Eagle Scout, according to his new scoutmaster. No matter how lax about religion our son’s lower division Den, the rank of Boy Scout and higher stuck to the rules of the BSA, the scout leader told our son at the end of last Friday’s meeting. A religious association and faith in God are required for rank advancement. Commitment to community service, practicing Scouting’s core values of “honesty, compassion,” as well as continually exhibiting “diligence as a contributing team member,” were irrelevant. Belief in a god was more important than social service. Atheism is a sin, the scoutmaster assured our son.
It took all my will not to U-turn right then and go back to the church where the meetings were held, hoping to catch the troop leader before he left. I was so enraged that this man told my kid his belief system was a sin I couldn’t construct anything but a rant to say to him so I didn’t turn around. No sense in destroying what little relationship I had with the man if my son wanted to continue with the troop.
“I could lie that I believe,” my son suggested, “If I have to…”
“Think that’s a good idea?” I asked, glad to be driving, which made it easier to keep emotional distance and sound casual.
“Maybe. I just don’t get why I have to pretend I believe in God. The Boy Scout handbook says we’re supposed to ‘respect and defend the rights of others to practice their own beliefs.’ But they’re not.”
Ah, from the mouths of babes…
He’s right, of course. Click on the official BSA website, and bring up the “Scout Oath and Law” page. The first line in the Scout Oath proclaims the scout will ‘do his duty to God [and country].’ Every level of advancement requires a promise or show of faith in God. Boy Scouts are instructed to respect the beliefs of others, but they are taught this respect should only be awarded to those who believe in the Christian/Judaeo God. Turns out, prejudice, hate, racism are systemic to the Boy Scouts of America, and a large part of what they quietly, and individually through their troop leaders, promote.
The Cub Scout sign-up table was at our public school. The Boy Scouts were allowed to promote their organization even though federal and state laws explicitly state discrimination by sex, race, or religious orientation is illegal in our public education system. Nowhere in the BSA literature we received and perused before or after our son joined the Boy Scouts did they say they were a faith-based organization that required their members to be believers. Had they disclosed this with all transparency, as do churches and other religious organizations pushing their beliefs, my husband and I would not have guided our son to participate.
We impose no religion on our children. We discuss it often— the concept of one god versus many; various cultures and their belief systems from ancient to modern man, using everything from the Tao to biblical references. Our kids get additional religious education through their friends, and faith-based celebrations with extended family. My husband and I try and expose our children to many possibilities, trusting they will discover their own spirituality, a belief system that works for them, with a moral code that positively impacts the lives they touch directly and indirectly.
Parents who provide religious training for their kids early on, and, it would appear, register them in Boy Scouts, are looking to validate their beliefs by indoctrinating their kids with the religion in which they were raised. And most of these parents have never stopped to consider whether the rhetoric their parents sold them is truth. They are blind believers, and turn their children into the same.
“The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) takes a strong position, excluding atheists and agnostics,” according to Wikipedia.
In 2014 the BSA finally voted to allow gay kids. They still ban atheists.
Perhaps the BSA works with the Church to convert unsuspecting children. Hook ‘em when they’re young, a mere 5 yrs old, in Cub Scouts. Get them to work hard for advancement, then deny them further advancement unless they convert to Christianity. Whatever BSAs agenda, and our son now sees they clearly have one, the meeting with his troop leader last Friday night soured him to continuing in scouting. It’s a shame, really, because the Boy Scouts have so many positives to offer. Weirdly enough, they tout much of the same morality I preach to my kids, like being courteous, honest, caring, and compassionate. The only difference between us is I don’t believe a god gave us this wisdom. I give credit to humanity, over eons, watching what works to build thriving societies.
There is no god that’ll save us from hate, prejudice, nationalism, and exclusionary religious sects like the BSA who lure kids in, like the Pied Piper, under the guise of community involvement, then change the rules mid-play. Regardless of our differences, religiously, culturally, politically, PEOPLE, me and you, must use our collective wisdom to unite as one race—the Human race—for our continued existence.
The Yin/Yang of Love
Got the call at 7:50 this morning and knew something was wrong. No one calls when I’m getting the kids ready for school unless it’s bad news. And there was no possible way my 14 yr old son could have made it to school on his bike so fast.
Could hardly hear the woman over the sound of traffic digitally amplified through her cell, informing me my son had been in a bike accident. I finally got that he was pretty badly battered, but conscious. He was bleeding, she said, quite a bit, but seemed in tact. The moment she said where they were, and before she finished speaking, I put the phone on the kitchen table, called for my 7 yr old daughter to come with me and we got in my car and went to my son a few blocks away.
He was sitting on the curb when I pulled up behind the car I later found out belonged to the good folks who stopped to help my kid. They were in traffic and saw him on the side of the road crying and bleeding, his bike crumpled in front of him. I managed to get out of my car without faltering, and my son managed to stand so we could hug, feel each other, body to body, soul to soul.
“I don’t know what happened,” my newly taller than me kid cried into my shoulder. “I didn’t see the trash can. They’re usually out tomorrow. I wasn’t expecting them today. I didn’t see it.”
His face was a bloody mess, bleeding across his chin, his upper lip, his shoulder, scrapes on his arm. He couldn’t move his left hand. I didn’t cry. He needed me to be strong. God, if he only knew how fragile and afraid I felt right then. The idea of him leaning on me was on par with absurd in my head. But I didn’t cry. I thanked the woman and the man she was with probably fifty times in the space of five minutes. The man graciously put my son’s bike in my car as I helped my kid in, and we went home.
My son walked away from the bike accident with a fractured wrist, abrasions, a loose front tooth that the dentist thinks will be fine down the line. In fact, in time, he should heal just fine. He will. I won’t.
Went out to my office once my son was squared away and cried my eyes out. If I could have prayed, I would have right then, and did thank dumb luck all day, and even still as I write this, and forever forward, my kid wasn’t killed, or injured beyond repair for life. He was careless, and the laws of physics that say we can’t move through solid objects came into play. I know this law to be true, I believe in this law because I’ve spent a lifetime witnessing it. I’ve never seen anyone walk through walls, or pass a hand through glass, except magicians, which we all know is an illusion, a trick of eye, not physically possible.
There have been many times, like this bike accident with my son, I’ve wished I could believe in something, anything to justify events other than just entropy, but I’ve always been an empiricist—show me, don’t tell me because I won’t believe you. On the outside of our religious world, at times lonely to the extreme, I went searching in my early twenties for an ideology to be a part of, and that’s when I discovered Taoism.
I am not a Taoist. I am an atheist, and do not believe in any ‘supreme ultimate.’ And though I’ve read the Tao Te Ching through, many times, I understand little of the poems of Laozi. It was through Taoism, however, I first heard of the concept of yin/yang. 陰陽
The Taijitu ☯, the commonly known yin/yang symbol from 14th century China, represents a philosophy first seen in the Tao Te Ching in the 4th century BC, though many believe the concept of opposites in harmony define balance existed many millennium before the writings. Black/white, day/night, male/female, dull/bright—in yin/yang ideology, with everything there is an equal opposite occupying the same space, intertwining, even mixing, actualizing each other’s existence, and keeping the natural balance of the whole, that which is all.
Heady, to be sure, but not when you break it down to what we experience daily. We can’t really know happy never having felt sad. Can’t have a bottom without a top. There is no such thing as right with no wrong (or left..; ). These are abstracted, philosophical truths. Just like physics, yin/yang’s empirical proofs play out in every aspect of living, which can never be fully appreciated without death.
While I believe the yin/yang philosophy to be truth, a basic physical and metaphysical law, and understand the balance interconnected opposites provide, I can’t help resent this fundamental aspect of natures structure in times like this morning when my child’s life is put on the line. The cruelest, sickest, most twisted opposites of all is the spectacular, magnificent, breath-taking, electric-connection we get to feel for our kids, and the choking, terrifying, heart-stopping fear of losing them— the yin/yang of love and loss.
The Folly of Perception
I’ve been on the outside looking in since I was a little kid. Failing to assimilate, I worked at cultivating unique and different. After achieving this coveted perception, I no longer wish to possess it.
Unique often translates into strange. And as the mother of a 10 and an 8 year old, I do not want to be perceived as strange or different. I want to blend like homogenized milk and give my kids the platform to fit in, be a part of. What I don’t want is for either of my children to be “that kid with the weird mom,” though I fear I may already be there.
My kids still hold my hand, and not just in parking lots or crossing the street. They both still love to snuggle. I am their first choice to talk to, confide in, way beyond their dad, which makes me feel valued, respected and deeply humbled all at the same time. I realize this level of intimacy probably won’t [and perhaps shouldn’t] last as they grow and find their own path, but I don’t want my kids to ever be ashamed of me. I want to be proud of them. I want them to be proud of me.
I try to fit in. I go to the soccer games and the ballet classes and I wait around with the other parents and try to blend. But I don’t. And I get that they notice I don’t. I look different. I’m one of the oldest among them, by a good margin. My kids came late, after six pregnancy losses. I dress for comfort so most everything I have is rather loose. I don’t wear make-up. My hair is long and fine and all over the place. It refuses to stay pulled back in the scrunchy. I never quite look ‘put together.’
But looks aren’t the only thing that separates me.
Through the years I’ve come to realize that I don’t think like most people. The glass wall between me and most of humanity is not just me being paranoid. There is a casualness the parents seem to have with one another as they discuss their kids, or some celebrity or popular new show. I stand there and nod my head when it seems appropriate, but I don’t watch much TV, and really don’t care that Tyler is playing basketball now which conflicts with his sister’s dance schedule.
I’ve tried engaging more personally, ask about jobs, interests outside of family, broached news and current events, but taking a position and endeavoring to discuss it has mostly been met with polite blank stares. Everyone is careful with their words—politically correct and upbeat. I’m neither, and over the years I’ve learned to shut up to avoid discord. The conversations usually segue back to their kids and related activities around family, school, church, which as atheists we don’t attend. I invariably check out of the exchange and focus on the event at hand and cheering on my children.
The game or recital ends but everyone stays and continues talking. I’m on the outside again, feels like I’m lurking while I linger to give my kids time to play. I stand there watching them all integrate, proud of my children for choosing to, and of myself for giving them the opportunity when I’d rather just leave. I watch the parents gaily chat and wish I fit in like that. The folly of unique and different is it’s really quite lonely out here.
On Being Cool
Had a meltdown on my tween son when he asked, yet again, for an iPad at breakfast this morning.
Before the iPad he wanted a laptop. He’d insisted he needed my old HP the moment I purchased my Toshiba, though he could give no reason why he had to have it, since he had a powerful PC with an enhanced graphics card for gaming in his room. After weeks of needling me, I finally gave him my old laptop to share after backing up [mostly] everything. He loaded the same games he had on his PC, and played them in bed on the laptop for about a week, until he inadvertently downloaded a virus which destroyed every program, every file on the machine—all seven years of my work. (Between ‘mostly’ and ‘everything’ I’d backed up turned out to be the Grand F**king Canyon.)
Prior to the laptop, he needed an iPhone. He’s had a cellphone since the 5th grade, when he started walking the quarter mile home from school. In the two years he’s had it, he forgets it at home most of the time unless I remind him to bring it with him. More often than not the phone has no charge because he doesn’t remember to charge it. Though all his friends have cellphones, he’s exchanged numbers with no one, and, upon inquiry, this seems fairly typical among his contemporaries.
Before the iPhone he had to have a video camera, which he got for his birthday. He used it a few times to tape episodes of Sponge Bob off the TV so he could view them later through the camera’s viewfinder. That lasted about a month, until he tired of it and he hasn’t touched the camera since.
An iPod was before the video camera. I use his iPod when I’m recharging mine, since in the four years he’s owned it, he’s used it maybe 10 times collectively.
He sat at the kitchen table this morning eating his cereal telling me how badly he needed an iPad. They are so cool, he insisted, giving me his puppy face, and good for school, he assured me, though was unable to define how, since a home PC with internet access was all his middle school required. He kept at it throughout breakfast, bargaining away all other gifts for his upcoming birthday in exchange for just one iPad.
And I blew a gasket.
He wanted too damn much! He asked for too much with no purpose. What the hell was the point of all these things when he didn’t even use them?
To be cool, mom, he said through tears.
His palpable shame was a knife through my heart. At 11 years old, crying had ceased to be acceptable, except in tragic situations, and me yelling at him wasn’t tragic. I sat down at the table adjacent to him and stared at my son, fighting tears from overwhelming me as well.
Being cool isn’t about what you have, I reminded him gently. Cool is about what you are, who you are, what you do that makes you special, separates you from the crowd. He was a straight A student, in advanced at math, played electric guitar, but every accomplishment I pointed out just made him cry harder.
None of that matters, he insisted. No one cares about that stuff. And being a nerd might pay off later, but right now no one his age knew or cared who Bill Gates was, he said, throwing my refrain back at me.
Your dad would ask why cool matters, was the lame response I came up with. I knew cool mattered, even to me, but especially for a kid becoming a teen.
It just does, my son assured me. And I’m not, he added shakily, unable to stop the new round of tears.
My heart in my throat, and struggling to swallow back my own tears stopped me from lecturing, but I again reminded my son that iPads and iPhones and video cameras are tools, nothing more, and possessing them doesn’t make one cool.
Yes, mom, he patronized me. But an iPhone is still cool, and so are iPads.
They are cool, undeniably, I told him. And that makes the engineers who invent Apple’s products cool, but not so much the people who use them. I needed to be sure he understood what “cool” really is, and perhaps remind myself as well.
Michael has an iPhone and an iPad and he’s totally popular, my son insisted. Everyone likes him. He has tons of friends and no one picks on him, ever.
Cool means Popular when you’re 11, and I suppose even for adults. Most of us want to be liked, admired, feel special, unique, seen as cool. But I knew Michael wasn’t popular because of his iPad and went about trying to enlighten my son without losing his attention. I pointed out Michael’s rather jovial demeanor, and reminded my son that this popular kid was also an avid sportsman, into soccer, basketball, baseball…etc, the ultimate key to cool for boys in school.
Perhaps Michael’s popularity had nothing to do with his iPad, I suggested. And to further my reasoning I asked, If Evan had an iPhone or iPad do you think he’d be more popular?
Evan is a jerk, my son proclaimed. He’s mean and rowdy, and he has an iPhone, mom. His eyes seem to sparkle with awareness of his own words. Then he smiled. He got it, and I smiled, too, for about a second, until his expression darkened again. But I’ll never be like Micheal, do what he does. I suck at sports and don’t really care about ’em. And I’m not exactly what you’d call upbeat.
And I’ll never write like Stephen King, or Ray Bradbury, or John Fowles,” I said.
Who are they? he asked.
Famous authors you’ve obviously never heard of. Forget it. Tell me, who else is cool, dude? Name five, other than your classmate, Michael. Anyone. Doesn’t even have to be one of your contemporaries.
Greenday, he looked to me for approval.
Okay. Who else?
Death Cab [for Cutie] (another rock band). Thomas Edison. Einstein. And Jason, at school. All the girls really like him.
I laughed. Why?
I don’t know. He’s short, but kind of buff already, I guess. He’s on the track team, and the basketball team, and he tells everyone he lifts his dad’s weights. He’s really into working out.
And what do all five you just named have in common?
He fiddled with the remainder of the Crispex in his bowl as he pondered my question.
They’re all good at something.
And how do you get good at anything? yet another of my canonical refrains.
Practice.
You bet. Find something you love, that turns you on, and work at it, my beautiful son. Practice your guitar more, and become a great musician. Invent a new video game instead of playing someone else’s creation. Learn how to program and develop apps, show us you need an iPad as a tool to create with.
He brightened, smiled at me. I had his full attention again, my reason for slipping in the iPad comment.
Owning an iPad is easy, my baby, and meaningless, just one of many who do, and more who will. Creating with one is cool. Cool is as cool does, kid. Pursue a passion and you’ll be engaged, entertained, and so enraptured in the process you won’t notice or care if you’re popular. And how cool is that! ; – )
The Power of Love
My son’s guitar teacher was freaking out the other day over the impending arrival of his first child. Beyond a healthy birth, he was consumed with anxiety over the care and feeding of an infant, all the way up through guiding his child through their teen years. As a parent of two tweens, I shared with him the secret of parenting, what makes the sacrifice not only tolerable but wildly enjoyable, and he calmed, and smiled, allowed his excitement to peek through.
It’s never talked about—that intense, profoundly magnificent feeling a parent gets to embrace the moment their child is born, and forever forward. It’s expected we love our kids, and therefore taken for granted, which is a shame, because the intensity of that feeling is so spectacular and unique.
I’d listen to my contemporaries talk about their children before I had kids. They spoke of the long nights with crying, colic infants, “the terrible two’s,” “the f***ing four’s,” surviving the teen years. Sometimes, they’d comment their Kylie had made Honor role, or that Jordan had just got first chair for his violin, and their entire countenance would light up. But those moments were rare compared to the complaints.
Like most women, I simply assumed I’d have children. I planned to have two kids in my early to mid-30s after I’d established my career and proven my own greatness. But it wasn’t until I was almost 40 that I became pregnant with my son, my first baby to survive after six miscarriages.
Nine and a half months of pregnancy, connected to the infant growing inside, and everyday was fraught with wonder, and fear. Five days of labor, and the moment I held my son for the first time, minutes after delivery, his tiny warm body on mine, a tsunami of humbling awe so overwhelmingly powerful swept through me it literally took my breath away. And as I kissed his downy head, his hands, each finger, I realized the joyful contentment, the sense of energized completeness, that electric connection I felt to him, for him— was love.
Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine the intensity of love that could be attained until having children. I’ve been lucky and had loving parents, a few dear friends, the love I now feel for my husband, passionate and true. But it doesn’t touch the intensity of the love I feel for my kids. Virtually every time I am with my children, snuggle with them, kiss them goodnight, or just see them across a room, I feel that all encompassing love fill me up and consume me with tenderness, compassion and humility. Now 9 and 12, and they still take my breath away. Every day.
People who never have children, or don’t devote their life to raising them— as with adoption— will never know this level of love. In their lifetime, they will never understand the feeling that we call ‘love’ can be this intense. I’ve heard many of my contemporaries say with conviction that they’ve never wanted, and will never have kids, with rationalizations like “I’m just selfish, I guess.” But the truth is they’re only robbing themselves.
Life’s greatest gift is our ability to feel. We all experience pain and sorrow, happiness and joy to varying degrees. The unspoken gift of parenting is getting to feel the fulfillment and richness of that intense love integrated into every aspect of our lives, motivating us to be positive examples, and challenging us to consider others, and the future beyond ourselves.
The price of living with this intensity of love is the amorphic fear of losing it, which is why parents worry so much. Through the tantrums and the tears, the joy and the fears in sharing life with kids, the ultimate reward in parenting is the privilege of loving our children.
jcafesin.com 