In this month's
Chatelaine magazine, they have an article in the Life section called Live and Learn--women from their 20's-70's share what they have learned so far.
I really enjoyed the section from the woman in her 40's, Lisa Moore. I tried to find the article online to link here, but it must not be posted yet. You'll have to pick up a copy of Chatelaine to read it in full, here is an excerpt:
If you have children, trust them completely, all the time, no matter what. If you don't trust them, pretend that youdo. Listen to everything they say and take their advice. They are always right, especially about fashion and tofu. they know about antibiotics in meat and what's a foul on the basketball court and who is a bully and who isn't. Believe them.
Give them a loonie or a cellphone so they can call home if they get in trouble. Don't get mad if they are in trouble. Stand up for them no matter what. Say you love them a hundred times a day. Say yes every chance you get. Don't be afraid to say no.
Try to have children in your life, whether they are related to you or not. Teach them how to be kind while you have the chance. Just open your front door and your back door and they will run through. Round them up and bring them to the movies or take them to the swimming pool.
Take lots of pictures. Write things down. Make home movies. Nearly a decade later you will find the home movie of your two-year old son with his golden curls--sun-shot, vulnerable, full of awe--on the carousel at the amusement park calling out for his sister every time the ponies make a complete turn. Where's Eva? There she is. Where's Eva? There she is.
Ride horses. But there will be a moment when you are galloping through the woods hunched over your horse's neck and something will compel you to sit up straight. Don't do it. Wait until you have passed under that low-hanging branch. Wait until you are out of the woods. In fact, always wait until you're out of the woods before doing something foolish. But be foolish a lot.
Read lots of books. Get lost in it. Give yourself over. Look up from your book and see that it is dark and everything has changed.
Be alone sometimes. Be in a hotel room with a dinky little coffee maker and its glowing orange light and blurbling. Be jet lagged and wake up at the wrong time and stare down at the quiet streets. You might see something magical, like a man in a hoodie on a unicycle riding with his hands in his pockets through a snowstorm.
Go to the Polish play with a new friend even though the only review you can find raves about the lighting. Go even though it's three hours long and there's no intermission and it's in Polish. Be impressed by the lighting. Be deeply moved when there is a scene with a little girl on a park bench and it starts to snow. The lighting will make it look like real snow and the little girl is in heaven. When it is over you will know that art really can change your life and you will be grateful there was no intermission.
Always be grateful that there is no intermission. Just be grateful.
*****
I really enjoyed this for so many reasons. One of which, I think, is the author advising that even if you do not have your 0wn children, you should have children in your life.
I adamently believe that you have not experienced the full range of emotion a human being is capable of unless you have children. It is an entirely different kind of love. Just like when you fell in love with your spouse, it was a different kind of love than what you feel for your parents, or your siblings or your job or your afternoon caramel latte.
The only people who ever disagree with me or argue that this idea is untrue are people who are not parents. Why? Because they haven't experienced parental love (yet). When Hannah was born, one of the first things Jeff said to me was "I love her in a different way than I love you." And it's true. And you can't describe it, you can only feel it. And you can't compare it to anything else.
Lululemon, in it's manifesto, describes children as the orgasm of life. Much like you can't understand what an orgasm is like unless you have had one, you can't describe the love you feel for your child unless you have had children. And you will only know when you become a parent.
I think of it like scuba diving. It would be amazing to go scuba diving (and I have a cousin who has traveled the world doing so)--the things you would see and feel would not and could not be comparable to anything on dry land. It's not even really comparable to snorkeling. Similar, but not at the same level. And certainly not at all the same as owning an aquarium or watching The Blue Planet or other underwater documentaries on tv. We can get close. We can imagine. But we can not truly experience.
Even in saying this, it is hard to fathom or believe that your parents could possibly feel for you what you feel for your child. You can really only understand it as parent to child. I remember my Dad once saying to me, during some kind of preteen breakdown fight I was having with him, that I will only understand why he was doing what he was doing when I was a parent. Of course, I rolled my eyes at him at the time, but it's true.
Unless of course you aren't a parent, and don't become one. I fully understand and believe that some people are not meant to or do not want to be parents, and I am totally cool with that. Everyone carves out their own path in this life, and makes their own choices and has their own reasons.
But I still assert my original statement--there is a range of emotions you will not feel; a color in the rainbow you will not see; an additional sense you will not experience. I am not saying it to be rude or dismissive--just because it is accurate.
And, I have had friends that have become defensive about this. But it's nothing to be defensive about-- if someone told you being in space made you experience emotions you never have before, you wouldn't say "well, I am sure I can imagine..." Or describing eating octopus, or skydiving, or watching a movie in 3D or seeing the hidden picture in one of those Magic Eye cartoons-- it is just something you have to experince on your own. And not everyone wants to, and not everyone will, but it doesn't make it less true.
And if you can't or don't have children, try to have them in your life, as the author suggests. They help you to see the world in a perspective other than your own, and teach you things you didn't realize you never knew.
