I’m standing at my book table in Lincoln City, Oregon on a cold, rainy October Saturday. It’s the “Plein Air” festival, expected to be a happy mix of painters painting, sculptors sculpting, musicians playing, and crafters, artists and authors selling their wares, but it’s just miserable. I’m already tired of the MC making wisecracks about enjoying our Oregon weather.
Despite the rain, quite a few people have come, many with toddlers in pink and blue jackets and tiny dogs in little raincoats.
A pretzeled older woman wanders into my skimpy shelter and says she’s trying to think of what to paint. An all-gray canvas? “How about a sea of colorful raincoats?” I suggest. She nods. “I was thinking of that.”
A while later, two younger women wander over to check out my books. The tall dark-haired one says she’s from Latvia. They ask what I’m working on now, and I tell them I’m writing about childless women. They look at each other and grin. “We’re childless,” they say.
“Really,” I say. “Are you childless by choice?”
“Yes,” they chorus.
“About once a year,” says the Latvian lass, “my husband and I ask each other, ‘Should we have a baby?’ and we say no. My art is my baby.” She makes intricately shaped and painted ceramic vases.
“Well, yes,” I agree. “It is hard to be an artist and raise a family.”
“I just have too much else to do. I don’t have time for kids,” says her curly-haired artist friend in the yellow slicker.
“But someday,” I suggest, “you might be lonely.”
Immediately comes the standard answer I have heard at least a hundred times: You can’t count on your children to be around when you get old. They move away. They’re too busy. “Look at my family,” says the Lat, “My mother’s all the way in Latvia. I hardly ever see her.” Then she twists the knife. “What about your momma and daddy?”
“Well, my mom is dead. And my dad lives in California, which is far away.”
“You see!”
And they go back to their art. Yeah, I see. But if I had kids, it would be different. Of course, everyone says that, too.
childless by marriage
Sadie’s chasing mice again
For those following the saga of my dog with cancer, the vet told us today that Sadie is in complete remission. In fact, after breakfast, she chased a mouse around the yard. The mouse got away, thank God. Sadie always insists on bringing her kills into the living room. Anyway, in the past week, she has regained six pounds, half of what she lost, and we’re cutting back the drugs. Good news.
What’s that got to do with being childless? Well, my sources show that most of the childless women I talk to are gaga about their pets. What does that mean? Are pets child substitutes? What do you think? Do you call yourself your dog’s or cat’s mother? Several different surveys have shown that more than 80 percent of pet owners do.
Full Speed Ahead
You’ve heard of NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month? Well, I have initiated OctoWriMo, October Writing Month, with the intention of steamrolling through the rest of my Childless by Marriage book. Most of the research is done, and this book has been hanging around unpublished for far too long.
I am contacting people I interviewed in the past to let them know it’s finally happening and that I might be asking for updates. Shoot, they might have had a baby by now.
There’s still time to add your input on the subject. I have a list of questions I’d be happy to send you. If you never ever wanted children, you’re not the person I’m looking for at this point. I have enough comments from the “childfree” crowd. I’m interested in women who might have wanted children but didn’t because they hooked up with mates who couldn’t or couldn’t father their babies. I’ll also listen to women who just sort of let the opportunity slide by. I’d like to hear from women who feel at least a twinge of regret.
Feel free to bug me about my progress and make sure I don’t give up by Columbus Day. Comment here or e-mail me privately at suelick@casco.net.
Nobody’s Mother or dog’s mother?
I just read about a relatively new book called “Nobody’s Mother: Life Without Kids” by Lynne Van Luven. Teena from Toronto featured it on her blog called “It’s All About Me!” Well, there’s a good blog title. But I wonder if it also relates to people who are childless by choice. It’s all about meeeee, not about some rugrat who’s going to take all my time, attention and money. Never mind. I’m biased. But the book does sound interesting. Although I don’t think it has too much about being childless by marriage, I’m ordering it and will report on it when I’ve read it.
Teena from Toronto says she and her husband Gord consider their dog and two cats their “kids.” I can’t tell you how many childless women have told me they’re gaga over their pets. Does this say they really wanted children but preferred the kind you could lock in the back yard when you wanted to go somewhere or didn’t want them around?
I don’t think that’s true for me. I wanted a dog because I adore dogs. Sadie is not a child substitute. If I had 15 kids, I’d still want dogs.
As I think I reported earlier, my dog Sadie has cancer. She’s doing pretty well right now, but the doctor has decided more chemo would be too hard on her, so we have a couple months with her at best. Very sad, but we try not to ruin the time we have by thinking too far ahead.
Husband? What Husband?
My dog Sadie has cancer. My husband is sick, too, but his symptoms are less dramatic, and I barely notice him. It’s all about the dog. I suspect that’s how I’d be with children.
Perhaps my husband, Fred, was wise not to make babies with me. He was married before and experienced what it’s like to live with a woman who was obsessed with her children. Maybe that’s why he ran out and got a vasectomy after that last surprise pregnancy. He knew the mommy gene would take over again and he’d be toast.
During the night, I listen to Sadie breathing. Is she panting? Did she moan? Does she need to go out? I hear every time she shifts positions, her nails clacking on the walls or the floor. I feel her settle at the foot of the bed, pulling half the blanket down. I notice my husband trying to get some covers. Rather than help him, I just scooch down lower and go back to sleep.
First thing in the morning, I hurry out of bed to make Sadie’s breakfast, carefully inserting her morning pills, leaving the husband to fill his own cereal bowl. I bake boneless, skinless chicken breasts for the dog, but do you think I’d offer to whip up some waffles for the spouse? Not likely.
“We’re out of milk,” the husband calls.
“Should have told me before I went to the store,” I reply. I don’t leave the dog or even look away from her. Milk, schmilk, the dog needs me.
Sadie spends most of her nights and early mornings lying on my bathroom floor. This morning I took my bath with her still there, leaving the door open and my clothes in the other room, doing my darndest not to drip water on her. God forbid I disturb her sleep. If it were Fred, I’d probably have told him, “Get out of here. I need to take a bath.”
As I chatter all day long, my husband often asks, “Are you talking to me?”
“No, I’m talking to the dog,” I reply in a tone that implies he’s an idiot.
I’m constantly asking, “Where’s Sadie?” I offer her food and water. If she won’t come to her bowl, I bring the bowl to her. I worry over every bite, every pill, every bathroom trip. I pet her and tell her I love her a hundred times a day.
And the husband? He’s on his own. I look over and comment, “Your hair looks funny” or “There’s a stain on your pants.” Do I rush to fix his hair or to find him clean pants? No.
When Sadie opens her eyes, I greet her like the Second Coming. Just now, I heard her coming down the hall. I left the computer to follow her out the door, applauding as she squatted on the grass. “Good pee!” I called. I gave her a treat, then hurried to present her bowl. I barely restrained myself from shoving my coffee-pouring husband out of the way so I could get to the dog food.
I watched every bite she ate, chanting, “Good girl, good girl!” until she had finished eating and settled on the living room rug. I left the husband to eat his healthy cereal and read his book alone. No “Good boy!” for him.
In fact, come to think of it, I have neither wished him a good morning nor touched him lovingly. If I had had children, God help my husband. I mean, look at how I am with the dog? How could he ever compete with a little person who grew inside me?
I recently read about women in Japan who dress their little dogs in tiny cashmere sweaters from the Fifi and Romeo dog boutique and push them around in baby buggies. They’re too busy for husbands and kids, they said.
At least I feel guilty about neglecting my husband. But the dog has cancer. That trumps the sniffles every time. So I’ll kiss the husband on the head and hunker down on the floor with Sadie. Fred will get his turn later.
The grandma bag
I was selling books at an author fair last weekend when I noticed an older woman carrying a tote bag covered with children’s photos. It’s the grandma bag, built with plastic slots to display 4 x6 pics. There were babies and toddlers and pictures of what must be the woman’s grown children posing with the grandchildren. As a bag, it was pretty ugly, but it’s one of those symbols that so many mothers and grandmothers carry around, proof of a great accomplishment. Of course it may just be that she loves to look at the pictures. Nothing wrong with that. Just another little case of me feeling left out. The bag I carried that day had flowers on it.
You’ve seen the jewelry with gemstones or nametags for each child or grandchild. For lower budgets, one can buy tee shirts or license plate holders boasting of motherhood or grandmotherhood. Again, it’s a whole market where we childless women are left out. Sitting at the stoplight, breathing the exhaust of a Buick with a World’s Best Grandma bumper sticker, don’t you sometimes wonder what your bumper sticker would say? World’s best . . . dog owner? Flute player? Flag-pole climber?
We don’t need any of this stuff. It’s silly. It’s often tacky, but there’s that little twinge of oh, I’m not in the Mom Club. I’ll never get a bracelet with the names of my kids engraved on it. And deep inside, we kind of really want one.
Anybody else feel that way?
Sue
Welcome to the Childless by Marriage blog
Greetings,
I have resisted doing this blog for a while because I should be working on my book by this title, but so many women have contacted me and visited the “Childless Resources” page on my web site that it seems like a conversation that is dying to happen. People can’t wait until I get the book between covers. Plus thoughts and happenings keep coming up that don’t/won’t fit into a book or an article. So let’s blog a bit. I admit up front that I am a professional writer doing books and articles on the childless thing, and I promise I will not use your comment without your permission. That said, here’s my situation:
I have been married twice. Husband number one didn’t want children, although he didn’t tell me that until a few years in. It was always wait till he finishes college, wait till he gets a good job, wait till we buy a house. Then there came a time when I thought I might be pregnant, and his tune changed to: if you have a baby, I’m leaving. Ouch. I wasn’t pregnant, but the marriage didn’t work out anyway.
Husband number two, a wonderful older man who already had three children, didn’t want any more kids. He had had a vasectomy. I thought he might change his mind, but he didn’t. So now I have just reached menopause with no kids of my own and three stepchildren I’m not close to. I regret not having children, but at the same time I know that I have done a lot of things in my life that I could not have done if I were a mother.
So that’s the deal. Missed my chance, but maybe that’s what God had in mind for me.
I’ll be sharing stories, statistics, comments, etc., here. I welcome you to join me. Be forewarned that I don’t consider myself “childfree.” I’m “childless.” There’s a difference.
Sue
Childless by Marriage 