I don’t think there is one.”

….perhaps equally as profound is the moment when you realise you’re *not* going to be a parent….?

Which moment is, btw, not necessarily a bad one….

Sometimes, they have cats.

Despite close calls with marriage (and children) over the years, I find myself single and even cat-less.

(My last cat, caught with great difficulty over a two-week period as a feral kitten, died several years ago.)

When things get “really difficult,” I tend to deliberately calm myself down and seek a greater perspective, reviewing what little I know of existence.

This includes an awareness of numerous life experiences, some of which included families and offspring, some of which did not.

The idea of “all in one and one in all” comforts me; there is a connectedness to all life, all being, that transcends an experience of solitude, whether lasting a moment or a lifetime; all is experience.

“I both admire and feel sorry for people who have decided not to have children. It’s a very brave decision.”

Not in my case. I’m actually ambivalent but economics has always been a factor; I have no career, no formal education, having made up my employment as I’ve proceeded through life, and have yet to strike it rich.

I’m very much aware of the huge expense and responsibility of child rearing, seeing childlessness as something of a huge trade-off; the benefits of being part of a growing family measured against the benefits of a freedom from the need to provide for such.

Even so, under the right circumstances, I would have no problem with creating and raising offspring. (Then again, cats are so much simpler — no need for clothes, education, and so on, the downside their relatively short lifespans.)

Bill

I don’t think there is one.

I didn’t plan to have my son. I’m not sure I am capable of making the concious decision to bring another life into the world, it’s just too damn scary. I’m glad he came along though as I needed a loud wake-up call at the time. That’s not to say it’s all been plain sailing (understatement of the century) as when you have a child with someone you are then tied to them for the rest of your life, and for me that means having to maintain a link (in the loosest possible sense in my case) with the person that I like least in the entire world (and that’s putting it nicely).

So for me to say that it was still worth it is saying quite a lot.

I have never had the slightest desire to pass on my genes to the next generation. So I have been, throughout my life, completely neutral about whether to have children – a complete cop-out as I left the decision entirely to the two women with whom I have shared my adult life (the first my erstwhile long-time partner and the second my present wife). Both felt quite strongly (in the second case very strongly) that they did not want children.

I feel neither brave nor unfortunate – I would have felt the same (I think) had children come along. I will say that it is a blessing for the human race that peculiar people like us are the exception rather than the norm. I cannot for the life of me think of an evolutionary reason for this non-desire to procreate, unless it is something to do with population regulation. I remember reading some years ago a hypothesis explaining the role of homosexuals in mankind’s development. If I remember correctly it was something to do with protecting the women and children while the men were away hunting – homosexual men would have been trusted by the other men not to lie with their women in their absence. Lesbians would have provided non-threatening childcare for mothers who might be out gathering. I think it was something like that.

Another issue raises its head here and that is putting oneself in other people’s shoes, rather than trying to divine how another person might feel themselves. The former is how we interpret empathy and it is the basis for the ‘Golden rule’ but it should not be confused with the latter (genuine empathy) which is impossible to achieve.

ChooChoo:

Thanks for the Iliad reference; I will look it up immediately.

Speaking to some of my – childless – friends is interesting: it – perhaps understandably – frightens some to the point of repulsion, while others imagine the limitations that becoming a parent must – surely – entail a welcome prospect. I’m in the latter camp, by the way. I don’t mind a slightly put-on cynicism or half-sincere, half-feigned aversion to children and their needs (and demands). But a genuine disdain I find most unpalatable (and a bit of an adult toddler tantrum): we were all tiny dependents at one stage. I love children’s serious silliness and (occasional) silly seriousness.

By the way, my favourite bit when I was studying Classics was the scene in the Iliad (book 6) where Hector meets his wife, Andromache, and his son, Astynax. We were encouraged to read this in terms of Greek gender roles (Hector enters the domestic setting and can’t find Andromache; she goes to the edge of what is acceptable for a woman – the gates – to find Hector; her name sort of means ‘man-struggle’). We were, in part, encouraged to talk about androcentrism and phallocentrism and other centrisms. But, really, I just thought that Hector’s tragic (we sort of know – even though it’s not in the Iliad – that his son will also be killed) scene with his baby son, when he lifts him up (after his plume has scared him) and says something along the lines of: When he grows up, may men say, ‘There goes Astynax, son of Hector, an even greater man than his father’. I’ll shut up before spilling more slush all over poor Homer.

Gordy – its’ a swift read! A suitable re-entry into novels!

Happy New Year, everyone! Looking forward to meeting up in March.

I both admire and feel sorry for people who have decided not to have children. It’s a very brave decision.

HNY too.

Ok. Better be careful…

I was profoundly moved by the presentation of the father’s love for his son. What I wrote above might be a bit misleading insofar as I mention (rather garishly) the dangerous gangs whom the father is desperate to avoid. (I hope this doesn’t give too much of a Mad Max impression). In fact, a huge amount of the novel describes very simple actions here and there. The father pitches a makeshift tent; they eat some tinned peaches scavenged from the day before and drink up the last drop of syrup; when possible, they have wash; that was their last tin etc. And the dialogue between father and son is not infrequent, though their conversations are – at first glance – bare. These form the main bulk of the narrative. But all these little actions and conversations – sometimes described in minute detail (though repetitive, they somehow never become tiresome) – bespeak a sacrificing love on the part of the father (and this impression was almost enhanced by his doubts stemming from the seeming futility of their predicament). This was one overwhelming impression then: moved by his love and finding his struggle to contain his pessimism thoroughly admirable.

Of course, the son is the reason why he even struggles to contain it. But the son isn’t merely a rather characterless figure for ‘hope’ or ‘conscience’. He also feels concrete. (There are times when he is childish, both in petulance and enthusiasm). If this makes sense: I could imagine myself trudging on in such a borderline hell for ‘the son’ (by which I don’t mean I’m so good that I’d…but, rather, he felt real).

So altogether, I found it stirring and staggering because of this passionate (as in suffering) love. (This is quite something given the setting; the imperfect characters – the father is no saint in the silly sense of the word – the fact that McCarthy is hardly a sentimentalising author – I understand he is rather pessimistic or at least bleak in his other novels). I found myself daydreaming about trudging down such a road, about the painful tension between having to trudge on and wanting to end the seeming futility. And I was also left with a sense that Mccarthy’s subtle handling of this tension wrestled with some – I hate the phrase, but hey – profound questions.

I should add one thing, but I can’t really go into it given your request! I wonder to what extent the ending of the novel answers or partly resolves that tension. I am left wondering whether the answer would be the same if things had ended up differently. I can’t really go into this more without clumsily spoiling it for you. Perhaps this might make sense when you read it. When I track down that copy, will pass it onto you for sure!

If you can’t then don’t, because I want to read it anyway. I claim first dibs.