A 30-something woman: just the phrase alone conjures up a cascade of associations (media sustained) about babies, marriage, having it all!, the toll of gravity, and so on. Sadly, the associations rarely escape that box. Adjusted, enlightened, creatively satisfied, financially autonomous, happy from within: these associations reserved (weirdly) for a select few in the AARP set, if media coverage is any measure. (And for the record, I consider enlightenment as important, if not more, than the question of a baby. And indeed, the former behooves the latter.) But much coverage of this 30-something specimen boils down to this: so we gonna pop a kid out or what? Baby, no baby. Baby, no baby.
A fresh batch of writing has appeared in recent weeks on the subject and I dutifully present them here. Lori Gottlieb kicked off the media firestorm with her book Marry Him! and has appeared on NPR and in the pages of the Atlantic making her case for settling down with a 'good enough' guy, as opposed for continuing the search for deep, soulful personal connection. One friend of mine responded to a particularly depressing passage with "if she doesn't give a shit about the human connection of marriage, she should just marry her vibrator." Gottlieb went personal in a follow up on HuffPo about one of the responses she received. While another HuffPo writer, Lesley MM Blume, wanted to 'jab her eyes out' after reading Gottlieb's piece.
Meghan Daum at the Los Angeles Times wrote a measured response questioning the very framing of Gottleib's thesis. Why the emphasis on being married with child versus mothering solo? Shouldn't the emphasis be on whether motherhood should continue to be the foregone conclusion of identity for the modern woman? One of my favorite blogs Feministing cried sour grapes on Gottlieb calling her piece 'anti-feminist porn'.
In the end, my biggest beef here is that women are presented with a one-size-fits-all conundrum, the lowest common denominator being vaginas and what to put in, push out of them. But what is so often lost when the dust that gets kicked up around this issue, is the journey to get to these decisions. Life is hard and demands hard work, and that has nothing to do with babies, marriage, career or being female. It's about getting in there inside yourself and facing existential issues of being and nothingness, excuse the Buddha babble. The issue of greater importance is the foundation (spiritual and psychological) that brings us to make informed decisions in the first place. (CN)
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