Enebarn/ønskebarn/yndlingsbarn

Recently on a forum I frequent, a discussion of playing favorites came up. The conversation was prompted by an article at Time Magazine (I'm not a subscriber, so I couldn't read the whole thing) about how parents always have favorites among their children, and how the kids always know, no matter how hard they try to hide it. Parent/child relationships are incredibly complex, as I am reminded every single day with my son, and this discussion prompted me to reflect yet again of the myriad reasons why I chose to have no more than one child.

As I have written before on this blog, E is a fourth generation only child. I'm not really sure why my Grannie was an only. I've always assumed Great Grannie would have liked more children, and I imagine Grannie would have liked to have siblings too, though I've never asked. My dad was an only child by mistake--he had an older sister who died very soon after birth. As far as I know I was a deliberate only. My parents were aware of the population explosion, and my mother (one of five siblings) has told me that she would have had more if my father had indicated he wanted them, but he never did. I didn't have E until I was 37. I had pretty much decided that I wanted to be child-free until I met KE, who definitely wanted kids. Our compromise was one, and in terms of my own situation as a mother I have not regretted it. E, though, has never been as unquestioningly satisfied with being an only as I was when I was a kid. I don't ever remember wishing for a sibling. He has talked about it a lot.

Family constellations and choices are incredibly personal. I know on a very visceral level that I don't have it in me to manage the balancing and juggling and negotiating that it takes to have more than one child. I struggle enough as it is to carve out time for myself and maintain my sense of who I am with one child and one partner in my life. You don't miss what you've never known. I've never had siblings or more than one child, so the sense of loss that other people with larger families assume I must experience is a complete non-issue for me.

I find it provoking and irritating, though, that so many people continue to comment negatively about families with only children. About a year ago a friend of mine who currently has one child commented that she wanted more so that they could be a "real" family (ouch). I said carefully that I felt we were a real family, even though we weren't a very big one. She was sensitive enough to apologize profusely. A friend in graduate school said (half?) jokingly "oh, that explains everything" when I revealed that I had no siblings. Well, yes, in some ways it does, but in other ways it doesn't. In that case it seemed pretty clear that my status of being an only child explained only my negative characteristics for that person, and not whatever positive characteristics I might possess. (I'm guessing that person would say that the fact that the comment continues to nag at me is an example of one of the problems with being an only child: not always dealing well with teasing. Whatever.) A few years later, at a work conference, a very strange women I hardly knew who had had a baby a year or so after me accosted me at cocktail hour and insisted that I should be planning on having another child. I experienced it as incredibly invasive and rude. She would not let up, and I had to tell her to stop harassing me, and walked away from her. A few years later I found out through the grapevine that she herself had not had any more children, and that she had sent her child off to live with her mother rather than raise it herself. Very weird.

In general, being or having only one child in a family is no better or worse than any other constellation. In my specific case, it is definitely better for me. Whether or not it is better for my son remains to be seen.

But in any case, here's to the families of the world with only children! And a word to the wise: those of you who make other choices, please don't treat us like there's something wrong with us.

familien min...

Just got E off to bed, and I'm feeling a little traumatized. Unfortunately, he's been in a long stretch of acting out, and it comes to a head in him hitting me pretty hard. It's so distressing. I have never been hit by anyone in my life, so the fact that my own son is doing it is hard to process. We would be less concerned if he showed remorse, but he doesn't. In so many other ways he's really perceptive and sensitive, so I just don't get this. I'm really hoping it will pass, and of course totally paranoid that it's some kind of red flag for a major personality disorder.

This morning I got an email from my Dad containing two snapshots that a college friend of his took. Apparently the guy recently scanned them and sort of randomly sent them to my dad. They're amazing:

That's my dad standing on the steps with the dorky hat and beard. My mom is (rather obviously) the woman sitting on the steps. In this next picture she's the brunette:

Apparently my dad sent these to her too, and she could barely recognize herself. She said it was only because the woman looked like me that she knew it must be her. She figures these were in their last year of college, sometime in 1964-65. She can tell by the hat, since it is "pre-stetson" and pre "the hat he got from my dad"...whatever those were.

Finished the front on the linen tunic, sewed the shoulder seams, and knitted up the neck edging. Now all I need is two sleeves and seaming and I'm done with number 12. This evening, however, I'm going to climb into bed early to read a murder mystery, André Bjerke's Døde menn går i land from 1947. It's background reading for the cabin book, really!

Samvittighet

So most of the blogs I read have to do with crafting and gardening and celebrating the joys of every day family life. For the most part they tend to paint a pretty rosy picture of things, and I suppose I follow suit in my own mildly cynical way. Partly one doesn't want to expose too much about oneself in what is (although it is very easy to forget) a very public forum, partly one wants to record positive progress and create a good impression.

I have had something on my mind for about two months now, and it doesn't put me in a very good light. I feel like I should blog about it anyway. I have one living grandparent, Grannie (my father's mother) who was born on 15 June 1916. That means she turned 93 a month and a half ago. The thing I need to say publicly is this: I didn't send her a birthday card or call her. I feel terrible. I felt terrible in the weeks leading up to the day (because I knew I wasn't going to do anything), I felt especially terrible on the day, and I have been feeling increasingly bad over the past six weeks. You see, I really love Grannie, and when I was a kid and well into adulthood we had an amazing bond that transcended the fact that we never lived near each other and only saw each other maybe once a year.

Then a few years back, maybe in 2003, we had a falling out. I won't go into the details because that would reveal information about other family members that I don't have any business sharing with others. But what happened is basically that my grandmother said something to me about someone which was so hurtful that I communicated to that person (after much agonizing deliberation). When that person confronted her, she basically said I had lied (though not in so many words). I felt horribly betrayed (even though one can very well say that I betrayed her confidence--I totally see that too). So betrayed, in fact, that I haven't really been able to interact with her comfortably since. I have been angry and hurt for the past six (!!) years, without really understanding why. This past six weeks of feeling guilty has actually really helped me work through it. I have finally come to understand my feelings of betrayal and to let go of them a little bit.

This afternoon I got a bit of time to myself and finally wrote her a long letter with lots of pictures of E, her only great-grandson (I am her only grandchild...). I am so relieved!



This has also been a week of conscience-easing knitting. Last August I gave KE a birthday I.O.U. for a pair of over-the-knee skiing socks (the kind worn with knickers). And now, a mere month before his next birthday I realized that I really need to get them done (well, started actually). It turns out to be an incredibly fun and fast project. In fact, it's the most enjoyable knitting I've done all year!

Just two more centimeters to go and I can start on the heel!

By the way, both snapshots were taken with my fancy new cell phone. It looks like the quality will work for blog updates, and it is fun to be able to synchronize my cell phone and laptop via Bluetooth. I feel so savvy, though of course I know I'm not...