this woman’s work

Last night I got into a friendly argument with the boys at work. It is their contention that “old people” are jealous of young people and that this is why they lecture them. It’s clear that they feel lied to and beaten down by their elders and they are understandably angry about it. They say that their generation is smarter than any generation that came before and that when they TAKE CONTROL the old people are going to be sorry for giving them problems (”It’s all right, Dawn,” says Andy. “Not you, I got your back.”). They sound hostile but they don’t have a real, dangerous hostility (I rush to say that in case any “old people” think these fine boys sound scary) but an understandable frustration with the way they’ve been treated.

I remember feeling this way. I remember feeling more lovely, more brilliant then everyone a decade ahead of me; as if I was literally burning up with all my shining promise. Every generation coming of age deserves to feel that way. I don’t know why I bothered to argue with them except that I have this silly idea that I can somehow bridge the generation gap. Whether or not I’m an old person varies in their minds, I think. One of them reluctantly acknowledged that I am technically part of Generation X but on the old end. Anyway, that time at the head of the pack is short and pretty soon, I told them, they’ll be relegated to the same “almost old” land that I am.

See, that’s the problem with us “old people.” We want to remind them that their time is short and that the malaise that seems to threaten our own lives is looming for them. I, for one, am happier with the burdens of adulthood (the mortgage, the child, those things that horrify them) than I was with the burdens of youth but maybe the boys are right. I don’t feel envious of their youth but maybe I am envious of their impervious belief that they are more important than we were. It’s their confidence in their own immortality (”I’m a great driver when I’m stoned!” “I totally know when to quit doing all these recreational drugs!”) that makes them so appealling and so damn stupid. It also drives their ambitions. This is the dichotomy that I, as a parent, have trouble with. I mean, I want Noah to love himself and his youth and to dream great, big, giant dreams but I, of course, want him to be safe, and smart, and sensible. Fat chance. What I told the boys is that parents and parental-like people who seem to do nothing but lecture to teens and near-teens have a hard time understanding boundaries between themselves and the children standing in front of them. I know that when Noah has a cold, I feel like coughing. It’s a constant struggle to say, “Yes, this is where I leave off and this is where my child begins.” I imagine it gets a little easier as they get bigger and need you less, but still, it’s a parent’s natural instinct to throw themselves in front of their marauding teenagers in order to keep said teenagers safe. And this is even when the teenagers are howling for their freedom. Of course, many loving parents handle their duties badly but that’s because it’s so damn hard.

It’s a shock when you’re in your twenties and you realize that teenager standing in front of you thinks of you as THE ESTABLISHMENT. This happened to me when I was about 22 or 23 and Brett and I were walking in downtown Portland. We kept passing running punk rockers then we saw ‘way down at the bottom of the hill a mob of black-clothed kids beset by cops. We turned into a Subway store and joined the group of punk rockers there.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“There was a riot ‘cuz of a band,” the girl reluctantly told me.
“What band?”
“You wouldn’t know them,” she sneered.

I was flabbergasted. Me? Not know the latest cool band? Puh-leeze! I was shaving my head when she was just a pup! I was doing drugs when she was still limping her way through the D.A.R.E. program! So I demanded that she tell me.

I’d never heard of ‘em.

One day, I believe, when the boyz at work reluctantly pass the baton to the generation below them they’ll realize, as we all must, that we are in this together. Having Noah is what did it for me. I feel such compassion for other parents — even enemy parents — now.

November 28, 2001

Noah’s been in such a great mood lately, despite his regularly flipping out on us. His flipping out is temporary, like a hormonal teenager. He asks for a sucker, we say no, he flips out and ten minutes later he’s Mr. Smiley again. But oh how I dread those flip-outs, especially since they happen 20 or 30 times a day.

I’ve been thinking about schooling lately since the kindergarten decision is looming. I realize it’s almost a year away but as any parent knows, you have to make these decisions by the spring before. Anyway, I know for sure that Noah won’t be going to kindergarten because they only have all-day kindergarten here which I am philosophically against. This leaves three options: preschool again (this is what we’re leaning towards), private school, or homeschool. Then the year after that, the preschool option disappears and we’re stuck gazing into the abyss of PUBLIC SCHOOL or HOMESCHOOL. Both displease me for a number of reasons. Meanwhile, I’m putting off permanant decisions and gearing my mind up to drive across town five mornings a week so that Noah can be in pre-K an extra year.

I’ve been lurking on this bulletin board made up of women who have very little in common with me because there’s one I’m fond of and she’s been trying to get pregnant for a couple of years. I check in now and then to see if she’s pregnant yet but so far, no luck. No luck on this end either and I’ve been fighing melancholy about it. I’m not charting or temping or using OPKs this month because I need a break from all of that. Right now I’m trying to decide if I should use the progesterone the doctor prescribed or not. Part of me thinks that if I get a kick-ass ovulation going (a good egg) that I wouldn’t need the progesterone and if I don’t ovulate well, then the progesterone isn’t going to help anyway. Still, I hate to take chances. The thing is about the progesterone is that it gives me a lot of pregnancy symptoms and it delays my period. So I end up *having* to spend money on a pregnancy test and all that hell before I can go off the progesterone.

Oh well. I’ll probably just take it.

Our original plan was for December to be our last month trying on our own and then January we’d try clomid but my ambivalence about clomid hasn’t gone away. I’m certainly not convinced that it would even work. So that leaves trudging away at this infertility gig. What else can I do?

November 27, 2001

I’m fighting both a cold and a nasty headache. It’s my first day off since Thursday and we are broke, broke, broke. It’s cold and rainy; the house needs a good scouring; the library put a hold on my card due to unpaid fines; and Noah has taken to making this gutteral “blah!” sound whenever we say anything that annoys him. Other than that, today hasn’t been too bad.

I told the work-boyz that being around them exercises parts of my brain left unused for the past few years. For one thing we talk about things that normally don’t come up when I’m hanging with my girlfriends. Penis size, for example. OK, wait, that does come up occasionally with my girlfriends but not in the same context. I told one of the boys that I wished I’d worked there when I was 17 because then all those mysteries of the male species would have been cleared up for me. He said, “But then you probably would have slept with all of us” jokingly but actually he’s probably right. Not all of them, certainly, but I’m sure I would have found a way to throw myself at one of them at least. Not sure which one, though. I forget what my type was back then. Here are the choices: