I’m My Own Purpose

What, you wonder, is to blame for the paucity, the shortfall, the utter dearth of posts at Rod’s Alter Ego?

In a word: Work.

You see, whereas my former job permitted me time to ruminate during the day, my present one has my nose to the grindstone. So by the time I arrive home, scratch Harry (who was diagnosed with Lymphoma, btw) behind his ears, prepare and drink a stiff one, Happy Wife is coming through the door. We commence with discussing our day, and then it’s couch time, another glass or two, and before we know it it’s 9:30 and off to bed we go. Or at least she does, because come 5:30 am Harry needs his morning walk since I am no longer able to do it midday. Because: Work. Spotting a theme are you? I go to bed about 10:00 pm after getting Harry back inside the house. If these things are done out of order nighttime commotion can result.

This caught my eye a few weeks back. In particular:

We don’t fare much better with time to love. It takes time and experience to develop the wisdom and maturity to choose an appropriate partner and love him or her in a way that doesn’t make everyone miserable. Relationships need attention, and attention takes time. Children take lots of time too, and some reflection and experience, yet we are biologically made to bear children when we are young and unwise.

What then to call those of us who didn’t bear children when young (or ever), fortunately wise? I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone tell me I was wise to not have children. Especially if the person had children of his or her own. Actually, I take that back. There was one person, a mother herself. She didn’t say it to my face, but many years ago during a rant against me in an email she’d sent to someone I knew, she barked that it was a damn good thing I never had children of my own because they would be totally f*cked up.

Well, gee, thanks Mom. Love you too.

If parents think that childless people must necessarily feel empty without children, as they would without their own children, that’s a mistake if you ask me. The feelings that arise from imagining that you don’t have something you in fact do have, versus the feelings that arise from not having the thing at all, are very different indeed. Consider: a person who imagines life without his right arm versus a real amputee. Maybe not the best comparison but you see my point.

Trust me parents, I have never felt incomplete because I don’t have children.

This relates to a pet peeve of mine. Caution: science ahead.

Evolutionary biologists tell us that the “purpose”[1] of evolution is reproductive success (as opposed to survival). All organisms, humans included, the theory holds, have been individually and “naturally selected” for the “purpose” of making more copies, more babies. Reproductively competent babies in particular. That’s what the author above meant when she wrote “we are biologically made to bear children.” The theory doesn’t only mean normal humans can bear children, as in we have the proper functioning biology to do so (sperm, eggs, uterus, etc.). No, the theory goes beyond that. Every gene, every cell, every organ, indeed an entire organism we are told exists for one and only one ultimate “purpose,” which is not survival — that’s old Darwinism — but reproductive success. The rest of life, we are sadly told by the theory, is nothing but a means to the ultimate goal of reproductive success.

Codswallop.

Lots of us are childless, often by choice if heterosexual, or because of sexual preference as with homosexuals. If every gene, cell, and organ in our bodies was supposedly naturally selected for no other “purpose” than the means to make (and nurture) babies, then why have so many of us not fulfilled that “purpose.” Can’t have it both ways if you ask me. And evidence exists indicating that the number of us who are childless by choice is growing, not shrinking. Plus the last time I looked more and more people are “coming out” every day.

Another snippet from the link:

Maybe the problem is not that we don’t have enough time but that we waste the time we have. Seneca famously thought this. (“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it.”) Most of us seem unable to refrain from “wasting” time. It is the rare person indeed who can be maximally efficient and productive. For the rest of us — that is, for almost all of us — Seneca’s advice about not wasting time seems true but useless.

Indeed. Which is why I adhere to Bonnie Raitt’s maxim: Life becomes more precious when there’s less of it to waste.

Gotta go. Lunchtime is over. Ugh.

[1] Purpose is put in quotes to indicate a matter of speaking. There is of course no real teleological purpose to evolution, i.e. no conscious intention.