Gratitude: People Who Teach

I’m back! I’ve missed you all and boy have I missed writing, but life should be calming down for a bit. Sidenote: I am sick at the moment, so I’m blaming any incoherence on that, and if I disappear again soon that’s why. This was a post that I really wanted to write a few weeks ago and just never got a chance to put down on paper, so here it is.

A little bit ago, I went to a concert in which one of my professors from college was playing. I’ve always enjoyed this person’s thoughts and company, and sitting there listening to him speak and sing, I was hit with a wave of nostalgia for school and for the people who taught me. I was struck with how my professors and teachers were so deliberate with their thoughts and their words, even those whose energy could not be contained. They were there because they were seeking after knowledge, and they respected each of us enough to treat their words with care.

I remembered the hours that I spent sitting one on one with professors, talking through an idea or a question that just wouldn’t let go of me, and how they never seemed to care how much of their time I was taking up. I remembered the lifelines that so many of my teachers threw to me when I refused to accept them.

And I was really hit by how much I owe to the people who have given me my education and how few opportunities I have to say thank you. And so despite the fact that most of the teachers that I’ve loved will never read this, I want to send it out into the void: I am deeply grateful for what you’ve given me. I am deeply grateful for you not just as teachers but as human beings who have expressed an interest in my life and my mind, and who have held me up when I am falling.

I don’t think it’s really fashionable to talk about the adults in your life, the mentors. And I think that’s horrible because teachers need to hear what they’re doing is making a difference. Publicly recognizing that who you are today is a direct result of the things that others have given you is necessary for us to understand that no one is self-made. We all rely on others, and my educators have been some of the most important people in my life.

As early as grade school, I had teachers who read hundreds of pages of my fantasy novel and encouraged me to continue writing. I had teachers who engaged with me, who would debate test answers with me to make sure they felt confident they had the correct answer. I had teachers who simply let me GO, who told me I could write and read and think as much as I wanted and they’d simply be there for me when I needed someone to talk to about it. In high school I had teachers who would sit around with me after school and discuss our readings and subjects in more depth. It felt like I had personal tutors because they simply cared enough to make time for me. Knowing how busy teachers are makes this even more important to me. These actions validated my curiosity and my drive. There’s no way I would have the love of learning I have now if it weren’t for the message these people sent that YES, these topics ARE interesting and wonderful.

And when I got to college I had professors who would develop things for me specifically to research and delve into. I had profs who created independent studies for me, who hired me as an editor, who sent me articles and conversed with me about them over the summer, who would spend hours talking to me about what major I should choose or where I should apply for grad school. I even had a professor who reached out to me in the midst of my eating disorder just to check and see if I was doing ok.

But perhaps even more than these specific memories, I think about the ways that my teachers approach teaching: through humor, with deep care, with passion. I think about the teachers who speak beautifully about the texts they love, or the teachers who are a little haywire and spout amazing rants that contain nuggets of brilliance in them. I miss the essence of the people who are teachers, the pure fervor with which they speak about their chosen subject. There are few people in the world who can speak about anything like a professor can about their subject, and I deeply miss being in the presence of those people.

Sometimes I forget that my teachers are human beings with complex lives of their own, but these memories mean the world to me. They remind me that there were people in the midst of my bad days who cared about me without having any idea what was happening in my life, simply for the mind I had and the ideas I shared. The most validating experiences of my life came in the classroom and came thanks to teachers who passionately cared about engaging.

So thank you. I am who I am because of you.

Being Childless: Prejudices and Pitfalls

Note: This post is very much an exploratory post for me about a variety of issues. I’m taking some time to examine how I feel about children and try to understand what about my behaviors might be disrespectful to children. I’d really appreciate it if you find something offensive in this post if you were polite about it and helped me come to a better understanding of why it might cause harm. I’m also going to be using childless and childfree somewhat interchangeably here, although I know that that’s not the most appropriate. I’m aiming to stick with childfree when it’s a choice and childless for an overarching term of those without children.

Somehow children and having children have decided to take over all of my blogs and twitters and internet haunts and have become the topic of the day. This is weird. I don’t really have any friends with children, I don’t have children, and I have no desire to ever have children (and if you tell me that it’s just because I’m young and some day I’ll want them and it will be great you can just leave now). I’m not used to thinking about children or the difficulties and questions surrounding raising children. And I particularly found myself challenged by a few posts by Libby Anne about prejudice against children. Many of the things she was saying were attitudes that I held: I don’t particularly like kids, they make me uncomfortable, I often find them frustrating when they’re in my spaces. Generally she suggested that people who hold these types of attitudes are “childist” and are discriminating against others. I’d like to delve into some of the nuances of what it means to be childless and still respect children and their parents.

Let’s start with a fact: children are an imposition. They are in fact a burden. Many people would argue that that isn’t the case because they provide so much back to us and they are human beings that are deserving of respect and love. I’m not trying to say these things aren’t the case, but they are human beings who are not capable of caring for themselves, or even of fully processing their world. This means that they impose upon adults in order to survive: they require the time, money, and resources of adults. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Many things in life involve some sacrifice and imposition and a whole lot of joy, and kids are probably one of those things. It doesn’t seem to me to be prejudice to recognize that fact.

Children are also different from adults. Yes, they are human beings, yes they have legitimate emotions, and yes they are fully autonomous. However their brains have not developed completely, they don’t know how to manage their emotions or their world yet, and they often simply view the world differently from adults. Again, this is not a bad thing, but it is not prejudice or stereotyping to say that children’s brains are different from adults’ brains. That’s a fact.

As someone who is child-free on purpose, I have taken these elements into consideration. I am not very good with children because of those reasons. Realizing that another being is wholly dependent on you is a scary proposition, and as a responsible adult I know I’m not cut out for it. Because of that, I avoid children. I’m not good with kids and so I don’t want to be around them because I don’t like being around people who I cannot socialize with. Interestingly, to many people this would be viewed as a prejudice, or as discrimination against children.

It’s widely recognized that childless adults, particularly adults who choose to be childless are often badgered and sometimes oppressed or discriminated against by the people around them. Many people with children want to say that the childless have turned things around and begun acting the same way towards them and their children. Of course there are some childless individuals who treat children poorly, just as there are some people with children who treat children poorly. But making statements about disliking children, about wishing children weren’t in your spaces, or about preferring people not to talk about children are not prejudice: they’re preferences. Children are a very different type of being, and each of us gets to choose what sorts of people we have in our spaces. For those of us who are childless, children can be difficult and scary. Wanting to avoid that is 100% logical.

Just the same as I choose my social spaces so as not to be around racist or sexist people (who I don’t know how to be around), I choose my social spaces so as not to be around children (who I don’t know how to be around). (This is not to say that I am equating children with racists and sexists, but rather that they’re both groups of people whose brains I don’t understand). It’s frustrating to me that I’m expected to coo over small people who confuse me, rather than running for the nearest exit as I would with anyone else that I’m afraid of (yes children scare me. I don’t like being confused). I’m frustrated that it’s labelled as “prejudice” when there are in fact major differences between the brains of children and adults and I don’t know how to bridge that gap. It’s frustrating to me that when I say kids are LOUD and I don’t really want to be around them, I get labelled as someone who thinks kids don’t have humanity or don’t deserve my respect.

While the world is not my personal garden and I can’t edit it to my taste, I should get some choice in the question of who I am around, particularly whose noise and body are in my space. We accept this with adults. And yes, kids don’t understand it, but I’m still allowed to make adjustments for myself and to request that the parents make adjustments. Particularly because children often don’t understand boundaries and more often don’t understand auditory boundaries, it doesn’t seem out of line for the childless among us to avoid them because we like our boundaries.

Now I will in no way defend people who call kids scum or evil, but I have been known to call them (to steal a phrase from Tennessee Williams) no neck monsters. But I’m going to level with you: I would call anyone who was screaming on the bus a monster. It’s not about dehumanizing the kid, it’s really just about me and my desire to express my discomfort. Like I said, kids are a burden, and I think we get to recognize that, particularly those of us who didn’t choose that burden but sometimes get saddled with parts of it simply because we’re out in public.

Of particular note here is friends with kids. I love you. I have no problem with your kids. But I want no part of the responsibility of children because I might break your kid so please don’t put your kid near me or in my lap because I will freeze up like a deer in headlights and start wondering what would happen if I accidentally dropped them. If I’ve made it clear that I am not comfortable around children, please don’t expect me to be overjoyed when you bring your kid over, or when you ask me to come over and be around your kid.

With all these thoughts in mind, I do still have some questions: Is it prejudice to recognize the differences in child and adult brains and have a preference between them? Is it a privilege to be childfree and to be able to avoid children? What are the potential oppressions that the childfree can enact on those with children? I’m not sure about many of these, but I suspect that there are some great privileges that people without children get, and which they often expect people with children to have (like time, flexibility, etc). I do suspect that we need more communication on all sides, and more exploration of what the needs and wants of all parties are so that public spaces can better accommodate everyone. And more than anything, the question that has been looming in my mind through this whole post is whether or not it’s prejudice or disrespectful to avoid children. I’d love some feedback.