Desiring No Children

This is a really interesting and enlightening article written by the daughter of Alice Walker who wrote the book "The Color Purple."

I find it not only heartbreaking, but amazing and surprising that Alice Walker did indeed seem to live up to her beliefs and standards...going so far as to write a poem comparing having her daughter to other catastrophic events in other great writer's lives.

Why did she even have a child if she felt that way? No wonder she and her husband ended up divorced. He remarried a woman whom Walker's daughter describes as far more maternal and loving than her own mother. I suppose living with a woman who completely embraced the "freedom" of feminism truly was impossible for her father to do. In fact, I'd be surprised if any man could live all his days with a woman who ran down the dark and spiralled path of feminism.

My father wrote this poem in his early years of teaching (some 25 years ago now) when one of his students one day announced she never wanted to have kids. His meditation on what that meant for her gave birth to this:

Of Her Who Desired No Children

You Know You're a Mother When...

- You don't hear the phone ringing when you're asleep, but you can hear through a wall and closed door and the noise of a fan and white noise machine a muffled fuss from the baby beginning to stir from his nap.

- You are very aware of how often he poops, and also rejoice when he fills his diaper because that means he's not chronically constipated, which is what you've been worried about for the past several days.

- You are acutely aware of noises outside your home while your baby sleeps, and are ready to spring outside to ask the neighbors to please quiet down whenever they are near the baby's window.

- You have deep conversations with your baby about lint between his toes, and you just know he understands completely your point.

- You look at pictures of other babies in your immediate family, and, reminded of your own cute adorable child, have the almost-uncontrollable urge to wake him up at 11pm from his solid night-sleep just to play with him and see him smile again.

You're a mother. And you love everything that comes with it.