The Way It Was

I don’t remember what brought it up, but there we were standing around talking in the kitchen about how old we were when we got married or had kids. I think it may have started out with me mentioning the Eew Equation, a formula that one of my students taught me about how old the youngest person is that you can go out with, without people thinking it was gross. That formula is half your age, plus 7.

So at 14 you can go out with another 14-year-old, because half your age is 7. Then when you add 7 to that, you end up right back at 14. At 30 you can date someone who’s 22, and at 56, I could date someone who’s 34 without people thinking it was totally disgusting.

Now, my 10-year-old daughter loves to point out that the formula doesn’t work if you’re younger than 14. If you’re 12, then half your age is 6, and when you add 7 to that, you end up with a 13-year-old as the “youngest” person you can date. But we seem to have gone off on a little tangent here.

As I said, we were talking about how old we were when we got married or had kids. I was the old guy in the group in many ways. Not only was I the oldest, at 56, but I was 32 when I got married, and 36 when my first daughter was born. The youngest person in the room was 33, and got married and had her son when she was 21 (and according to the formula, she’s also just a year too young for me to date).

But wait, there’s more. Her mother had her when she was 19, and her grandmother had her mother when she was 17. Being the math person that I am, I figured that if this patterned continued, her son should have his first child when he’s 23.

Then one woman mentioned that her great-grandmother got married at 16. Yes…16. Now intellectually, we all know that people did things a lot younger all those years ago, and especially in certain parts of the country, but it was still a little jarring to us, because we tend to think of 16-year-olds as being gum-chewing, iPod-toting, high school kids who don't have the common sense that God gave a broom handle. But it wasn’t always so. In fact, there’s a wonderful story behind her great-grandmother’s marriage.

It seems that one day great-grandma’s boyfriend showed up at the house and asked to speak to her father. He wanted to marry her. Her father figured that he had gotten her pregnant and wanted to “do the right thing,” so he said yes. A quiet little ceremony was arranged a few weeks later, and the rest of the family sat back and waited for the baby.

And waited. And waited.

A year and a half later, a baby arrived.

Great-grandma’s family was a little confused. “We thought you wanted to get married because you were pregnant,” they said.

“No,” she replied, “we wanted to get married because we loved each other.”

Now, while that’s a touching good story, it’s important for what it implies. And what it implies is that back in great-grandma’s day, people assumed that with all the time the kids had taking long walks near the creek and such, with all the time that they had together without being under the watchful eye of some sort of chaperone, it was only reasonable to assume that some of them…maybe even a lot of them…were going to have sex. And if the girl didn’t get pregnant, that was fine, but if she did, the boy was expected to “do the right thing” and marry her.

My friend’s great-great-grandparents were no fools. They knew what was going on around them. And they probably knew what was going on around them because they had done it too, as had their parents before them.

But something changed in the generations after that. For some reason we began to officially pretend that people didn’t do that before they were married…at least good people didn’t. Or maybe it was “good people” of a certain social class. And as a result, all kinds of pain, sorrow, and hypocrisy followed in its wake.

Now, however…we seem to be back to the days of great-grandmother and her parents. 16-year-olds being what they are these days, none of us thinks it’s a good idea for them to be having sex yet. But as I’ve said before, if you’re 26 and have been seeing someone for more than six months, we all pretty much assume that you’re having sex, and no judgments are made. In fact, we’re sort of surprised if we find out that you aren’t. Some people may not like it, but at least the hypocrisy is gone.

I’m glad that the way it was has become the way it is again.

He Never Really Loved Me

Many years ago I read a letter to one of the two twin sisters of advice…Abby and Ann…from a woman who was totally devastated after the death of her husband of 50 or so years; a man who was well-respected in the community and with whom she had an almost fairytale marriage. No, not because of his death itself, which is to be expected, especially after that long of a marriage. But because of what she found out in the weeks after the funeral.

You see, after her husband was dead, someone felt free to tell her about the many affairs he had during those 50 years, and that he had worked very hard to keep her from finding out about.

Now, before I go on, we will all pause to virtually smack that person upside the head with a 2 x 4. Why? I mean really, just what did this person hope to accomplish? What good did this person think would come from this? Was getting this long-held secret off their chest worth the price of what it would do to her? I’m guessing that you can figure out my answer.

When this woman wrote to the twins, one of the things she said was that when she learned this, she realized that her whole life was a sham, and that her husband never really loved her anyway.

Wait. Time out. Hold it. Stop. It’s logical fallacy time. It’s also time for me to introduce you to a little cognitive dissonance.

In our culture, we make the mistake of confusing love and fidelity, and maybe they’re not always the same thing. Maybe you can love someone with all your heart, and not be able to be faithful to him or her, as hard as you might try. I can see that some of you aren’t buying this, so let me give you a different example.

Suppose someone said “If you really love me, then you’ll learn how to play the piano?” And suppose you just happen to be tone deaf? You could love that person with all your heart and soul, but not be able to play Heart and Soul. Does your inability to play even the most rudimentary piece of music, despite getting the rest of the relationship right, mean that you don’t love that person? I know this is an imperfect example, but can you see my point?

Conversely, in the song Silver Threads and Golden Needles, the singer says that she doesn’t care about his stupid mansion or all his money. She wants him to stop fooling around with other women and love her again. Um…I hate to ruin her pretty little picture, but his being faithful to her wouldn’t  necessarily mean that he loved her again, but simply that he was following the rules because they were the rules.

Is it reasonable to ask, nay, demand, that the person who claims that they love us be faithful? I’ll give you a definite “maybe” on that. Perhaps it can be done most of the time. And perhaps we modern westerners are a little to tough on ourselves. Look at the story of Jacob from Genesis. He was counted as being faithful while having two wives and being able to get it from the maidservants.

But let’s go back to the beginning. The letter-writer claimed that all of this showed that her husband never really loved her anyway. I beg to differ, and this is where the cognitive dissonance kicks in. I can see him as really loving, really adoring, his wife, but knowing that no matter how hard he tried, he could never be faithful. And I can see him working very hard to make sure that she never found out, so that he could preserve the world she knew…precisely because he loved her.

And then along comes some well-meaning dolt who feels that they have to tell her the truth.

Vinny, get me the bat.

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Piece of Paper

It was the late 60s and early 70s, the time of “love and piece,” and especially of love. Couples had openly started living together without being married, and not merely as a temporary arrangement either to test out the relationship or while planning the wedding. I’m talking about the people who had moved in together with absolutely no plan of ever getting married. Their battle cry (or should I say love cry) was “We don’t need no stinkin’ piece of paper,” which was pretty much what Joni Mitchell sang in her 1970 song My Old Man.

That’s right, they didn’t need a piece of paper to validate their love for each other. They didn’t need to get city hall or the county clerk involved in their relationship. Their love would stand the test of time, thank you very much, and so they didn’t need that little piece of paperwork called a marriage license…and a simple civil ceremony in the county clerk’s office.

Delaney and Bonnie famously sang “I’ve got a never-ending love for you” in 1971 and that’s what they believed. Long before Neil Sedaka wrote it and the Captain and Tennille sang it, they believed that love would keep them together.

Frankly, even at age 15, I thought that was kind of naïve, but then what did I know? Maybe the world was changing, and these people were right.

And then it happened. The famous Michelle Triola Marvin “palimony” case of 1976. When it first broke, my reaction was pretty much along the lines of, “Excuse me, but you didn’t need no stinkin’ piece of paper, and now you’re suing for the rights that it would’ve given you? I don’t think so.” I wasn’t vindictive, I was simply a realist. That “little piece of paper” gives each person certain rights and protections in the event of an unfortunate breakup. That “little piece of paper” ideally protects each party from being unfairly taken advantage of by the other. That “little piece of paper” prevents his or her relatives, who never liked you in the first place, from throwing you out on the street in the event of a fatal accident that leaves you alone in the house that you had shared, but that they’re the legal heirs to.

That “little piece of paper” would’ve given Michelle Triola Marvin a legal leg to stand on. But because she joined the throngs of people crying out that they didn’t need it, it made perfect sense to me that she didn’t get the protections that it would’ve given her. The judge apparently felt the same way I did, and denied her the $1.8 million she had asked for.

That “little piece of paper” is not only very important, but it’s a bargain. Right now a marriage license in Syracuse is $40. That’s far less than the hundreds of dollars that I know some people spend to draw up non-marriage contracts that give them the same rights, but without “the interference of the state in their private affairs.”

Ladies and gentlemen, this isn’t about “morality.” I really don’t care whether or not two grown people are married when they’re having sex. For me it’s all about practicality and taking care of each other. I feel that if you love each other enough to move in together, then you really oughta spring for that $40 piece of paper. Both to protect yourself and each other.

Amazingly, after the disaster with Lee Marvin, Michelle Triola moved in with actor Dick Van Dyke, without getting married. He says in his autobiography, My Lucky Life, that he asked her to marry him several times, but she just never got around to it. They did, however, have contracts drawn up to avoid what happened to her earlier, but you know…I think the $40 would’ve been cheaper.

Oh, and by the way, despite the sentiment of the song, Delaney and Bonnie got divorced in 1973.

What an Old Lutheran Wants from Young Catholics

I was sitting in the living room playing on my iPad with a new app called Zite that lets you create your own custom digital magazine, when I saw the article from the Washington Post about what young Catholics wanted from the Church. I was too busy fiddling around with the app at the moment to read it, but I cynically and impatiently said to myself that they wanted to be Lutherans and Episcopalians, but just couldn’t bring themselves to admit it.

Cynical? Yes, I admit that my first response was cynical. But that other word in there was even more important…my response was not only cynical, but impatient. For you see, I’ve been hearing young Catholics wanting these things since I was a young Lutheran who hung out with young Catholics. That was over 30 years ago, those once-young Catholics are now 50-something, and I think that listening to this for 30 years gives me the right to be a little impatient.

I understand not wanting to give up on the church you grew up in, and, as one friend of mine said,  wanting to be there to be part of the dialog that helps to affect whatever changes are coming. But after 30 years I think there’s also a point where you have to (excuse my Latin) “sh*t or get off the pot.”

And yet, I’m actually not being cynical when I say that these people just need to admit that they’re really Lutherans or Episcopalians. Rather, I’m being a librarian.

Yes. A librarian. A cataloging librarian, to be specific. For you see, I went through this issue myself those 30 years ago, when I was both dating a Catholic girl and working in a library.

I grew up in the Episcopal Church and had always been interested in religion, reading about Christianity and Judaism voraciously. This Catholic girl gave me reason to start reading more about Catholicism, and as I read more and more about it, and especially the changes that had occurred as a result of Vatican II, I started to wonder if there was really any good reason for Protestants to even exist anymore. I started to wonder if maybe I shouldn’t just be a Catholic and get it over with.

But there were a few problems. While I could accept about 80% of the “official party line” (the most that I believe anyone really accepts in any denomination), there were just some things for me in the Catholic Church that were deal-breakers. So now the big question was, “what was I really?”

Well, I worked in a library, so I treated this as a cataloging problem. If I were looking at a book, I’d carefully consider its contents and then decide what category it best fit under. I wouldn’t try forcing a music book to be a history book by ripping out 75% of the pages. And so it was with myself. I looked at what I really believed, and decided that I really should be shelved under either Episcopalian or Lutheran (the Southern Baptists never had a chance). And so, despite the fact that I had grown up in the Episcopal Church, I ended up “cataloging myself” under “Lutheran.”

So am I asking today's disaffected young Catholics to “switch sides" and change what they are? Not really. As a librarian today, I guess I’m just annoyed that they complain while refusing “to do the proper cataloging,” insisting on shelving themselves where they don’t fit, just because that’s the kind of book they’ve always been told that they are…whether they really are or not.

There’s nothing wrong with being Catholic. Really, there’s not. There is, however, a problem with being a “closeted Episcopalian.” And now that I think about it, maybe that’s where the big issue is for so many of these people…coming out of the closet is hard. So I guess I should stop being so cynical and impatient, and have a little compassion for them.

After all, isn’t that a Catholic virtue?

What's Wrong with Cliché?

Last year Redbook Columist Aaron Traister complained that he had a problem with Valentines Day because it just seemed so cliché. He didn’t like dealing with what he thought was yet another Hallmark-created holiday (and by the way, for all of you who regularly get down on “Hallmark Holidays,” Hallmark didn’t create them, it’s just that the folks in Kansas City recognized that a lot of people were looking for cards to help celebrate them, and were very successful in fulfilling that need). He was looking for a way to celebrate Valentines Day with his wife that didn’t involve candy and overpriced flowers and all the other stuff that Big Romance pushes on us.

My response? Get a grip. What’s wrong with a little cliché every now and then? I’m willing to bet that he’s one of millions of guys who sits in front of the TV every year with his beer and large assortment of “guy snacks” as he watches the Super Bowl. And don’t try to tell me that Big Beverage, Big Food, and Big Sports aren’t trying to push all of that consumption on them. It’s the same thing every year – lots of food while sitting and watching a football game – so why isn’t that considered cliché?

Or is it not cliché if it’s something that’s near and dear to your heart?

But let’s talk about another cliché: birthdays and birthday parties. I wonder if he passes on them because they’re so cliché, or whether he gets into all the food, and cake…and presents. I know that I sure enjoy celebrating my birthday…especially since the tradition with me, my mother, and my sister is that you get a check for your age in the birthday card. What’s not to like about that? If that’s a tired old cliché, then I say should have more clichés!

Heck…Valentines Day is like a birthday party…with sex! And who’s gonna complain about that? (OK…you in the back row…sit down and shut up.)

Really though, so the tradition is that it’s supposed to be about chocolate and flowers and romance. Is that a big problem? I figure that there are lots of ways to deal with those that aren’t all that cliché at all.

Let’s start with the chocolates. There’s no rule that says it has to be a box of Whitmans. It could be a gift bag full of Hershey’s Kisses and Hugs (and wouldn’t it be really cool if they made…oh, never mind). That’s what I gave Cheryl last year…and then found out that she really doesn’t like the Hugs. That was fine with me, because I love them and ate them for her.

But I know what you’re saying, you’re saying “Those little red and pink-wrapped candies are still just soooo cliché. Do I really have to do that?” You’re hopeless, aren’t you? OK, how’s this for original…find out what kind of candy she likes…you know, like what kind of candy bar she likes…and get her a bagful of them. Imagine the look on her face you present her with a huge gift bag full of Snickers or Caramelos or Nestlés Crunch bars. That’s chocolate…and it’s different. And make sure that you keep your mitts off of what’s supposed to be her candy.

What about the flowers? Sorry, I can’t help you there. That’s because, quite frankly, I’d love to send Cheryl flowers but I can’t. I can’t send them to her at work (which I’d love to do, in order to show all her colleagues how wonderful I am) because she works the night shift, when no one’s delivering. I can’t send them to her during the day because she’s sleeping, and she’d have my head if she was from her bed untimely ripped, to answer the door from the flower delivery guy.

Oh wait…bring some home myself…in my hands? Wow. I never thought of that. I could just stop by the supermarket on the way home and bring her some flowers. What a concept.

Now I have to admit that I’m sort of lucky when it comes to things like Valentines Day and anniversaries. That’s because while I’ve been planning for weeks in advance, Cheryl usually forgets until she sees the present from me sitting on the bed. Then she decides to take me out to dinner at our favorite restaurant.

And that’s almost as good as two checks for my age.

Explaining Shame to a 26-Year-Old

In so many ways it’s a different world out there than it was 30 or more years ago. And that’s a good thing.

Why do I say this? Because my wife was telling one of her colleagues about the conversation I had with my daughter about the social pressures that might lead a girl to feel that she had to have an abortion, and 26-year-old “Emma” looked at her like she had three heads.

You see, Emma doesn’t remember the dark ages when it would have been a major league SHAME to be pregnant and unmarried. She was born just as those days were winding to a close. She neither remembers nor can conceive of a time when getting pregnant without being married was something that brought such shame on yourself and your family that it’s why we have the term “shotgun wedding,” as the parents of the girl rushed to make sure that she was properly married when the baby was born. She doesn’t remember when children born outside of marriage were called "illegitimate" (and that’s the nice word). She has no concept of an unmarried girl being so ashamed to face her family and bring that shame upon them, that she felt that her only choices were an illegal, and often dangerous, “back alley” abortion or suicide.

You see, mercifully, our world isn’t like that anymore. We no longer have the official pretense that people are waiting until they’re married to have sex, and that anyone who doesn’t is a Bad Person™. It used to be that the unmarried pregnancy was a sign that you had been one of those Bad People. While it’s still not a good idea for 16-year-old girls to have sex, and an even worse idea for them to get pregnant, we pretty much assume that a 26-year-old woman is sleeping with her boyfriend. And while it may be a little embarrassing to explain, we no longer pin a scarlet “P” on these women if they get pregnant. In a world where sex before marriage is assumed, most of us see an unplanned pregnancy as just a little “oops.”

At least most of us don’t. There are still some quarters where the unwed pregnant girl is sent off or “hidden away” so that she doesn’t set a “bad example” for the others.

And that’s one of the big differences between then and now: SHAME vs embarrassment. One would think that the with the SHAME gone from being pregnant and unmarried, more women would be willing to carry the baby to term and then place it with an adoptive family.

Let me make myself clear, I’m pro-choice, but that doesn’t mean that I believe that you should be able to have an abortion just because it’s Tuesday, or just because it’ll ruin your vacation plans. I’m pro-choice because I remember the days of SHAME and coat hangers. I would prefer that women make the “tragic choice” to have an abortion because of “tragic circumstances” such as a threat to her own life or rape…or facing the SHAME that some of the very people who are fighting abortion would subject her and her family to. I have a problem with it being used because the pregnancy in “inconvenient.”

And what of me and my family? What have I said to my two daughters? I’ve said very simply that if they should ever find themselves unmarried and pregnant, while it may be a little embarrassing, I’d like to get to know my grandchildren, no matter when they arrive.

Explaining Abortion to a 10-Year-Old

It all began with a postcard from our older daughter.

She sends us postcards, real drop-in-the-mailbox postcards, a few times each week, with a little snippet or two about college life or something interesting she’s learned on them. The latest one said that a good portion of women who have abortions consider themselves to be pro-life, and think “I’m a good person who made a mistake, so it’s OK if I get an abortion.” But when “those” people get abortions, it’s because they’re bad people and irresponsible.

As I read the postcard to myself, her younger sister asked what it said, and when I told her, I got a question that I wasn’t expecting: What’s an abortion?

Now, the reason I wasn’t expecting the question isn’t because I was naïve. My daughters are nurse’s kids, and knew more about sex at age eight than many kids knew at age 14. If you ask us a question, we’ll give you the answer. Besides, just last week she was in the same room with me when I was talking about our church’s position on abortion with a friend, and she hadn’t asked any questions then.

And in case you’re interested, the last time I checked, the official position of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is that abortion is, and needs to remain a “tragic option,” one that is sadly necessary for some people in this fallen world.

But back to the main story here, when she asked me what an abortion was, I could easily have deferred that one to her mother, but she was asleep, and I figured that this was something that we needed to talk about right then and there. I was going to try to talk about it in the most neutral way possible, without hitting either of the rabid extremes, but coming from the uncomfortable middle, where I find myself, along with most other people in this country.

I don’t remember my exact words, but I explained to her that an abortion was an operation where a pregnant woman goes to have the baby removed, and it dies. I didn’t use the word “baby” over “fetus” for any political or ideological reasons. It was simply because I was talking to a 10-year-old, and that’s the term she understood.

When I explained this to her, a look of horror went over her face. Once again, not because of any particular political or ideological reasons, but because this is the kid who can’t walk through the mall without saying, “Ooh, look at the baby!” While she can imagine someone not wanting a baby (she knows that having a second kid was really not on my personal To Do list, and laughs at me for losing that battle), she can’t imagine anyone not wanting one badly enough to kill it. Her immediate response was “couldn’t they just have someone adopt it?”

Ah…in a more perfect world that would be the case. But I also took the time to explain some of the social pressures that might lead a girl to feel that she had to have an abortion, and that how, ironically, those pressures can come from the same religious people who are fighting against it. It used to be that an abortion was one way of hiding the “shame” that you had been having sex without being married. Or rather, of hiding the shame that you’d been caught. We all knew that people were doing it, we just didn’t want to admit it. Nowadays we assume that most people have sex without being married, so getting pregnant is only the confirmation of what we figured you were doing anyway.

In recent years I have been very pleased to see the baptisms of a few babies in our congregation who were the children of unwed parents. I was pleased to see that the mothers were not “sent to visit Aunt Sue for a few months,” but remained as part of the community, and that their children were fawned over just like any other new baby in the congregation. I was quite proud to know that our congregation isn't part of the problem that I told my 10-year-old about.

But I know that this conversation isn’t over yet, and while I really don’t want to talk to her about coat hangers, I know that I need to in order to put this whole issue in context.

And even though I’ve run long over my self-imposed word limit, the conversation here isn’t over yet either, and will resume in a few weeks as I think about a book that influenced me a great deal when I was in high school.