The fairytale aspect of life is presented ad nauseum both by books and films and TV shows. One of the primary sells being that the magic princess/prince will arrive, snow white charger optional, and whisk you into a life beyond your wildest dreams. Nightmare more like. At least for over 50% of us.
Case in point: Carol (not her real name) is a 40 year old woman living up the road from me. Attractive. Five children. Two husbands under her belt. Children by 3 different partners. None of whom give her a dime of support for her family's well-being. So we the people do it with our slim taxation dollars. Us 99% I am referring to, of course. I doubt if it crosses the 1%'s mind that such people exist. And if it did it would be “their own fault,” “bootstraps,” and “I'm alright, Jack”.
Nothing wrong with Carol and her life, though there are some that judge her. All the time. Her unhappiness leaks nearly every day from her Facebook posts. She is poorly educated and if you knew why, you would weep (snippet: as a toddler she saw her mother murdered in a bath of blood by her father). Her dream for the knight to ride in and save her has never left her mind since she was fourteen. She just made poor choices in the past, you see. But HE is still out there and will find her. Just like the soaps she watches in the afternoons. So she does herself up right sexy before she even opens her door and zeroes in on any available upright man who walks around. HE will be the one. It is a constant uphill struggle as sometimes they use and sometimes outright reject her. But her poverty and belief in this dream enables her to continue getting up in the morning.
It never crosses her mind to get an education now that all the children are in school full-time. To change. To determine that her happiness is an inside job. Not the knight's responsibility. I've spoken to her about this. About the joy of personal fulfilment and she looks at me sideways. This credo has absolutely no perceivable benefit to her. I just don't get it, you see.
How many countless others are waiting like her for this fantastical teevee land of Father Knows Best and its ilk?
No one talks about failure having much better odds than success in a relationship. And if we included the incredibly unhappy and abusive ones that manage to hold together in a kind of misery loves company toxicity, the odds would be overwhelming indeed.
Why does no one ever talk about limiting the size of their families in this overpopulated and abused planet - while we breed ourselves to the point of extinction? Children are being raised in poverty just about everywhere by single parents. Why? Because they believed in that Princ(ess) Charming and forever with a brood of happy kids frolicking in the meadow. Hell, if the sex is good than it follows that everyone and everything around us would be too, right?
I was one. The only lifestyle that improved after my divorce was that of my ex-husband. All sorts of both material and other benefits were cut from my two children's lives. I had bought into the dream too, you see. Like most of us. Forever and ever, amen.
What a crock of shyte as my people would say.
It is time we stopped this massive delusion.
So that Carol's children won't perpetuate the insanity.
Indeed, if Carol had put her faith in education and self-sufficiency she would almost certainly be having a much happier life than waiting for Prince Charming to come along. But women are peddled this absurd heterosexual idyll so vigorously it's hard to resist. Even if your parents are miserable, you're still convinced your own marriage will be perfect. The constant triumph of propaganda over reality.
ReplyDeleteI have so many friends, well educated, well paid, and well over the age, who still look for a man to make them happy. They are wasting what's left of their lives looking for someone else to "complete them". It makes me want to barf.
ReplyDeleteit's so tough! you're right, that dream is touted everywhere. and so many women make bad choices when they're too young to know better. Carol probably knows better now, but now she's stuck.
ReplyDeleteThere is no easy answer to this situation. It is very sad.
ReplyDeleteI do have a certain amount of sympathy for Carol, yet how on earth did she allow herself to become pregnant - so many times?
ReplyDeleteShe's only 40, so birth control was no longer in its infancy during her adult life, and it doesn't take much education to be aware of it. One or two children - maybe - but FIVE!!
Maybe I'm judging her unjustly? But this is one of my own hobbyhorses....too many take the bringing of more life onto this already overcrowded planet with too little serious forethought.
Some women are victims of their lives and take no proactive role in changing anything about them. It's like they refuse to see their lives any differently than what they had envisioned, even though those lives have clearly not turned out that way. They stubbornly cling to the idea of how it's supposed to be and not to how it really is. They are their own worst enemy.
ReplyDeleteI really hate the latest teenage books that perpetuate the myth of romance for young girls. And they sell millions.
ReplyDeleteWe need new books for girl children, new dreams.
May I beg to disagree. Just because Carol had a bad time with her knights in shining armour, it does not become a rule. For every Carol there are more than a few who have made good marriages and lives, educated or not. Limiting the children is certainly within one's capabilities to increase the joy of married life, but that alone does not make for one. And, often dreams are all that we are left with to just live or more aptly, exist.
ReplyDeleteIt's sad - but surely hope is preferable to despair?
ReplyDeleteOr is despair the wrong term - perhaps it should be realism.
Would that parents would parent...lead by example...
ReplyDeleteThere have always been Carol's, even Educated ones, maybe, just maybe we need them to realize how blessed we.
I know a few women like your friend. But most women I know are pretty savvy these days.
ReplyDeleteMothers should make certain their daughters learn a marketable skill, so as adults they can support themselves (and, if necessary, a couple of children).
ReplyDeleteMothers should also make certain their daughters fully understand reproduction, its prevention and consequences, including the heavy responsibilities of child-rearing.
Education is the best birth control.
ReplyDeleteIt is a pity that many people (men and women) without the mating gene get caught up in the mating frenzy for much of their lives (conditioned by the first mention of a toddler/infant boyfriend or girlfriend, my personal pet peeve).
I personally feel a tremendous freedom once I recognized that the 'lack' of this gene doesn't make me less worthy and in fact allows me to redirect this energy.
Most of the species on this planet are not monogamous. This gives me great comfort when the culturally inspired urge to mate starts to nip at my heels again :)