Geeky Mom

Sunday night I watched my tivoed Frontline episode, “The Last Abortion Clinic.” I was a seething ball of anger the entire time. I don’t think it was good for my health. Mr. Geeky kept patting my leg and saying, “I’m sorry I made you watch this.” Of course, it was my idea to watch it.

The episode profiles the last abortion clinic in Mississippi. Yep, that’s right, there’s only one clinic left in Mississippi. As I watched people singing and praying outside of the clinic and shouting things to the women who were walking in, I literally wanted to do them harm. It angers me that they care more about the fetuses, the group of cells residing in those women’s bodies than they do about the women themselves. One woman they interviewed at another clinic across state lines explained that her boyfriend, the father of her first child and the one she was carrying had died in a car wreck. She didn’t have a job. She felt like she couldn’t handle having a second child. That seems like a good reason to terminate a pregnancy, and I’m glad they showed it, but to me, it doesn’t matter what the reason is because it’s her decision. What you do with your life and your body is your decision and I want the praying, singing idiots to leave those people alone and let them live their lives.

The single biggest conclusion I took away from the episode (aside from the anger) was that restrictions being placed on abortion harm the poor much more than they harm the middle class. As the clinic director explained, transportation, child care and time off work all tend to prevent women from being able to visit the clinic. They might be able to arrange all three for one visit but because there is a law requiring a 24 hour waiting period, they have to return a second time and sometimes it’s difficult to arrange all three again. For those of us in the middle class, not a problem. The episode also highlight the high incident of teen pregnancy in the area, which, because of restrictions on abortion leads to more teen mothers who don’t finish high school, can’t get jobs and thus, live on welfare, a vicious cycle indeed.

Like many pro-choice advocates, I do not want there to be more abortions. I want there to be less. But unlike the pro-life contingent, I don’t think the way to decrease abortions is by getting rid of the clinics or putting increasingly heavy restrictions on abortion. What we need is better sex education, easy access to birth control (including Plan B), and better education more generally so that many of the poor teenagers who see pregnancy as their only option can see a future for themselves.

At the end of the episode, the clinic director said of the pro-life movement: “They’re only pro life while the life is in utereo. After that, they really don’t care.” When I was reading Jody’s response to the NY Times article on children in restaurants, I thought of this. At the end of her post she says:

The real problem, as I see it, is a society that sees child-rearing as an individual pursuit. I’ll raise my children, and you raise yours, and those folks over there will have nothing to do with children whatsoever. The kind old woman on the bus who tries to calm my rambunctious four-year old is just an interfering old biddy, and the young man who tries to divert my impatient six-year old with a story while we wait for our tables at the restaurant is just a pervert in the making. Families are on their own in this dog-eat-dog world, and you can only rely on yourselves.

I agree with what she says, which is why I’m so baffled by the pro-life’s unusual interest in preventing abortions when they have no desire to deal with the children that result from their own policy. They don’t really think there should be more children in the world, just less “murder.” There’s a disconnect for them between cause and effect and that disconnect drives me crazy.

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When Mr. Geeky got the job here, I sat down with my advisor to tell her I’d be moving and attempting to work long distance on the Ph.D. (you all know how that worked out.) She said, “It’ll be interesting to see how you handle being the faculty spouse.” And I thought, Isn’t that what I’ve been for the last four years? I have been a faculty spouse for almost 10 years now. For 7 of them, I was associated with the same university where Mr. Geeky taught. I have always chafed a bit against the role and am continually surprised by the sexism that often surfaces as a result.

There are unwritten rules about being the faculty spouse and for some reason, these rules only apply to the female (heterosexual) version of the spouse. I’m using the institutions I’ve been at as sole example, so if you have other experiences, I’d love to hear them.

1. Preferably, you will not have a job. This is so you can deal with everything from children to housekeeping to making doctor’s appointments and arranging travel for the holidays so that your spouse, who needs to keep his mind uncluttered from such things, won’t have to.
2. You will be patient about the long hours of grading and writing, of work on the weekends and over holidays.
3. You will attend social events and be gracious, especially to those who have power to grant (or not grant) tenure.
4. If you are smart, you will not show it unless you are a faculty member yourself either at this or another institution. I have no idea what the reasoning behind this is, but it seems to be the case.
5. You will be willing to host faculty and students in your home.
6. You will be willing to give up your own ambitions, at least until he/she gets tenure.

Now some of these obviously come from a bit of bitterness and are a little tongue in cheek. We’re in the home stretch here in the Geeky household. Ten years of pursuing tenure have meant a lot of sacrifices on both our parts. The tenure process is extraordinarily difficult on a family. Even if the individual spouse recognizes this and tries to reduce the difficulties as much as possible, the institution itself just doesn’t. In fact, it pushes even harder, creating a situation where it’s much less stressful to strive for tenure if either a) you’re not encumbered by a family or b) you have a spouse at home tending to it.

Mr. Geeky and I discussed this when we noticed that many of the men on his tenure schedule had wives who didn’t work. We noted that it would be easier for him if I didn’t work. Instead, he occasionally dealt with the children’s days off from school or doctor’s appointments. He was always home for dinner and helped put the kids to bed. Even if I do a little more housework than he does, it’s still something that’s been negotiated and not just automatic.

Other faculty tend to react to me in a way that says they don’t really want to know about Mr. Geeky’s personal life. They know, perhaps, the sacrifices made by a faculty spouse and don’t want to be reminded of them. Or, I get looks along the lines of, “Hmm. Didn’t think she was smart enough to marry a professor.” (This usually from people who know me as a staff member and are truly shocked to find out I’m married to one of their own. I literally have gotten gasps.) I can’t always put my finger on the pariah nature of the way I’m treated sometimes. Many people are, of course, quite gracious, but others, mostly men, react to me as if I have some kind of disease.

I suppose I would be more comfortable in my role (and would make others more comfortable as well) if that were my only role, but I have a job and worse, I have a job at the same institution. They’re not sure sometimes, whether to deal with me as Mr. Geeky’s wife or as the staff member they know. And, unfortunately, they wouldn’t deal with me in the same way for both roles, which I think says something pretty significant about the way they view those roles. In many ways, they see both as inferior, but one is more inferior than the other. Which one that is depends entirely on the person’s perspective, but makes no difference to me. I’m still not on equal footing with them or with my husband (in their mind).

I have a huge post brewing about being a faculty spouse, but until I get it all worked out, I have to tell you about my adventures with Geeky Girl today. We went shopping. It was mission shopping. We had specific things on our list to get: leaf blower, cds, sweaters. We had to be efficient because we needed to be back in time to meet Geeky Boy after basketball practice. (Yes, this is my real life.)

We score a leaf blower at Lowe’s along with a bird feeder and birdseed, then we hit Best Buy for cds and dvds. Here’s the conversation that ensued:

GG: Here we are: disctopia.
Me: (grinning) Yep. (thinking, of course: how clever is that; I must blog it.)

We pick out the requisite cds and dvds.

Me: That wasn’t so bad.
GG: Well, things are always easier when you work together.
Me: Yes, they are.

Bleh. I fell a little short of my word count goal this morning. I’m at 16,500. I had wanted to get to 17,500 with an ultimate goal of 20,000 by the end of today. The good thing is I’m getting to a part that’s mostly already written in my head. It is, in many ways, the scene that inspired the whole project to begin with. So I’m expecting that to basically write itself.

You know, it feels really good to be doing this, no matter how bad I think the results are. I think I’m learning a lot about myself, about what I think I can accomplish. There are so many big projects–degrees, novels, dissertations–that I haven’t finished. Like a marathon, the goal is to finish, not to place. Just think what might happen if you decided to do this every other month. Is that possible?

nanowrimo

There are many poems I could put here, that both honor the veterans and the sacrifices they made and question the motives of war. I want to put here a poem I’ve heard read a few times, written by an old teacher of mine (and of artichoke heart, I believe). I have a quite distinct memory of the beginning of the first gulf war. I was running to the student union, on my way to bridge club of all things. On my way in, a couple of people on their way out told me the war had started. The next day, I rode the elevator with Professor Komunyakaa up to about the 10th floor of the library where our class was held. “I can’t believe this,” he said. I knew he had been in Vietnam. I hadn’t yet heard the poem below, but I had read it. We talked for the ride up about how crazy waging war was. I was twenty-two. At the time, I thought the gulf war might turn into Vietnam. Little did I know, it would take another 15 years for that to happen.

I was inspired to do this, in part, by Bright Star’s posting of poetry. I especially like the one she posted today.

Here is “Facing It.” You can hear it read here.

Facing It

My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn’t,
dammit: No tears.
I’m stone. I’m flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night
slanted against morning. I turn
this way–the stone lets me go.
I turn that way–I’m inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke.
I touch the name Andrew Johnson;
I see the booby trap’s white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman’s blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird’s
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet’s image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I’m a window.
He’s lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she’s brushing a boy’s hair.

13,800. Getting there, slowly but surely. Actually, I got about 2500 words written in an hour. Geeky Boy came down with his friend and Geeky Girl.

GB: How’s it going, mom? How many words do you have?
Me: Hmm, let me check. (clicking on profile)
Friend: What are you doing?
GB: (positively beaming): She’s writing a novel.
Friend: Really? What happens if you finish?
Me: Fame and fortune. (giggling a little) You guys could write one.
GB and Friend: No way, huh uh. (general denial)
GB: I can’t get the words out of my head.

They’re so cute. I couldn’t convince either of them to try it.

There is an extraordinary situation that’s developed over one of Nels’ students published papers. If you haven’t read about it yet, you should. It is a good example of how contentious this whole issue of parenting is. There’s a real subtext here of how parenting is not valued in any context.

I got a little write-up on our college news site. Very exciting. Mr. Geeky gets a mention at the bottom, but most importantly, Michelle, of Culture of Chemistry fame.

As you might imagine, I’ve slowed down a little because of yesterday’s election. I went to bed early Monday night since I had to get up at 5:30. Then last night, after 14 hours of poll working, I pretty much crashed. So two nights in a row of not writing. I got in 1000 words tonight, putting me just over 11,000 total. I’m still pretty tired and my brain is even more tired than my body. My plan is to write every night this week and then do a really big push this weekend.

Some observations about this whole experience so far:

• Writing every day is useful. Even though much of the writing is bad, it feels much more like progress and the story itself feels much more contiguous than when I’m writing in snippets. I’d like to try to continue this pattern.
• Writing gets harder after the first rush. For me, there’s a nugget, a scene that gets me started. Once I’ve gotten past that initial spark, I’m much less motivated.
• That said, just writing helps keep me motivated. I find myself saying, “Okay, write just 500 more words.” And sometimes that leads me into another scene that I’m interested in and I’ll write much more than 500 words.
• People think I’m crazy for doing this. Maybe I am, but I don’t care.

Audience participation part:

• Any name ideas for the internet startup that my main character works for?
• Any thoughts on whether my main character should get the guy or not?

nanowrimo