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Vulnerability
Well, now that the most pressing of needs have subsided and everyone's fevers have returned to the normal zone (though my levels of pique and dander remain high) I have a moment to indulge in a little freak out about how annoyingly susceptible one finds oneself when one has children and I am frankly really annoyed about it.
I truly hate the fact that the news can issue a teasing warning one hears in passing while trying to ladle yogurt into one kid's mouth that some toy CERTAIN TO BE IN YOUR HOUSE is deadly in a way you can't imagine. Tune in at ten o'clock (or closer to half-past the hour, really because they inevitably bury those stories). I hear that caution and sigh because I will never ever ever figure out what time bomb is lurking because I will probably not remember that there is news on at ten, let alone to watch it. So this just leads to another fine thread of relapsing and remitting concern. ("Is there something deadly in the house? Surely someone will tell me about it soon if it is really an issue. Surely. I hope.)
I caught a fragment of another news story today about children who drown hours after leaving a swimming pool. Terror again. Even the doctor called upon to comment said that the symptoms of "dry drowning" were the sorts of things one would observe in a normal toddler. How does one know whether one's kid is drowning or having a tantrum?
So not only am I susceptible to worry, I am susceptible to the news in general, but not enough to actually give it my full attention, of course.
And then today, I glanced at Slate quite early while feeding the children and saw Emily Bazelon's piece about the Ground Rules for Writing About Children. I suppose I should be chided for having written about my kids at all, but I don't think I tend to say much that is overwhelmingly personal or unusual. Of course one is always ambivalent about talking about intimate things or embarrassing moments, but I do think it is all right to have the constant question of why one is writing what one is writing. I could muse forever on this but for today I think here is another way in which one is vulnerable. People often find great inspiration in their children and there is fear in revealing them at the same time as there is this impulse to talk about them all the time. (I have a variation on this problem where I get so frightened that I will be dismissed for having kids that I tend to lie by omission to people, my editors, for instance, and don't mention I have kids at all. Then one starts bleating while I'm on the phone and I have to confess.)
It is a constant life on the edge.
posted by Elise at 9:38 AM
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