A few guys gather weekly to talk about ideas. They tend to like to focus on abstract concepts and philosophies. They asked me to bring to the discussion some focus or other. I said I wanted to talk about early childhood education. It seems to me that people I know drift more immediately toward discussions of being a parent than to ideas of being parented.
When I think of the biological process of creating a human being, I think of Melvin Konner and his book "The Tangled Wing." It is about the process of growing from a fertilized egg to a born baby. It is an amazing process. Much of it seems to be about being reasonably careful and not engaging in tackle football while not over-doing delicacy and restraint. I asked my wife, a mother, grandmother and greatgrandmother, what some of the basics of being pregnant were. She said take vitamins and be under a doctor's care.
I enjoy watching "Call the Midwife", the tv series about London nuns who serve as midwives just after WWII.
The show simulates births often. At least I think it is a simulation. A few years ago, I learned of the Latin phrase: nascens inter urinam et faeces
(born between urine and feces). It is true that the construction of our mother's bodies was such that we emerged between two orifices for emptying but doesn't signify much unless we want to get all poetic. I have learned that the millions of years that have shaped the operations and logic of our bodies are pretty impressive and intelligent so I don't take much from the proximities.
One reason that people seem to have more to say about being a parent than being parented is that we are older and more articulate and more aware of responsibilities and hopes when we become parents. It seems that most of us squawk and cry aloud when being born but we don't have clear memories of that important event. We may well have 9 whole months to think about a coming baby and how we plan to be fabulous parents.
