When I was in grad school, my friend, internationally renowned poet and soon-to-be bride Elline Lipkin , and I both noticed a missing term in the English language. The term was for that sensation when you've been to the hair stylist that day, and gotten an amazing cut and probably glamorous color, and need to go out to have a beer and let people view the hair, and how irritating it is when you just have to go home. Using Latin roots, we coined "bellechevism"– (something like beautiful-hair-ism in French). (amusing how so bourgeois a syndrome sounds a bit like Bolshevism…) I was thinking about this today because I encountered another missing word that needs to be coined: male old bitty.
What do we call an old man who is nosy and intrusive? We don't really have such a term, do we? I was driving along today, after an experience at Starbucks that I will soon recount, and thinking… well, "old bitty" actually refers to chickens, so would there be an old rooster or perhaps (shudder) "old cock"? But no. And of course there's old fart, duffer, geezer, codger, coot, etc., but all of these seem to disparage the oldness, malodorousness and possible derangement of the man in question, and none seem to imply the particular prying, scolding sort of behavior of the bitty. I open the conversation– if anyone has a suggestion, let me know. Maybe there's something obvious that I overlook.
(Stephen Colbert's acute observation about our nation's seniors: "They look like lizards.")
You can't really go out in public with a baby for over a year and not encounter bitties of all ages. There was the young woman at an insanely crowded cafe, who took it upon herself to shriek to the entire restaurant, "HELLO??/ SOMEONE!!??? Your BABY is CRYING!!" At the very moment when I was running myself half to death trying to manage an unruly Isaac and get our tray cleared up and get a to-go box and GET US OUT of THERE, while, yes, the baby was crying… And there was the True Old Bitty, 100% bona fide right down to her heavy foundation and bony haunches, who admonished me for letting Elias toddle around an ice cream shop, occasionally dropping his empty, dry cone on the floor and picking it up and gnawing on it. I told her directly that "he's supposed to eat a peck of dirt by the time he's five," which made her fellow crones laugh, but she only glared at me with pure seething hatred. And there was the young bitty, who skulked behind me while I was shoe shopping one day, as Elias slept a scant five feet away in his stroller, and muttered under her breath, "…leaving your baby unattended…"
To name but a few!!
But today I encountered that rare bird, a male old bitty, in a Starbucks, as Elias and I killed time before Isaac's school birthday celebration. (Our boys are now five and one!) He opened the conversation cordially enough, remarking on Elias's stunning cuteness and asking his age. We chatted amiably for a short time, and then he brought up this article he was reading about community colleges. He started blathering a bit about how back in his day you had to do such and such to get a degree, and blah blah blah. Then he said:
"Where did you go to college?"
I said, "I went to Vassar."
HIM: "Really? And did you go on to grad school after that?"
ME: "Yes, I did– I went to Columbia."
[Little interlude about what did you study– yada yada–] then: "That's SUCH A WASTE. I mean, we educate these women and then they just have kids and SIT HOME and DO NOTHING."
ME: [Quite calmly, considering] Well, raising kids is not doing nothing. [Holding my ground! Poised, yet firm. And no obscenities.]
HIM: [blather about his daughters, which seemed to be what he was really talking about.] then: Well, what will you do when they're both in school?
ME: [none of your fucking business] I'm not sure at the moment.
HIM: [getting up to leave– thank god] well, heh heh, enjoy your kids!
ME: [go to hell] Thanks!
This is all such a can of worms. And sort of a hot topic lately with the whole ruckus about the opt-out revolution (in which I am apparently a participant) and Linda Hirshman and her gratingly pompous "Get to Work!" manifesto. (Trust me: I have never worked so hard in my life.) What rankles me the most about her, and the "what a waste" comment, is that the truly menial work of housework is conflated with the truly important and non-menial work of child-rearing. Yes, I do hate scrubbing the toilets, the floors, the dishes, etc. And it IS menial. I hesitate to say it's "beneath me," because that surely implies that there are lesser people who should be doing it instead, but at the same time if I could delegate it I gladly would. (I'm very conflicted about the cleaning and have several times begun an essay entitled "the drudgery report," but not competed it.) But — whether it's changing the one millionth diaper or watching the baby's first steps– raising the children really is NOT menial. Not beneath me. Not mindless. Not a waste of my time or education. It's important. It's an honor and a privilege to get to do it myself, rather than having to pay some probably less educated, certainly less devoted woman to do it for me.
This is dangerous territory, I know. I have so many friends who struggle with the work versus child-rearing conundrum, and I surely don't want to offend. The other day I went to visit this upscale preschool in our area, that bills itself as a wonderful, loving, child-centered, etc., etc. I had hoped that I could leave Elias there for two mornings a week, and finally go to the dentist– haven't been since the dislocated jaw of June '06– get my hair cut (see above), and do any of the other millions of things I need and want to do without a speeding distructo toddler helping me. But when I went there I found… basically, a day care center. In the room for 12-18 month-olds, there were two women and TWELVE toddlers. Ee-gads. I had the ill timing to arrive just as the poor, well-meaning, kindly women were attempting to get coats and shoes on all twelve of them, and get them out to play outside. It was unreal– Sisyphus never had it so easy. At least eight of the tots were crying at once, and for every pair of shoes put on, two pairs were removed. Anyway, I came away thanking my lucky stars that I don't HAVE to turn Elias over to such a place. I spent the rest of the afternoon hugging him.
Oh, the "what a waste" contingent… arg. And who is this "we" he refers to, who took all that effort to educate me? I assure you– that old male bitty had nothing to do with my education and nothing to lose by my alleged wasting of my talents on two tiny and invaluable members of the human race. I have to ask who is supposed to raise these children instead of us well-educated women? Just someone, anyone… doesn't apparently matter…
Anyway, ack. I won't go on about it anymore. When my children grow up into good and useful humans, whether they change the world or cure cancer or just are really delightful wonderful people (which they already are), I'll have the last laugh.