The Book is Unbearable to Read!
It's poignant, prescient, and too real for so many in our society.
Which book?
It was written in 2010. I don't remember reading it, although I remember reading some discussions of it.
I was busy in those days - teaching high school, and surrounded by evidence of fertility, both the relatively young parents of the students, and their children.
My daughter had three children at that time. I'd been a relatively young grandparent, compared to my peers. Most of my friends and relatives had grown children, but few were having children before their late twenties or early thirties.
My daughter was the exception. At only 21, she married a man with a not quite 9 years old son. I was so excited to become a grandparent for the first time. He actually wasn't adopted formerly until his 23rd birthday, but for me, from the day of the wedding, he was mine. She went on to add two more children to the mix.
I felt the same way about my husband's son, born before we even met. We only discovered his existence a few years ago. Thanks to my new son, I now have an additional two grandsons, and a lovely daughter-in-law.
But we have many friends and family members without descendants. Many of them never married.
Its not the lack of spouses or children that concerns me. It's the lack of connectedness with subsequent generations, and isolation from a community with a full range of ages that bothers me. That is one of the problems with moving to a retirement community - you lose the connections.
My eldest daughter is not married; she is, however, enmeshed with her religious community. They are truly sisters in faith. And, thanks to vigorous work to introduce younger women to their community, their order is growing.
It isn't really about spouses, or even children. It's about working to grow and maintain strong communities with a future.
That's what the dying nations, states, and regions lack.
I finished Children of Men this morning. It gives me even more reasons to work to change the culture to be pro-children, pro-family, and less authoritarian.
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