Lifetime for Men

If you've ever had the misfortune of viewing a movie on the Lifetime channel or reading a book from Oprah's book club you already know that men are jerks who ruin the lives of women and drive them to drinking and all matter of horrible destructive behavior. Now, before I say much more let the record show that I concur that 98% of men are jerks. I've had my fair share of jerk men in my life, I could easily make a dozen Lifetime movies from my own life. Furthermore, I know of much worse from the lives of others. Only problem is that women can be pretty awful too, which left me wondering, why isn't there a lifetime channel for men?

Imagine a plot something like this: A hardworking all-American guy from Detroit meets a sweet young girl from a trailer park and is swept up in a romance of sorts only to discover that early in the relationship she has become pregnant. Having been raised with good "family values" he does the honorable thing and marries her only to discover shortly after the nuptials that she is in fact NOT pregnant at all. Still an honorable guy who believes in love, he sticks with her with the understanding that they'd wait a while to have any children. Yet within a short time she is pregnant, this time in reality, not fantasy. During the pregnancy he cares for her and prepares their home for the baby. At some point she asks to put her name on the deed to the house and of course he agrees. Shortly after the birth of the child and nearly moments after the ink is dry on the deed she leaves, files for divorce, and commences to take the man for all he is worth while denying him access to his only child. The child living in squalor back in the trailer park and developing a hearty smokers cough by the age of 2. All the while the unjust legal system giving the less-than-equipt mother preferential treatment and all of his money.

This little narrative is based largely on events in the life of someone I know and the truth is I could tell stories all day about men who have been largely screwed over by women and a system that doesn't seem to value fathers very much. In fact I think most people could think of stories like these involving people in their own lives. So the question for me is why isn't there a whole industry centered around the poor beaten down guy story? Women's lives as ruined by men is arguably a billion dollar industry, so why not men?

At the end of the day I believe society as a whole is more comfortable with the man as victimizer, woman as victim paradigm. Men certainly don't want to see themselves as victims, and honestly I don't think women want to see them that way either. Conversely we are somehow very comfortable with women as victims, although we always love the happy ending where they stick it to "the man" and get a "liberating" job as a secretary somewhere and pay the rent on their crappy two bedroom apartment all by themselves.

Right or wrong women have managed to get disproportionate rights as a result of this paradigm. On the whole we as women are peripherally aware of it, but since we get so few advantages its always nice to have that ace up our sleeve. Men are reticent to draw attention to the vicimhood for a variety of reasons, largely because in the end the scenario still gets turned back on them. They still end up the jerk.

Imagine this scenario: Parent A & B divorce. At the time of the divorce parent A is staying at home with the only child. The custody arrangement gives parent A 55% of the time with the child and parent B 45% of the time. Parent B is required to pay one third of his/her income to Parent A and to pay for the child's health care expenses. This arrangement doesn't change even if the stay-at-home parent secures employment. Which parent is the mother? Of course the answer is A. The real clincher here is that if the father in this scenario were to fight to pay any less given that mom is now working and not paying for rent he would be a jerk for trying to reduce his child support even though he pays all the child's expenses during the 45% of the time that he has the child.

I suppose the answer is that in a perfect world we would all feel empowered enough that we don't view ourselves or others as victims. Or even better, we learn to value one another and chose to treat each other with love and respect so that fairness might reign supreme. Until then we're stuck with the lifetime channel and some men silently squashed by an unfair system...............

Someone Else's Path

“If you see your path laid out in front of you -- Step one, Step two, Step three -- you only know one thing... it is not your path. Your path is created in the moment of action. If you can see it laid out in front of you, you can be sure it is someone else's path. That is why you see it so clearly.”
-- Joseph Campbell

I spend a certain amount of time and emotional energy feeling somewhat lost these days. I've re-formatted my entire life around a new set of principals. I've let myself imagine the life I never dared to dream of and am trying to trust that this life will materialize. I'm making all of my decisions within the context of my true passions, but I don't have a rigid structured path to follow. On the one hand this is difficult, yet on the other I'm growing to see the wisdom in it.

In what now seems nearly foreign to me, my former life had a clear and recognizable path. I graduated from high school and went to a nice college. I graduated college and got a good job. I married a good man, we got a good little dog. (I did fail to have the good kids..........) My career progressed to another good job. ...........and yet the whole time I was terribly unhappy. Worst of all I couldn't understand why. I had all the stuff in place that I was supposed to have. I had a nice house, a new car, I was even on the society pages a few times. And it was completely empty. I was never going to find joy along someone else's imaginary path.

At the end of the day I want more. I want to wake up with a lightness of spirit and anticipation of the day ahead. I want dread to become a distant memory. I want to live a joyful life and bring joy into other people's lives. I can't do that unless I'm living the life I truly want to live. The truth is that there is no way that I could possibly plan the next steps conclusively without closing the door inadvertently to the infinite possibilities that exist. There is no clear path because there is but one of me and if I'm ever to sort it all out I'm beginning to realize that when I arrive wherever it is that I am going, I could have never anticipated the path that took me there. As my grandmother Clara used to say, "I've never been lost forever."