Dadsmidlifecrisis

Steve Jobs And His Magic View

2011-10-10T06:57:00.000-07:00

If you've seen and taken on board Steve's Stanford Speech then you will not need to read this one. It's just that when you hear something that has such a profound effect on you, you know you have to pass it on. Enjoy.

'You've got to find what you love,' Jobs says
This is a prepared text of the Commencement address delivered by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, on June 12, 2005.

"I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?
It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.
And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.
It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:
Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.
Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.
I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.
I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.
During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.
I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.
This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
Thank you all very much."

Role Reversal

2010-02-19T09:05:00.000-08:00

Heard yesterday from my osteo (whilst I was being crunched and popped) that he has a friend who is, like me, a stop at home dad; interestingly he is working on a book provisionally entitled 'We've been conned'.

Apparently its central theme is that women have for ages conned us into believing that the job of doing the domestic work and childcare is very, very, very difficult, and that we as men are not up to it .... and he thinks it is a breeze ... grrrr !!

I'd love to see his day/house/loft/fridge/playroom/laundry as I suspect that he is in denial as well as quite possibly at war with his wife. Or maybe has a team of manservants (woman-servants?) on hand and London's finest concierge service. I'd especially like to hear his wife's assessment of his performance.

This seems to be a good example of that classic insecure over-achieving, over-ambitious 'can definitely do' 'deny every weakness' trait frequently exhibited by bottom-sniffing wannabe alpha males in corporate structures, such as the workplace he graciously resigned from to do the 'dadding'.

It's 2010 - turn your gaze to the city and look where that thinking has brought us - so many of these men definitely could not do what they were either convinced they could or were told they could ....

With more women at the helm would not the world be a slightly less greedy and bereft, but slightly more humane place right now ? Whilst far from a perfect sex, women just have a better way of getting the job done from what I have seen.
More harmony, soul, empathy, care, cooperation and foresight and forward motion; less bravado, less bullshit, less swagger, less dogma and definitely less misery.

My own personal experience is that househusbandry has been the most challenging thing I have ever done, topping my youthful ambitions and efforts to become a rockstar (minor success but then it's a very competitive area !) and building two of my own businesses (slightly better efforts). I can see the odd grey hair, and my nerves are shattered from the baby-toddler lack of sleep thing. My tolerance is all used up. I will never be the same. I am uncertain of what talents I possess anymore.

So, I happen to think that if someone has found a way to do it effortlessly they should keep their bloody trap shut or write a book about it so we can all judge their methodology for ourselves ... hence I will definitely be looking forward to the book he has planned hitting the shelves !;?

Ok .. Back to the point I am trying to make, I think it's time for all men to respect the women in their lives more, trust and appreciate the unique talents of their partners in humanity - not belittle them with competitive alpha-male nonsense like this example.
There is just a small chance that this way, the women they deal with may just respect and see more of the good in them, and then they'll no longer need to puff up their feathers in this insanely destructive way that takes us to war or to bankruptcy.

Men - Don't be afraid; admit it - you're bored with behaving like you're in the playground ! Open up and chill out a bit - find something to admit you're rubbish at, and get over your cocky selves !!

Somewhere between Cave-man and Metrosexual Moisturised Man there lies a happy path, where the woman you care about will still love you, want you and admire your unusual ways ....... and guess what ?

You're worth it !

Followers (Mini Post Alert)

2010-02-03T05:50:00.000-08:00

Apologies to all anonymous blog followers and not so anonymous ones but I haven't found a way to successfully mail you (with google friend connect etc.) so as to thank you for following ... So ... Thank you !!

Ax

That Four Hour Week Bloke ...

2010-02-03T03:38:00.000-08:00

In the comments below his blog I saw this and liked it - especially the bit about the children laughing because they know the truth therein - is that them displaying emotional intelligence ?

[on http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2008/03/10/24-hours-with-tim-ferriss-a-sample-schedule/]

March 10th, 2008
5:10 am

Who can disagree. The hardest part is to learn to relax into the other 20 hours after you have your 4 hours of productive work.

A while ago I took an afternoon off from work to go to my son’s birthday party. One of his friends arrived with a babysitter and announced that “My parents couldn’t bring me because they are very busy.”

My good Calvinist indoctrination of an upbringing whirred into action and I felt useless and disempowered. Why wasn’t I busy? Was I just slacking? Why am I not that that much in demand? Blah, Blah….

Then in a moment of grace my Muse made me say: “Being busy is horrible. It makes you grumpy.” All the little ones burst out laughing because they knew it was true.

Later I remembered how many times had I seen this same little guy’s father all irritated when he was dropping his son off at school in the morning. Hardly something to strive for.

Amen; and worth bearing in mind if you already have your little ones on the treadmill to repeat your own history/career/workaholism.

Please if you have children create a time every day when you are most definitely not that grumpy person for them - I remember my Father being in a bad mood for almost all my childhood (and I'm not judging him for this - he probably had good reason !) ... or rather I remember the contrast ... one or two moments that stand out in all of the grump, e.g. once when I was about eleven years old, with a martini in hand he kicked a beanbag across the living room floor and said "wahey !!" and looked very happy ... the fact that this one moment sticks in my mind 'til now is unfortunately an indicator of what the rest was like ....

People, don't you do this to yourselves !

Ax

Australia Day - Got Me Thinking About

2010-01-26T02:38:00.000-08:00

Mmmmm ... warm summer evenings, with bits of this ....

And a little bit of this ....

Maybe some of this ....

Or if you prefer, this ....

But you can stuff this ....

Professional People

2010-01-22T08:50:00.001-08:00

Something I have noticed at the school gate.

This might be just a S.W. London thing; our school is in an area that considers itself rather posh (...ahem...).

What is it with some people, that the level of professionalism they have had to adapt to, for them to have their hopefully rather splendid daytime career life, cannot seemingly be turned off.

It's as if they cannot bear the thought of being personable or personal or anything other than professional - and they even appear enjoy the opportunity to 'out professional' others around them, dealing more unemotionally and brusquely, but of course perfectly politely and professionally, with people that are just trying to be friendly or gain some human contact or ..... connection. That's what's missing - sincerity ! Ooooh the cold.

A friend of mine used the word 'despicable' to describe such people, and whilst that's rather an emotionally loaded word, it may have grip here.

It IS like talking to robots.

Some sort of evil this is - like a new shiny replacement for the 'holier than thou' chin-up'ness that actually had kudos back when folk gave a monkeys about religion.

Is it about insecurity - that they want to appear to have 'good standing' in the community ? Are they frightened someone is going to hug them .... in public !!! Arrgh ! Dirty dirty !!!

Pseuds ..... the lot of them ...

Bring back being personal, and treating people personably; spoil yourself, and have a relationship beyond officialdom and niceties, begin to feel .... breeeeeeathe - there you go; you feel better already don't you ?!?

Over and out, but please stay posted for my observations about how this applies to a stay at home daddy stuck precariously in amongst the mummies !

AO

Skool's Not In ?!?

2010-01-04T03:53:00.000-08:00

Odd how technology sometimes makes things worse - our school has email weekly bulletins - and guess what - it even allows them to send conflicting information out !

GIGO is the appropriate techy saying, I believe ...

Net result ?

Today is the day we thought we'd need to be back in school (according to one email from them) so we rushed around last night and this morning .... but no !! Padlock on school gate ! One or two other confused Mum's driving round carpark ..

And as it's not, some thank you letters get done at 'daddy school' and now we are about to embark on baking session as we need the oven on to keep warm - Brrrrrrr

A

Crisis What Crisis ?!

2009-12-17T14:51:00.000-08:00

Mmmm... Beginning to realise that if I'm to get any peace round here I need to regain the right to my own midlife crisis - I thought I was being supportive by listening ... but now I realise I am just encouraging hers to gain more momentum and .... Heavens above !! ..... Distract me from my own - dagnamit !!

I have earned this middle-aged 'yard-time' - I've been carefully, studiously, boorishly serious for many a year; I've been messed up stressed up and kept schtupp too ..... It's not as if I make anyone watch me having mine- in fact I 'do' midlife very subtley. It's pleasant.

I simply cannot allow her crisis to ruin mine; oh the mojo of midlife crisis.... So what can I do ?

It's not like I want a sports car or an affair, or penis enlargement surgery.

But it's mine and I want it as it is, not bent out of shape around someone who, I strongly suspect, just doesn't like her job, ....that's not a real, proper dilemma, c'mon ?!!

(joking)

Wishing you all plenty of space to direct your own personal search for true bliss or just a weeny bit of peace and quiet. Just so long as you don't wreck other's in the process !

...So tread softly in this process, offer tolerance, and treat other's dreams as you would have them treat your own. But don't ever, ever, subjugate your own.

There isn't time to wait !!!

;@)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Snowy Hash-taggy & The Carol of the Bells

2009-12-16T04:00:00.000-08:00

Brrrrrrrrrrrr ! - it's cold now but I wanted to relate my weekend's high spot to you -

Last Saturday

DG away for loooooooong w/end - in exotic location made miserable apparently by being work conference based.

Missing each other as v rare intimacy had returned briefly, so both a bit sad. Oh dear. Love you miss you xx.

But (woop woop) - it fruitfully chucked up the opportunity to examine navel, drink tea in bed & allow the kids to be kids, hurrah !!

(... ever read The Idle Parent, any of you ?)

I thus decided we could all lie in, eat what we want, do what we want and when we want. For one day. No harm in that surely ?
Hey - we had a projected 7:30 a.m. start on the Sunday to deal with so what the heck !? No guilt here surely !

So .... what's sooooooo special about that ? Ok, let's sell it to you .....

Here are my first tweets that morning as I lay in bed, toes wriggling beneath the duvet, actually tingling with joy at not rushing around - toes really are mood-barometers aren't they ? - ever seen what toes do when their owner comes ?!! Ahem ...

Tweet One - "Today I am going to avoid helicopter parenting - it just breeds adults that need micromanaging! Let kids be kids whilst they still have time"

ta dah !

and upon unrelated sweet but humorous suggestion to race off and do something else deliciously exciting and very dreamy ... (from @VenaRamphal Passion Coach, whom everyone should follow on Twitter.com and at http://www.venaramphal.com/)

Tweet Two - "...if only ! - home-alone-dad this weekend, only plans are chilling with my children ... Loose but lovely plans !"

Curious parent-type friends scanning twitter notice this and quickly do the maths ..... now I was inundated with requests for specifics from them - was I, for instance, going to do junk modelling with the children ? Make sculptures from papier-mache ?

errr .. No !

Next - Was I going to ' _ _ _ _ _ ' with them ?

And there you should insert name of any activity that if described at a coffee morning would allow for all upstanding parental types to grasp exactly the positive educational nature of the event and nod sagely whilst saying something like.....

"Lovely, yes we went there/did that/intend to do that last week/this week/all the time")

No ! No ! No !

The best parenting advice I have ever heard - that I recognise as having been successfully applied to my childhood - is from the book "The Idle Parent"

It's a quote from an eminent thinker whose name escapes and is not important but

Rule 1. Leave the child alone
Rule 2. LEAVE the child alone !
Rule 3. LEAVE THE CHILD ALONE !!!

(I got to run across fields with our terrier and pals, five-go-mad style, build catapults crossbows and go-karts, catch tiddlers, and generally learn how to be an independent creative thinker - Now where is the smug emoticon when you need it !!)

Yes - for a few minutes you may hear "I'm bored" or if the child has already had too much helicopter-parenting, "I want to go to '_ _ _ _ _ _' ..."

(tends to be some place that sells biscuits, that get used to bribe said 'engaged' but increasingly tetchy child whilst at a museum/other worthy activity - they are not stupid and know how to play the game!).

Any way - back to the scene - Saturday morning, my two get on with it like hamsters let on their wheel for the first time - lovely, happy, giggling, playful children.

I receive even more tweets from jealous parent friends who have their day mapped out ..........

Daddy's toes dance the morning away .......

Big big bliss,

Bye bye

x

A change is in the wind ....

2009-12-04T19:46:00.000-08:00

Winter brings such lovely urges to cuddle up, hibernate, settle in, stock up.
And sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. Yum.

But once I am properly rested I cannot wait to see and throw some snow, cook 'homely' recipes with the kids, get a tree, etc..

Contemplating the new year ahead hasn't even begun as the old is still here to be savored. I like that kind of thing ...... it's so easy....

The sweetest warmest moments get fractured though with my DD's newest hilarious observation - that a carrier bag with a hole in it and two oranges and one banana (poking out of said hole, all very specifically arranged, and described with hand gesticulations) apparently would look like male genitalia (she's 7 years old - should I book her a shrink now ?) ........ very concerned at this new-age lad'ette-ishness, yet also VERY glad she had the sense to whisper this at the Christmas Fair rather than yell it out !

Ah well - I can inflict my own sense of humour back on them when I force them to watch National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation with me, cuddled up on the sofa ! ..... They'll tolerate this; because there will be snacks !

... tis the season to be jolly ;?))

Recipes as well as comments please ...... especially those involving chorizo (I bought too much, at too good a price not to).

tralalah,

AO

2007 archives "The Past - a note ..."

2009-11-26T06:12:00.000-08:00

This is an addendum to the archives of 2007.

If you happen to go back through the archives there is some whingeing and whining and not particularly attractive descriptions of my beloved partner's failings or my reactions (at the time I felt let down, as I am sure many mum's/women homemakers have at one point or another).

Her 'unreconstructed female misogynist behavior' is frequently brought up (it's a new, messy definition so there isn't a simple term yet, e.g. like 'pig' for men). We had two children a year apart - of course we were at each other's throats. She hit a mid-life crisis and career burn-out. I grew to hate the drudgery. Neither of us will ever be perfect (this blog would be a typed-out equivalent of a box-set of Enya CD's if we were) and if tired parenthood has brought me one bad thing, it is an unfortunate lack of tolerance .... I hate dealing with someone else's crap, but I'm working on it !

However, my angry grimace may be a permanent feature - the wind changed direction as I was pulling this face, so maybe we'll just have to get used to that. Grrrr....

Subsequently, at times I have felt like editing these 'yukky' bits out to make this all tamer, sweeter and more 'lovely', but it is in the past now, and actually happened. So it stays. I'd advise you don't read it if you're squeamish, and as it has been there for over two years, comments will be noted but I've moved on so please don't expect a dogfight.

So, if you are a woman reading the archives, especially one who has experienced abuse or just lack of support at the hands of the men in their relationships, then I would urge you to try and swap the 'male' for 'female' positions in those blog archives before flaming me. At the time offence was not my intention; a cry for empathy (at the injustice of it all) was. There are many worse forms of abuse, and I am not trying to equate my suffering to them. And if you do swap 'male' for 'female' you may just find it describes a classic 1950's Americana relationship ..... how amusingly retro ?!?

Later Peoples !

Andy O

My changed life !

2009-11-25T09:42:00.000-08:00

Getting so much fun out of my jailbroken iPhone and Twitter - all of a sudden my life is complete !
Gadgets I cannot do without indeedy.
Twitter dials up such delights as virtual spiritual companionship and helpful technical advice at the drop of a few characters ... Even locally

And jb'd iPhone so way, WAY more useful /applicable in my day to day techiness. Bring on the blackra1n (sic) everytime !

No it doesn't make toast but it brings me into contact with the world's loveliest and brightest sparks even over edge networks and services my every mobile IT need .... Easier to read than my pals' netbooks and much more portable and more battery life.

[Interesting to feel something so warm and human married so well with cold technology, but it definitely has put a spring in my step.]

Why not join me..........

Bye for now!

Andy O

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Like All Boys Do

2007-05-04T16:12:00.000-07:00

I feel hollow inside today - right now - that's right, a man, 42, feeling hollow. No, not shallow, hollow. Wake up !

For so long, it seems so many women have thought of men as ...well .... sexually as being like a switch, and the more me and DG do this ....... errr, reversal, this role reversal, the more I see us mutating our behaviour, mutating into facsimiles of what each other's behaviour would be in our more traditional roles - DG too tired and pressured from work, me acting as the hub of the family, thinking of only one thing, and that is ALL of our happiness, being aware of what it takes ...... and all I meet is resistance. And now I feel something else, unswitchlike, something that I no longer can believe is gender-specific, but instead possibly sociologically rooted. And it isn't the usual lusty hunger (hey, now I want to be cuddled) ..... but its after effects are related.

Some background, for new readers (i.e. here comes the rant) ...

I realise that the sum of me, 24/7, is a badly micromanaged family happiness facilitator, with a very austere (and distracted) manager and some tricky clients ..... and no contract (not married - seems she (DG) only wanted my seed and skivvying, help !!).

It seems no-one, perversely not even DG, is allowed to have a good time - especially if it could be classed as sensual enjoyment - pillars of death-cheating self-defining purely-pleasurable behaviour such as ooh, say taking twenty five minutes to watch the kids muck about on a sunday afternoon. Ohmigod. Oh no, sorry, but I just don't think so ...

And you are in deep trouble here if you think it may/might just be ok to have sex this year (even five minutes worth if there isn't time for some serious Goddess worship) ..in the middle of the day, one day. Fuck spontaneity (if it's going, that is) - it wasn't in the plan and there just isn't time for it right now ! (Now that is not ironic !!)

A few weeks ago a half glass of rose wine poured upon a Saturday lunchtime, to go with some pasta (can anyone actually eat the stuff without wine ?) was described as 'decadent' ....... but I'd forgotten where I'd put my horse-hair shirt and so I sipped on, and on .... knowing damn well that it wasn't going to get us anywhere nearer a warm and secret embrace for perhaps another fortnight of moons or so ... but hey, bugger it.

Oh no, life really should be full of misery, tiredness, stress, grotty behaviour (and that's the adults' as well as the kids) nasty snide asides, bizarre games (learnt as a sibling) of 'nikky nikky nah nah'. Oh, and my hot topic of the month - rushed, shit meals (but not necessarily cheap - these are strangely the real kitty budget busters).

Now for some more melancholy (I wonder how many women reading this believe that I am genuinely deeply feeling this, and if they do, how many of them equate it to the depth of sincere feelings that they experience ?). I have a feeling that only my 'Mum' friends that have seen me at breakdown point would, which depresses me, but hey, as I said, 'now for some more depression and sop'.

She is here, but I miss my love and I miss her so deeply that I feel it inside, like an empty ..... about to cave-in, black space.

Oh no

Oh WOW check out this webite - WWW.MENWITHCRAMPS.COM. Oh my god, no, that's not it.

And I feel numb as a result of again feeling this for a few days now.

And I feel miserable, just dead miserable. I cry. I yearn. Interestingly & possibly inconveniently I am still heterosexual though (sorry if anyone sisterly close to me has felt like prey over the last few weeks - I could eat my own right now and I am sure my pheremones are giving the game away).

And sometimes I unreasonably (honest) feel tense and angry that she can have and unwittingly abuse this power over me, and sometimes I just sooooooooo know this must be at the root of all my back pain, a desperate childhood-learnt catch of a sniff of the fact that I might be a piece of worthless shit (hey surely that is why I am getting treated like this, no ?!). I used to feel so special. In her arms.

Let's go back in time - The day I fell off the gym horse I remember feeling very scared, knowing I had let down my bully of a primary school gym teacher, and that I wasn't such a great kid after all. M & D were breaking up at home - my cuteness wasn't going to keep that going either - when I awoke the next morning with severe back pain the emotional association was coincidentally made, wasn't it ? They now go hand in hand and my back is like a barometer of how loved I feel. Perhaps.

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Oh I don't know ....

But I have sense of humour to fall back on so lets try ....

Nothing seems to satisfy, no sense swap will work its usual 'magik' ... and as for chocolate ... well this is perhaps a sad indicator of how pitifully bad the sex is, that some folk must have .... (aha - maybe THAT'S why she isn't interested any more ;?)

I mean, for someone to say that 'chocolate is better than sex' - even the 97% Noir Infinite sold at Maison Blanc is no substitute for the early caress of a lover, before even the tired foreplay starts.

C'mon.

A great start to Wednesday .....

2007-03-07T04:11:00.000-08:00

Big big row yesterday.... Looking after poor pukey 4yo daughter who had been up with me all night, I have had some violent tummy bug over weekend ‘Oooop North’ at Grandma’s-in-Laws and she now too, but, hey, day didn’t go tooooooo badly considering Darling Partner ‘working’ from home, we did all the usual and then later into afternoon when DD not needing full time cuddles, I got stuck into jobs around the house .......... piggy coat rack for kiddies, sort out all the old baby clothes that have just been returned from first loanies, and a few that have just come back from Sinister Sister in Law (she’s actually lovely but I have come to learn what to expect and fear from DG after she has visited her ….)

Great
Fine
Wunderbar
Zeig Heil !!!

DP (Darling Partner) descending stairs, from hard but seemingly productive day in the office being waited on hand and foot, breakfast snacks drinks lunch snacks drinks etc ... allowed her to take all juicy bits of child contact (i.e. no nose wiping or vom stained laundry, just quick visits to nursery to collect DS, bit of colouring with DD, etc.) .....

She turns and notices said piggy tail rack installed on back of door in meter cupboard understairs, harumphs (apparently now satisfied that she has found a flaw in my handywork ..... that has been completed after no sleep, me having tummy bug for last three days and masses of vom cleaning and laundry) and says "That´s a bit dangerous having the coat rack in there ...."

mmm...

Now bear in mind she recently had a rejiggle in the same cupboard, exposing meters previously buried by piles of windcheaters, bike helmets etc. and there has never been a lock on this door ..... I am uncertain how to ascertain increased risk of 3 and 4 yo clambering over toolbox to chew on mains cable due to installation of piggy tailed coatrack (which they can do more easily anywhere else in house without opening spider cupboard !!) ??

But hey - she'd found the flaw ....

Please help me here if you can Dear Reader.

If it was me descending those stairs ..... I am fairly certain I would have congratulated her on a neat and practical job (after smiling the smile of someone has really appreciated all the waiting on hand and foot) commented 'well done' noting that it was completed under fairly adverse conditions, at the same time as looking after DD and DS, who admittedly were watching a bit of Cbeebies, but still needed observation due to disputes regarding viewing material.

If it were me ...... So as not to risk being seen as a hypercritical micromanaging pain in the proverbial, I may have delayed popping a lock on the door for a few minutes, or waited til she was out even.....

But I would never repeat never never never ever consider pointing out any fallibility or criticise her admirable efforts to her face, let alone forget to show some appreciation. I have learnt how to get along in that respect.

Now unfortunately, whilst dealing with my hurt feelings I forgot my cortally pre-programmed criticism inhibitors and decided to criticise her for her criticism.

Uh oh.

I said "You can never just say something nice, can you - you always have to negate everything I do with a criticism ......... for you the glass is always half empty isn't it ?? "

She has been quite miserable just lately .... as it happens.

It didn't have the achieved effect.

And so now I am the monster for lowering her self esteem, apparently always daring to criticise her - but hey - for criticising me (how horrid) (nasty man).

I am soooooooooooooooooo ***king dischuffed you cannot believe it.

The shit I have to put up with after

1. Three days of no meals (too much nausea to eat the food I was preparing for everyone else when I finally arose from my sick bed on Sunday lunchtime)
2. One missing night's sleep
3. A days vom laundry wrapped up in the typical househusband's daily duties waiting hand on foot etc etc etc

THIS IS A RANT OK I ACCEPT THAT ..

Phew

Take two blog posts, slowly stir, and ........ relax

Thanks, you were wonderful - was it good for you too ??

Now .... onto today .....

This morning, noticing that the house was all tidy as she left for work (AT work today - phew, no micromanaging of me today) she said ...

Wait for it ...
“As there doesn't seem to be much to do today I guess you'll be having a nice long session at the pool ?”

I said ‘Wha ?’

She said “Well everything looks tidy so there can't be anything that needs doing, ....”

I said ‘Oh yeah, lucky me, the whole day at the nail bar ....!’

She muttered something about what a monster I was and stomped off to her train ...

So I wrote her an email whilst fuming away ...... with the kids going ‘where's my school tights’ etc etc

It goes like this (sounds like I have written her a song doesn't it - well one day I might, but not today !!)

‘Excuse my reaction this morning but I find it incredibly insulting when just because you don´t know what I am doing you assume I have nothing to do. You have no idea how inflammatory your assumptions are, and I want you to understand and accept finally once and for all, that life at home doing all the domestic stuff is not the bunch of roses you make it out to be – it seems you live in a dreamland – if you were the husband making these remarks to a housewife you would be branded a sexist pig.

Maybe this isn't your intention, in which case you need to work on your tone (which came across as very patronising) as much as I need to develop an iron cladding on my sensitivities to weather your insensitive remarks. I know if I was a little less sensitive I'd cope better with your comments, but you know how hurt I get partly as a result of the history of your criticisms so why do you do it ?

And no, I have never heard you say you have had an easy day - you always make some comment when asked and sometimes even if not to the effect of “you have no idea just how shitty my day was today”. And woe betide me if I ever insinuate or let my tone suggest that maybe you have not got it so bad.

Still some perspective needs to be put on this - I have had an incredibly rough few days and am exhausted simply from me being ill (as you will shortly find out if you get it) let alone getting hardly any sleep Monday night and not being able to eat properly – despite needing to go to bed after a nice bath I went out last night to the Webster Stratton parentcraft course because I want to be a better parent, and the course was booked for that night…… Still it wears me out …

Ok. As you having such a hard time understanding that life is not all fun educational play sessions nail bars and gym sessions, these are just some of the things on the list that need doing today that, alongside the basic running around (if DD at school and not requiring looking after at home) should keep me busy enough to satisfy your requirements. Although I shouldn´t have to justify myself to you your attitude demands it.

I wish you could understand that just the “basic” running around entails delivering children, collecting some shopping, making three meals for our family, doing two or three dishwasher (it’s a half-size mini one) fills and empties, and perhaps one load of laundry (there is always one waiting to be done – today it’s the bedding - oh no, I was wrong, there is still another load hiding in the kitchen waiting for me from last night).
Just these are more than enough to keep the average Mum in our social group busy enough to need some tea and sympathy from her loving partner. And flowers. And exotic lingerie. Weekend breaks. Paid for by her partner. Hint, hint ....

Also as you can see, while you were lying in bed cuddling the kids at 6:40am I was already up emailing your Dad to see when he’d like to come up and celebrate his birthday with us, making kids breakfast and your crumpets so you don’t go to work on an empty stomach.

Now -Make DD’s and DS’s Lunch up

In a few minutes -Take DD to school

On way back collect free dvd cases from ******** (names removed) housing estate’s gatehouse for the school Christmas dvds.

9:15 am - Get back here for a play date set up with ******** (names removed) and ******** (names removed) – while they are here, whilst trying to not be too impolite, I will try and put away the two big piles of laundry in the bedroom which the kids have just helpfully tipped out onto the floor (great for my back) in emulation of their Mum's antics.

Tidy up and then take DS to nursery lunch club 1130

12pm Sort holiday dates, try and finalise & ok them with you, get back to my Dad

12:30pm try to meet/ call with ******** (names removed) to offload most of the responsibility for the nursery auction onto her capable shoulders

Call Elec and gas (again) to try and sort bills

Call ISP and sort lower DD

Lunch (?)

1pm Take clothes sorted and prepared yesterday back to ******** (names removed)

1:30pm Shop – the big one, we are out of many things from juice through to meat fish marmite etc takes two hours if I go to Waitrose as well to try and keep spend down by hunting for bargains/reductions yet buy basics at Sainsbury’s which is what I usually do

Home to put away shopping – this takes quite a while in our tiny kitchen, and however I do it I know I’ll have you later in the week moaning at me that you can’t find anything, so I always put some thought into this process to try and avoid this.

[So I have an hour and a half to do a 2 ½ hour job (leave for DD 3pm)]

Collect DD 3:15pm take her to Spanish Lessons

Shoot off to get DS, back to Spanish Lessons (takes a while this as you have to park on the wrong side of the school and walk round with DS)

4:40pm Go home, dishwasher empty and cook dinner for kids,

5:30pm Repeatedly beg them to eat it,

……..While trying to get house tidy again (pick your stuff off floor in our room, make bed presentable for bedtime reading) so you can tell me that nothing needs doing around here once more …….

6-6:30pm Get kids ready for bed

Worry what other things you might have identified whilst on your commute home that should have also been attended to (always by me it seems) -

[And these range from]

- boxes sort and into loft

- have you got back to the carpenters

- have you sorted Spain yet (get it into your head that I don't want you to bully me on this PLEASE)

- have you done anything educational with DD & DS

- time we changed DD’s & DS’s beds isn’t it ?

- why have we got furballs in corners of bedrooms

Worry that I haven’t sorted you some suitable dinner yet and you’ll get angry because you are hungry and tired

Deep Joy

Wouldn’t be so bad if I had a supportive partner and by that I don’t mean one that does any of the boring shitty bits, I am looking for emotional support here, tea and sympathy … which is hard to receive (even if eventually offered) from someone who is usually more busy handing out criticism or more tasks ………..

Now I know you just see this as character assassination, but if you are going to hand out criticism all the time you should expect to receive some back, we both need to change to make this work and unfortunately we are both going to have to hear bad things about what we do to each other to achieve this. I don’t believe you intentionally upset me, but it does happen … Am I supposed to just put up with it ?

Bx

"night NIGHT !!!"

2007-03-05T16:52:00.000-08:00

"night Night !!" .......... she said, but meant something else - "go to sleep you bad boy" ? ..... I try and ease myself into her head and mindset, instead of unwittingly and subconciously into her warm, still perfect body ......... oh fear of fears ! ........... and still, for several minutes more ........... I lie there trying not to feel resentment, to still feel loved for something other than being her cuddly toy, her domestic, nanny, skivvy, and even mangy cat to kick when things get shitty at work.

Oh Boy/Father/Man what-have-you (what are you now ?). Instead of counting sheep I try and recite the S.C.U.M. manifesto, but twently odd years of old-er (and-er, slightly more misogynist) ageing since living in pro-feminist communes has taken its toll on the old grey matter. Shame, as that would have taken it's toll on the old pink matter ! Job (would've been) done !

Then realise I have done this over and over, over the last six years, and for many, many more minutes than it would take to to do something more positive and .... new.

I decide that this 'new' should be to write something and through it try to find a better understanding of our relationship. Anything to change this numbing pattern of domestic non-resolve and bitter encumberment. Anything just to make it easier for tomorrow, yet another day more usually spent depleting our passion in a slow boil bicker.

I want and need a resolve, a finished process and article, even, that I can and will refer to many a time .. and perhaps one day refer my son to, or maybe more usefully, my daughter. Ho-hum, what grand designs.

I have to add that I am a fan of good communication and the improvements it can bring to any scale of relationship, personal or international - unfortunately my writing skills will not illustrate this, hence the need to point this out early on.

So ....

Why did she not even want me to touch her back, stroke her toasty bed-hot bum even ? I have been so very good for so very long, silently avoiding ever sex-pestering her, making sure her bath, my love, my affection, our children and house are all at a constant warmth.

Perhaps a fear of maybe ending up wanting me and the ensuing wrath of passion keeping her up too late ? Later than the two episodes of Spooks she watched tonight ?.... err, that she had already watched with me a month ago !? Doing it for a dangerous second time in the last four weeks ? Could that turn me or her into a dreaded sex-junkie ? Horror of horrors, how ever would the housework get done ! The once or twice a month when we do make love my heart sings for a day at least and it seems the whole world just snaps into place, the housework is a breeze - and so I think it has little to do with the few seconds of orgasm - which when self inflicted never has the same effect on my sense of well being. More the confirmation of our intimacy.

Would that shift our eternal power struggle too far in the Auld Enemy's favour ?

Instead of my total and cheery optimism making a slave of me to her corporate wage earning power, would surrendering to 'le grande lurv' risk making a slave of her to my 'libido' ..... ok, we can call it a penis here, can't we ?!?

After all, that is all she sees my deep and heart-wrentching sensual and erotic all-consuming creative love for her as .......... isn't it ? ...... something inconveniently hard, sticking out of a very soft body and shabby mind ..... that of an underling, someone not that often worthy of her respect, someone who has willingly given up his all and ended up with 'just' two beautiful children and a live-in divorce ? [Whenever I think of these children, it all seems so possible to put up and shut up, but I know one day they will leave, and we will be left with each other, so for now this writer will write !]

I read. I read a lot a lot of articles that give me hope ....... here's some that have spoken so much to me, like letters from Amnesty International would, if you were languishing in an archetypal Turkish prison.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article641298.ece
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article656273.ece

A big shout out here has to go to Andrew Clover, whose musings in general, in his Dad Rules column, have given me much merriment and mirth and 'I am not alone-ness'. Would love to see his standup comedy.

I do have parent friends, so I am not strictly speaking alone, but (gosh, has that 'but' word ever sounded so harsh - and here, it shouldn't) they are all errr, well you know, all women.

They are great as in REALLY great people and friends - some have held my hand when I have twice thought I was having a breakdown, some have said the nicest things about the state of the domestic ship I run, one has even hugged me once when I was all soaking wet with tears and soggy face, thinking my Muse was leaving me and taking the kids with her (they'd look good in the office, I guess) ..... and this was in public in a car park at a Big Yellow Box depot, with her husband in the background probably wondering what the ***k was going on..... Some have told me they think my partner is a fool for not realising what a great bloke I am, and that if their partners were to do half of what I do they would be in line for regular sexual favours of a flavour I have long since forgotten the taste of ! - I blushed at this one, as something harder than flesh stirred in me simultaneously - Pride !!!! That felt new.

Some have said "Get used to it - she is a bloke !" (as she does typically bloke-insensitivity quite well, and they have witnessed it). Some have said 'tell her to get ***king real !' - a solid bunch indeed, when I talk to them, everything feels fine.

I know what you're thinking - but not once has anything ever happened of any kind of sexual nature with any of them - these women feel like sisters I guess (difficult to be certain as I am an only child).

While my young single male friends were busy freeing up disk space in their newest of new blackberry contact databases (as soon as I became Dad) these women so abley filled the gap that they taught me a thing or two about friendship, and they see me for who I am – so how come my partner is having such a hard time ?

I know she isn’t having an affair – I trust her.
I love her and find her incredibly attractive - would it be easier if I didn't ? If her looks had gone to ruin ? - Dunno, I think it is more the way she feels when she is next to me, and I spend a lot of time contemplating/fantasising about being sexually intimate with her (in all senses). I can't wait for her to get home at least half of the week ..... though it just never works out how I had hoped.

Enough for one night's sofa sitting,

Adios Amigos/Amigas