What does being an adult mean to you? And does the word have positive or negative connotations?

After an interesting twitter discussion, hot chick Janiece wrote about her take on the mythical adult; here’s mine.

I have always felt *old*. Controlled. Humdrum. Intense. Stressed. A bit melancholy. I’ve never been particularly good at relaxing, playing, letting go. Since I have been very young, I’ve tried to be the caretaker and the adult to those around me. The whole adult thing comes very easily to me, it’s acknowledging that life can be enjoyed that is a little tougher.

Certainly there are moments where I suddenly feel disoriented and think, whoa, wait — I’m just a kid playing house, how did I end up with my own grown kids?

Still, my life has mostly been a string of sobering moments that have made me painfully aware of my adulthood, my level of responsibility.

• At 15, I vividly recall helping my drunk father to bed, driving my migraine-stricken mother to the emergency room, and waiting up for my sister to return home from a school dance.

• At 25 I gave birth to my first son. My husband at the time slept through my labor and delivery and I realized how alone I’d be. Thank god for my sister and mom who were with me.
• At 27 my eventually-to-be-ex screwed up our money yet again, leaving us thousands of dollars in the hole, and me pregnant and destitute in a foreign country.
• At 30 I finally divorced the man, which cost me my faith, and moved halfway across the country with my job. My dad not-so-diplomatically informed me I needed to stop leaning on them emotionally, I was on my own there too, and I cried for hours.
• At 33 my youngest, at 5, had his worst asthma attack ever and ended up in pediatric ICU. Seeing him walk down the hospital hallway pulling an oxygen canister drove home my responsibility like nothing else.
• At 35, when he was 70, my father died. My mom, sister and I held each other up as we put his memorial together, and I closed down his consulting business.
• At 38, when he was 13, I held my eldest son through his first tonic/clonic epileptic seizure, then stood by as paramedics thought he wasn’t going to come back from it. He nearly died, and was not there for a very long time. It terrified me.
• At 40, when he was 15, I lived through several months of that same son’s violent, bipolar, psychotic break. (Related to previous? Probably.) Supporting a child through mental illness that I could not help and could not cure is perhaps the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, including the next…
• At 44, when he was 45, I lost my beloved husband to a sudden and unexpected heart attack. Saying goodbye to his cold, still shell and going on alone to support my family and continue my profession and my life was both a challenge and a comfort.

After those painful, transformative life changes I’m consciously trying to enjoy life more, to value family, friends, community and my own health and sanity. I’ve been an adult for everyone for a very long time, and now I choose to work less, to be less obligated, to be less well-behaved. I’ve kicked my kids out to a college apartment. I’m buying a condo and going to Europe.

I plan to grab onto life with both hands, travel, laugh, love and enjoy the ride.

This week’s Federal judicial reversal of Proposition 8 as unconstitutional has brought up some fascinating water cooler and after-hours conversations.

Single Judge reversing Popular Vote

We were talking yesterday about the Proposition 8 overturn with a group of colleagues, and one of the participants was a Russian immigrant, a naturalized US citizen. He made the comment that he had a hard time with the overturn because he doesn’t believe the democratic, popular vote of the people should be able to be overturned by a single judge’s judicial decision – nor a state law be overturned by a federal court’s decision. He feels that it’s a miscarriage of democracy and, of course given his country’s history, he believes such a process can lead to abuses of power and eventual corruption.

Of course, the opposing viewpoint is that when we’re considering constitutional law and matters of right and wrong, democratic vote is NOT the end-all be-all arbiter of such issues. If democracy decides that, say, women and blacks can’t vote it doesn’t make it morally right, legally correct or ultimately a sound law. (I realize that I’m grossly oversimplifying.)

As my excellent friend Eric says, we don’t actually live in a democracy, we live in a republic. The government is only indirectly influenced by the will of the people, and given that mob rule is not always measured and sane, this is not a bad thing. The initiative/referendum process is a relatively new development and actually cuts across all the careful checks and balances of the original republic.

Morality

Back to the question of morality, though. The definition of right and wrong, especially when it comes to gender, sex and marriage, is highly subjective and entirely unclear. I believe that what a person does in his or her own private home is their own business. I believe that if it harms no one, we should be able to do as we choose.

Not everyone is as liberal as I am. Those with strong religious or traditional marriage views have a different perspective on marriage rights & definitions. My answer, only partially tongue-in-cheek? You don’t believe gay marriage is right? Then don’t marry a gay person.

Bottom line: I don’t get to define your moral choices and you don’t get to define mine.

I grew up reading and watching science fiction. My favorite TV & movies including Star Trek, Logan’s Run and Stargate, and books included Robert Heinlein, Samuel Delany and Ursula K Leguin. They all depicted a sexually liberal, free, experimental culture that extrapolated “what-ifs” about love and marriage with wild abandon.

Same-sex marriage was small potatoes. They showed variants of relationships and marriage including polyamory, limited term, polyandry, polygamy, group, line, and more as a backdrop to a harder science background. Transgender and even gender variable characters examined marriage and family and gender roles from entirely new perspectives in those brave new worlds.

I don’t have a problem with any of these ideas among consenting adults. (The FLDS families, with underage wives and what in my opinion are abbreviated womens and adolescent boys rights along with what I think is religious brainwashing, are a different story.)

What you do in the privacy of your own home, even if it’s right next door, is your own business. (OK, I wouldn’t be too crazy about having a swinger club next door, but that really stretches “if it doesn’t harm anyone” – that kind of wild extended partying is not really being a good neighbor.) Enjoy, prosper, you’re welcome to it – and yes, my kids can play with your kids.

I’ve been heterosexual and (serially) monogamous most of my life, so these questions are somewhat academic for me. Should I ever choose to embark upon another relationship it would likely be along the same lines, although I’m not inclined toward marrying again. (Why?) I do have cherished friends who are married gays/lesbians and others who would like to be – and I wholeheartedly support their desires.

Shoot, they can have my no-longer-used marital rights. I don’t want ‘em anymore.

This week I’m in Hawaii, in Waikoloa on the big island. I’m surrounded by fabulous friends who love me, encourage me, lift me up and make me laugh. The trip was the fabulous Barb’s idea. It’s exactly what I needed, and I’m excited to share it with Paulette and Angie as well.

Just three years ago Bryan, the boys and I visited the big island. We had an excellent trip, with lots of sun, sand and adventure. We’ve been to Hawaii a few times (we’re very spoiled) but usually Kauai or Oahu. The below picture is from an early trip to Kauai, when the boys were fairly little.

In spite of my amazing friends, it was a little bit difficult coming here this time without Bryan. He loved visiting Hawaii, loved snorkeling, diving, beachcombing, golfing, driving around the island. On one of our most memorable trips, we went scuba diving off the south shore of Kauai, in Poipu, and we were surrounded by sea turtles. We knelt on the sandy bottom while the turtles danced around us in the crystal water.

Bryan and I had a travel ritual. When we’d go places we loved, we’d try to bring home a piece of art to remind us of our trip. We have a particularly beautiful colored handmade paper lithograph over our mantel of sea turtles, symbolizing the life cycle.

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When I lost Bryan almost exactly a year ago, symbols like that became important to me. I wore a small gold turtle pendant he’d given me on a chain, circled by his wedding band, on a gold chain for months.

One of the rituals I did to mark his passing was get a tattoo. It was my first one. (My only one!) I chose to take the piece of art we’d brought home from Hawaii, and have it translated to body art. I’m proud to wear it not only to honor Bryan, but also as a reminder to pursue adventure and joy – to dive with the turtles when I can.

Yesterday as we wandered Waikoloa, I fell in love with a turtle pendant. I got it for myself. For Bryan. It’s the simple, graceful sort of thing that I can wear most of the time, and probably will.

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I’ll probably do something else to remember him while I’m here as well – toss a lei into the volcano or the sunset surf and say a few words. Still, finding and wearing the turtle necklace completed something for me.

Recently, I’ve been wrestling with the concept of responsibility – my own hyperdeveloped sense thereof, and what I perceive to be a pathological lack of it in others.

Responsible
1 a: liable to be called to account as the primary cause, motive, or agent b: being the cause or explanation
2 a : able to answer for one’s conduct and obligations : trustworthy b : able to choose for oneself between right and wrong

In my profession, I am the responsible party, the bottom line. If a project succeeds, I give the credit to my team, but if there are issues, I’m the “single throat to choke”. And personally, as single parent to two, and foster parent to a third, I’m also the responsible one, even if the boys pretty much adults.

I’m going to try to talk about the concept of responsibility without sharing the details behind the issue; the detailed story is someone else’s and I don’t have permission to share, and when I’m frustrated with a person or people I prefer not to name names.

I’m struggling mightily with someone else’s strange, complete disconnect with responsibility. This deficit is not new to me, I’ve known about it for years. Still, it’s bizarre and puzzling to that someone can simply decide that responsibility that is legally, morally and ethically theirs can simply be ducked, with a shrug and maybe even a little bit of blame game, just because they don’t want it.

I talked about this with a good friend last night, one who is always direct and honest with me. (All my good friends are that way – I’m very blessed!) This friend said, “You are all adults now. Being an adult has responsibilities. That is the hardest thing to learn. And you are trying to solve all of their problems, and you cannot.”

Ouch. This bears reflection, because it is so very true. If I can’t be helpful and supportive in a family relationship or a friendship, I often wonder what value I bring to the table. I do tend to be a fix-it kind of gal, although I’m ok with just listening too. Still, what if the best and most constructive thing I can do for someone I love is to require them to stand on their own two feet and learn to solve their own problems?

This brings to mind another definition:

Enabler
1 a: one that enables another to achieve an end; b: one who enables another to persist in self-destructive behavior (as substance abuse) by providing excuses or by making it possible to avoid the consequences of such behavior

Am I acting as an enabler, because I do too much, want too much to be helpful? It’s quite possible.

The questions here, the murky areas, are related to mental illness, an adult de-facto dependent with a significant degree of mental health impairment and mood disorder.

• What additional support is required?

• What logical consequences are appropriate or even comprehensible?
• What level of expectations are appropriate?
• How can I, as caregiver, live my own life?

I don’t know of any hard and fast guidelines – suggestions range from a completely supported lifelong live-in model to a tough love, sink-or-swim model.

Actually somewhat applicable here, the classic and actually very infrequently used insanity defense is based upon an evaluation that the accused was incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong and that he/she was unable to control his or her behavior at the time of the offense.

None of this answers the question of how I deal with people in my life who are unable to comprehend or accept responsibility at all. Unfortunately it can’t be externally applied, via flog, spur or carrot-on-a-stick. I guess where I’m arriving at with this rambling essay is that compensating for them by taking the responsibility on myself helps no one, least of all myself.

This Thanksgiving, I reflect on how very, very blessed we are.

Yes, it’s been a hard year, a year of terrible loss, grief and pain. But it’s also been a year of rebuilding, of adventure, and of the most wonderful inpouring of love I’ve ever experienced from my family and friends. I could not have gotten through this year without those I cherish, and this Thanksgiving, I think of them.

My awesome sons and I are healthy, thriving, and successful in our chosen endeavors. We have become closer and more supportive of each other, and they have helped me out with running our household and matured beautifully. I’m very, very proud of them.

We have a beautiful, comfortable house, reliable cars, and everything we need in our pantry and our closets, and can share that with friends when we see need. We also have both preventive and acute medical and dental care when necessary.

We have high speed Internet and more technology toys than we should; we’re all geeks. At the touch of a finger I can research pygmy marmosets, order flowers for a hurting friend, or watch the news from Afghanistan.

Those, though, are only material things. What we no longer have in our home is a father and a husband. While I miss Bryan intensely at times like this, I’m coming to terms with his loss. He’s in a better place, whatever that is, and he’s with us in spirit on Thanksgiving and every day. While I’d planned to grow old with him, I’m still so very, very grateful I had twelve beautiful years by his side; he loved us very much.

I also remember my father each Thanksgiving with love and honor. He left us ten years ago, 1999, on Thanksgiving day, and the world is a smaller, drearier place without his ideas, intelligence and integrity.

Looking back on the memory of
The dance we shared ‘neath the stars above
For a moment all the world was right
How could I have known that you’d ever say goodbye

And now I’m glad I didn’t know
The way it all would end the way it all would go
Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain
But I’d have had to miss the dance
      ~Garth Brooks, “The Dance”

I’m thankful for the dance: the precious years with Bryan, but also for the unmarked future, on my own but surrounded, supported by so many I love.

I wish you all a peaceful and meaningful Thanksgiving, filled with love and laughter.