Category Archives: Relationships

February 23, 2013 · 9:20 pm

Reeva, Oscar and the Feminist Lie

Their relationship was short. And fatal.

Last week the sports world was stunned at the arrest of “the Blade Runner,” South African Olympian Oscar Pistorius, for the murder of his beautiful girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.  Pistorius, whose legs had been amputated below the knee in childhood, gained fame competing in track during the London Olympics against able-bodied athletes.

While the full facts have yet to unfold, this much is certain:  Reeva is dead and Oscar did it. And her death is a tragic lesson in the perils of intimacy too-soon.

Hours before her death, Reeva tweeted coyly, “What do you have up your sleeve for your love tomorrow? #get excited #ValentinesDay.” She expected a sexy sleepover with Oscar, followed by a “day full of love,” not a violent death.

In the wee hours of their Valentine’s morning, Oscar shot Reeva four times. Her skull was fractured and police found a bloody cricket bat at the scene. Although Oscar claims he shot Reeva because he mistook her for a robber, police have charged him with premeditated murder. News reports suggest that Reeva’s friendship with another man might have triggered murderous jealousy in Oscar.

The murder is shocking enough. Reeva was stunningly beautiful and, by all accounts, kind and intelligent. A 30-year old law grad, she gained celebrity as a lingerie model and reality TV contestant. Her life was precious to family and friends.

But the context of the murder is disturbing too. Oscar and Reeva had begun dating in November—three short months before her death. Sparks of intense attraction, fueled by the aura of celebrity, ignited a ‘relationship’ in a flash. They quickly became physically intimate.

Like many, if not most, young women her age, Reeva put herself in a vulnerable situation, willingly: she became sexually intimate with a man she hardly knew.

How, after all, could she really know Oscar’s history, much less his character, in the space of a few months? Sure, she could learn the basics in ten minutes on the Internet. She knew he was a sports hero, a national favorite who gave back to his fans and his country. On Twitter, he encouraged disabled kids and veterans and tweeted inspirational Scripture verses. He professed his faith, saying, “Christ makes all the difference. He aids me in all my struggles…” And, ironically, Oscar declared his solidarity with abused women, retweeting, “Girls and women need to be valued, respected, and feel safe, not only at home but also in public spaces.”

Interesting stuff, perhaps.  But public information is no substitute for the test of time when it comes to understanding another’s character, personality, or morals. With more time, Reeva might have learned what Oscar’s friends already knew: that he had dated numerous women, not necessarily one at a time, and had displayed raging anger and a pattern of domestic violence in other relationships.

But instead Reeva lived by the gospel of female empowerment, standing on a platform of sexual freedom. For sophisticated young feminists, women’s empowerment includes the right to pursue casual sex—the power, as Hanna Rosin wrote in The Atlantic, to enjoy “sexual adventure without commitment.”

Whether it prompts a one-night hook-up or a scorching love affair, the feminist lie that left Reeva so vulnerable is this (in Rosin’s words): ”Women benefit greatly from living in a world where they can have sexual adventure without commitment or all that much shame, and where they can enter into temporary relationships that don’t get in the way of future success.

Feminists perpetuate the myth that casual sexual relationships signify female agency and independence. Ambitious women manage their “sexual careers,” eschewing time-consuming relationships in favor of commitment-less sex and “temporary intimacy” (an oxymoron, surely). Later, when it’s convenient, these women might make room in their lives for a committed, long-lasting relationship, though not necessarily marriage.

Oscar clearly supported the feminist script. His “complex love life” was a revolving door through which women came and went—a succession of ‘empowered’ girlfriends ‘benefitting’ from temporary sexual adventures and truncated relationships.

It’s the great feminist lie. And it makes women more vulnerable than ever.

Sex without commitment hurts women. Worldwide, “intimate partner violence” occurs more often in women who cohabit than among married women. A 2012 Child Trends analysis of relationship violence found that 52% of young adult cohabiting couples experienced some form of relationship violence, ranging from threats or shoves to injury-causing outbursts. And in U.S. high schools and colleges, condom giveaways and Plan B vending machines co-exist with programs, rallies, and bumper stickers decrying “dating abuse.”

Perhaps Reeva didn’t know that sexual activity itself lowers a woman’s instinctive, protective barriers. Oxytocin released during intercourse increases a woman’s trust in and sense of bonding with her partner—good for married couples but risky for women in casual relationships. Reeva wasn’t stupid—she’d been in an abusive relationship before. But she was blinded by her own empowerment, blinded by the false intimacy that sex-too-soon begets.

So Reeva was vulnerable: barely clothed, sexually willing, but locked in the fortress-like estate of a man who kept his character hidden and guns exposed.

I sometimes ask young women whether, after a first date, they would turn over their debit card and pin number to the man and invite him to help himself. They’re appalled. “No way.  I don’t know what he’s going to do.  He might steal all my money or spend it on something stupid.”  I follow up, “Even if you’re very sexually attracted to him? Would you give him the debit card and pin number after three dates?  A month?” Not a one would grant financial access or presume a man trustworthy so quickly.  But young women willingly grant quick access to their bodies, trusting their emotions, safety, and reproductive future to a sexual partner they barely know. Aren’t women’s lives, integrity, and wellbeing worth more than their bank accounts?

Reeva struggled with those very contradictions. According to friends, Reeva was “very passionate” about “women and empowerment” and was set to give a testimony of sorts on Valentine’s Day. She had suffered from a previous sexual relationship gone bad, and blamed that abusive relationship for her “loss of self-worth.” She wanted to encourage students to be empowered, to  “make your voice heard” and to hold onto the truth she belatedly discovered, of her “value in this world.”

It’s a crying shame that Reeva did not get the chance to deliver her message. But it’s even more tragic that she did not see her value apart from the feminist myth of sexual freedom. Perhaps young women will see in her life—and death—the lesson that Reeva herself missed.

 

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February 8, 2012 · 11:34 am

Abortion: A Private Matter Between a Woman and Her…Vending Machine?

At Shippensburg University, female students who hook-up for drunken sex on Saturday will find it easy to dispose of just-conceived babies on Monday or Tuesday. A quick trip to the vending machine is all it takes.

Easy. Kind of like buying a bag of Doritos.

Women who wake up in unfamiliar beds or sober up and wonder,  “What were you thinking, girl?” needn’t worry much. Stride across campus, past the dining hall (grab a doughnut for later), and into the University Health Center. Flash a student ID and head to the vending machine in the “self-help” area. There, next to the cough drops and Mucinex, in discreet, feminine packaging, is Plan B One Step. No questions asked. Feed the bills into the slot, grab and go. Empowered with “choices,” these women pop the package blister, swallow the pill, and breathe easy.

Problem solved. Glad that’s over.

Only it’s really not.

Billed as “emergency contraception,” according to the package insert, Plan B inhibits ovulation and thus prevents conception.  But it also alters the lining of the uterus, preventing a newly conceived child from implanting in its mother’s womb.  Without implantation, that tiny human being cannot draw nourishment and will die. (Occasionally, Plan B fails and the pregnancy continues.)

In most cases, however, Plan B ‘succeeds.’

But ‘success’ is not pretty. Our Shippensburg student will have a one-in-three chance of heavy bleeding. And 13% of women who take Plan B One Step end up curled up in bed with nausea, abdominal pain, and fatigue. Worse, nearly one in ten women who use emergency contraception (compared to 2% of pregnancies in the general population) develop severe abdominal pain and require emergency treatment for an ectopic pregnancy.

But no worries, this is a private decision between a woman and her vending machine.

(Maybe the Supreme Court should update that hallowed language about abortion being a private medical decision between a woman and her doctor, eh?)

Back in Shippensburg, it’s been a bad few days for the University’s PR team–one negative link on Drudge would keep anybody hopping—and they’re feeling a bit defensive. “We’re not the first” to make Plan B available on a college campus, they say.

But from a vending machine?

Has our culture so trivialized sex and baby-making that the ‘solution’ to an unintended pregnancy comes out of a vending machine? And the grown-ups in the room don’t even blink?

Shippensburg’s decision seems destined to create a campus norm of casual sex. But in its February 7th statement, the University asserted that it’s “not encouraging anyone to be sexually active. That is a decision each student makes on his or her own.”

But why offer students abortion-inducing drugs, right on campus? (Ironically, the University vending machines don’t carry condoms, the typical must-have accessory for promiscuous sex).

In a phone interview February 7th, Dr. Peter M. Gigliotti, Executive Director for University Communications & Marketing, said the university installed the vending machine “several years” ago after a student survey showed that 85% of students favored on-campus access to emergency contraception. He defended the decision, expressed surprise at the media coverage, and insisted that no one under the age of 17 has access to the vending machine. (By law, Plan B cannot be dispensed to anyone under 17 without a prescription.)

In Shippensburg’s public statement, Dr. Robert Serr, Vice-President for Student Affairs, also downplayed the disclosure and framed the issue as support for reproductive choice: “Reproductive services are a personal decision to be made by every man and woman. As such, the university is providing students with a medication that they can obtain legally elsewhere as part of their ability to make their own choices.”

Put differently, Shippensburg wonders, “What’s the big deal?”

That attitude is precisely the problem.

“Emergency contraception” dispensed from a vending machine is the perfect icon of our culture’s impersonal–and utilitarian–view of sex and reproduction.

The icon’s meaning:

  • Sex is no big deal. It’s entertainment. Condom malfunction? Fix the problem in less time than it takes to rent a Redbox movie.
  • Making—or destroying–a baby is no big deal either. Using ‘emergency contraception’ has the moral significance of taking a cough drop. (One button on the vending machine gets you Plan B, another gets you lemon-flavored cough drops.)
  • Convenience rules. Why bother with nine months of pregnancy—and 21 years of child-rearing–when freedom is just a vending machine away?
  • Like casual sex, abortion (even disguised as “emergency contraception”) turns a union of two into a solo event. No strings. Just another individual experience that requires “appropriate decisions.”
  • Repeat business is a given—the abortion industry depends on it. No one visits a vending machine just once.

To the women of Shippensburg University: wake up! What could be more lonely than heading across a cold Pennsylvania campus “the morning after,” alone, to rendezvous with a vending machine? It’s an automated ‘problem-solver,’ stoically dispensing drugs that not only kill your baby but also numb your heart.  All so you can go back and do it again.

That’s not ‘choice.’ It’s exploitation. And people who really care about you won’t exploit you.

Please, reach out.  Because you deserve better.

 

 

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July 18, 2011 · 11:58 am

Same-Sex Marriage: Lessons in Conscience

At first glance, there’s nothing impressive about Laura Fotusky. Her soft, middle-aged figure, unremarkable cardigan, and dark, ‘80s-style hair capture the plain ordinariness of small-town America.

Nothing chic or trendy here.

But Laura grabbed headlines recently, standing tall to answer the call of conscience against the power of law. She resigned from her job as Barker Town Clerk, a position that would require her to issue marriage licenses to gays and lesbians once the newly passed “Marriage Equality Act” becomes New York law on July 24.

Why resign from a fulfilling job when unemployment tops nine percent?

Conscience.

That’s the same word that gay advocates pulled out to laud New York State Senator Mark Grisanti, a Republican from Buffalo, for his balance-tipping vote in favor of homosexual marriage. He too earned headlines, as homosexual activists across the country hailed him as a “hero” for “voting his conscience.”

Only thirty-five miles apart geographically, Laura Fotusky and Mark Grisanti stand worlds apart on the meaning of conscience. The contrast between them is itself a powerful lesson.

Conscience means more than ‘what I think is right.’ Conscience is “a way of obedience to objective truth.” So taught the brilliant, and saintly, intellectual— Cardinal John Henry Newman.

Clerk Fotusky searched for truth by looking upwards, to the Truth-giver. She read His Book and bowed to its authority:  “[T]here is a higher law than the law of the land,” she said. “It is the law of God in the Bible…The Bible clearly teaches that God created marriage between male and female.”

Politician Grisanti sought truth by scanning left and right on the political horizon. He looked right as he wooed Christian churches, particularly African-American ones, campaigning on the promise that he was “unalterably opposed to gay marriage.” (See his 2008 letter here.)

Post-election, he looked left, bending a listening ear towards LGBT lobbyists and fielding pro-gay calls from Governor Cuomo and tweets from Lady Gaga.

Finally, Grisanti sought the truth about same-sex marriage by looking inward, to his “personal belief” (a temptation Pope Benedict once described as “self-sufficient subjectivity”). Before, Grisanti said, “I simply opposed it [same-sex marriage] in the Catholic sense of my upbringing.” But now, for this pressure-filled vote on same-sex marriage, Grisanti announced he would seek truth by relying on “reason” bereft of faith.

And so, like the politician who peels off his suit coat when it’s time to “get real,” Grisanti peeled off his faith to gay applause because it was time to “take the Catholic out of me.”

Wrong move, for any serious seeker of truth.

Newman insisted, according to Pope Benedict XVI, that, “freedom of conscience” does not mean “the right…’to ignore a Lawgiver and Judge.’” Put differently, one who seeks truth in good conscience cannot ignore God, who is Truth.

When Grisanti closed his eyes to God’s truth, he stumbled into a blind alley, hopelessly lost. Defending his decision to support same-sex marriage, Grisanti asked, “Who am I to say that someone does not have the same rights that I have with my wife, who I love…?”

In his moral myopia, marriage looks like a fuzzy framework that honors his loving feelings for his wife. But marriage bestows rights not because of the couple’s feelings but because their sexual union as male and female, unlike the sexual activity of two males or two females, quite naturally produces children–children who need the stable union of their own mother and father, a commitment secured by marriage.

What about our other truth-seeker, Laura Fotusky?

For her, ignoring God was never an option. Her search for truth brought her face-to-face with Him.  And she found her answer.

“Since I love and follow Him, I cannot put my signature on something that is against God…I would be compromising my moral conscience if I participated in the licensing procedure.”

With no option but to “choose between my God and my job,” she resigned.

For her faithfulness, she’s been rewarded with sneers from the liberal elites. The Daily Beast, eschewing the respectful convention of capitalizing God’s name, smirked that, “maybe god wanted her to be unemployed?”

No matter. Laura’s courage and clarity of conscience don’t depend on others’ approval, only God’s. And she’s not alone. Other officials, like Supervisor Karl Brabenec of Deer Park (a Catholic), have resigned as well, citing conscience.

And Grisanti? Political expediency labeled “conscience” has proven quite profitable. Days after his vote for same-sex marriage, Grisanti’s re-election campaign received over $50,000 in donations from national advocates of gay rights, including $10,000 each from New York Mayor Bloomberg and Tim Gill (the financial engine driving the same-sex marriage train).  And while Republicans aren’t happy with Grisanti, one journalist reported that, “Democratic party regulars are chasing Grisanti like hormonal tweens chasing Justin Bieber at the airport.”

Life seems good for Mark Grisanti.  When he looks in the mirror, he feels “wiser today” than “yesterday.”

But life’s even better for Laura Fotusky. She says, “I’ve made my choice, and no one means to me what Jesus means.”

And in the end, conscience is not about pleasing the person we see in the mirror.

It’s about pleasing the Person we see for all eternity.

© 2011 Mary Rice Hasson

 

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April 1, 2011 · 8:50 pm

The Facebook Generation: Narcissism, Sexting, and the Decline of Empathy

Two recent stories suggest that a disturbing practice has found acceptance among teens and young adults: broadcasting the sexual misbehavior of their peers, especially girls, on a massive scale within hours. Photos preferred.

Is it just gossip, gone digital? “Mean Girls,” with a sexual twist?

I don’t think so.

Some commentators too easily dump these incidents into the overflowing bucket of cyber-bullying or dismiss them as teen-age drama, writ large. But these episodes deserve a second look.

A few months back, a Washington state eighth-grader named Margarite “sexted” a nude, frontal photo of herself to her new sort-of-boyfriend. Within weeks, their fledgling relationship died.

The photo lived on.

The boy sent it to another girl who captioned the photo, “Ho Alert!” and added instructions: “If you think this girl is a whore, then text this to all your friends.” The photo instantly ricocheted, via text, from one social circle to another. Within hours, students from four different schools had ogled the sexter’s naked body and passed the photo on. The eighth grade girl was devastated.

The second situation occurred in the upscale suburbs of New York City. Someone created rankings of 100 allegedly sexually adventurous girls and boys from the surrounding school districts and circulated the lists using Blackberry Messenger.

One teenager (who claims he was not the original creator of the lists) quickly created a Facebook page called the “Westchester SMUT List” (“SMUT” meant “slut,” thinly disguised to evade Facebook restrictions), and posted only the girls’ rankings (including full names and descriptions of sexual activity).

Within hours, thousands of people saw the list. Over 7,000 of them “liked” the Facebook page that trashed the girls’ reputations.  And with one click, each of those viewers magnified the damage, publicizing the page instantly to his or her Facebook friends.

The sexual behavior of the 8th-grader and of the SMUT 100 (to the extent the reports are true) reads like an MTV script. And that’s certainly a huge problem.

But let’s switch focus, for a minute, from the girls to their enthusiastic “audience” of thousands. Their behavior may well reflect the bigger problem.

Consider the smut list. What does it mean when thousands of young people swarm, within hours, to the site of their peers’ humiliation? (Imagine piranhas in a feeding frenzy.)

And what drove seven thousand of them to click the “like” icon on the smut list?

Meanness, maybe. But narcissism is a likely suspect, too.

The Facebook generation shows an overwhelming desire for self-promotion, to weigh in, to be in the know. Want to be important? Dispense scandalous information.

The teens who “liked” the list not only didn’t care that others knew they’d seen the list and passed it on, they wanted others to know that they’d done so. Being among “the first to know” matters too. It’s a sure way to build social capital—be the source that sends others to the newest, most outrageous virtual place.

No shame, no hesitation, no reticence. In their narcissistic stampede towards Facebook fame and “firsts,” thousands trampled on the dignity and reputations of very real people. And they didn’t even care.

Why? Because, in a given moment, narcissism blots out both moral sense (do their consciences even register slander? detraction? cruelty?) and a sense of empathy. (Many ethicists believe that empathy is at the heart of morality.)

An empathic person in this case would grasp the pain, shame, and humiliation experienced by the girls on the list—and would never add to their misery by passing the information on, especially because it might be false. A narcissistic person would seize any opportunity, including the humiliation of others, to vault back into the center of attention.

Narcissism gave a good showing at the Westchester Smut List.

There’s a second factor at work here as well.

In today’s culture, sex is entertainment.  It doesn’t need to be either personal or intimate—a lesson the Facebook generation has learned well.

It’s not surprising, then, that these young people easily accept the idea that women are sexual objects. Depersonalized sex is everywhere, in ads, music videos, TV, movies, teen websites, and, of course, pornography. Immersed in it, they can’t help but be shaped by it as well.

Take, for example, the teens recently interviewed by The New York Times on the topic of sexting. For this sex-saturated generation, sexy photos become a strikingly impersonal part of the mating dance.

One girl puts it this way: “We see virtual images all day long, so if someone sends you a [naked] image, it loses the identity of the person. It’s just a picture.” A teen-age boy in the group added helpfully, “And usually the face is not in it.“

It’s the very definition of depersonalized sex: the most “personal” aspect, a face, is out of sight. But the naked body still titillates and makes the rounds, by cell phone and text.

And even when the photo does include the person’s face—as it did in Margarite’s case—her peers had already lost sight of the real person who would be mortified, shamed, and crushed with regret as they passed her picture along. She was just a body, grabbed, groped, and used as an object for pleasure (or humiliation) in the virtual space. Her reputation became a plaything as well.

Similarly, a teenage girl on a smut list is but a name—no one cares about her.  They care only to know what she’s willing to do with her body–or at least what others say she’s willing to do.

What’s missing is any sense that these girls are persons, not sexual objects. And what’s lost, among other things, is the privacy and space that would allow these adolescents to mature, repent, change course and begin anew. Instead, they’ve been humiliated on a grand scale, and will be haunted by the exposure for years.

On the plus side, at least the girls know they’ve gotten off track and need to change.

But their peers—the thousands steeped in depersonalized sex and searching for the next narcissistic shot at popularity—they have no idea how far off track they are.

And the real question for our culture is, “What are we going to do about that?”

© 2011 Mary Rice Hasson

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December 17, 2010 · 5:46 am

The Good Marriage: One Simple Secret

I couldn’t help but notice their chemistry.

Paul and Lynn were our unexpected dinner companions, joining our small group for a delicious seafood dinner. The meal was fabulous, truly, but not nearly as memorable as this delightful couple.

Their enviable relationship was the fruit of fifty years of marriage, some very hard times, and one secret—the secret, I discovered, that can make nearly every marriage better.

It’s been a tough year for marriage, in my world.

Four couples I care about are divorcing this year after 13, 17, 24, and 28 years together. Their backgrounds, hometowns, and stories all differ.  Some are parting for just cause; others for the excitement offered elsewhere. But twenty children (the combined total from the four families) now share a common, painful experience: lives turned upside down, families fractured, and hearts broken.

Recently I stumbled across an interview with writer Nora Ephron, a frank and usually funny woman.  But she spoke seriously about divorce: “There are a lot of people who get divorced and several years later they think, ‘Hmm, was I really that bored?’ …Don’t kid yourself that your kids are OK. The kids are really not alright. It doesn’t mean they don’t survive; it’s just, don’t kid yourself that kids like leaving one house to go to another. It’s not what they’re built for…. It’s tough for kids; it just is.”

Even when divorce is the right solution for an untenable situation, like abuse, it wounds not just the couple but the families and friends who love them both.

So my heart smiled within minutes of meeting this pair, Paul and Lynn. They glowed with love for each other—twinkled together, really–as Lynn shared their plans to celebrate fifty years of marriage with a ten-day cruise to Alaska.

When she spoke, his eyes shone with tenderness and crinkled in smiling delight.  He listened, really listened, when she talked. No glazed eyes or dismissive looks; no wavering attention or a wandering eye. He really wanted to hear what she was saying over dinner. No matter that they’d already shared some 17,000 dinner discussions. He was as attentive that night as if it were their first conversation.

And her face sparkled, with both youthful affection and mature love, as she talked about him, the life they had shared, and the years ahead. She enjoyed him, leaning forward to catch his soft-spoken words, touching him affectionately, and anticipating his needs before he did. It was unself-conscious and real.

But I was sure that it hadn’t come easy.

Over the years, I’ve mentored many women in marriage and motherhood and gratefully learned much from those who’ve mentored me.  I approached Lynn in that spirit as we mingled after dinner. Thinking of the pain in my friends’ relationships, I wondered, how do Paul and Lynn repair marital rifts that tear other marriages apart? What keeps love flickering and then roaring back to life when human weakness, failings, and sin threaten to smother it? What’s the secret to a marriage like theirs?

So I asked Lynn.  She paused, but only for a few seconds, and said.

“It’s simple, but it’s not easy…

“It’s what’s in your heart. You’ve got to LOVE each other. We’re happy because I do things for him and he does things for me. That’s what love means… I do things for him and he does things for me.”

It was how they lived their life: I do things for him and he does things for me.

As she talked, it became clear that the “things” they’ve done for one another were way beyond the “pick-up-his-socks” and “surprise-her-by doing-the dishes” things suggested in typical marriage columns. Their mutual “doing” carried them across parched deserts and through tumultuous rapids—past the dangerous places where marriages die. It was no easy feat.

They were married at 18, had four kids, moved many times, and endured years of penny-pinching.  At times, Paul worked two jobs and Lynn did double duty at home.  And when he was unemployed, she worked and he scrimped. They survived teenage turmoil without turning on each other and avoided the blame game for their money troubles.

This attitude of heart–I do things for him and he does things for me—was woven into the fabric of their life, carrying them through new trials even at later stages. With children launched, finances eased.  But life challenged them anew. A once in a lifetime business venture to secure their retirement carried high costs: a move to a different continent, selling everything and leaving adult kids and grandkids behind.

It tested them mightily. Lynn was miserable. She missed her family, friends, church, and the familiarity of life stateside. She wanted to leave. And Paul listened. She had come there for him and he’d move now for her. While leaving the country was not possible yet, moving within the city was. Lynn would choose. They moved from the city apartment that was perfect for Paul, close to work, to a village near the sea, where Lynn could create a home, find friends and a place to worship.  And two years later, they would return to the U.S., back to family and friends.

As in times past, their common pledge–that simple secret–kept them going. I do things for him and he does things for me.

“It takes work,” Lynn said. “If you’re gonna love each other, you’ve got to ask what the other person needs. And then give it.  You’re in this together. That’s why I say, I do things for him and he does things for me.”

Fifty years had stoked their passion and fifty years had burnt away selfishness. Deep inside their hearts, an everlasting ember gave off sparks of joy, delight, warmth, and affection at regular intervals. Theirs is a mutual love that says, I do things for him and he does things for me.

For me, I’ve learned a new shorthand for the theological truths of “mutual self-gift,” “sacrificial love,” and “finding fulfillment by giving yourself to another in love.”

“I do things for him and he does things for me.”

Much more memorable, don’t you think? And that’s the secret of a good marriage.

© 2010 Mary Rice Hasson

 

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December 9, 2010 · 4:07 am

Fantasies in Marriage: Spice or Spoiler?

“You’ve got to see these photos of Lori!

Rob sidled over to a group of neighbors at the party, flipping open the pocket album even as he spoke.  Lori, his wife of ten years, trailed behind, smiling gamely. But her eyes looked unsure.

“Great. Let’s see.”

Rob must have captured some interesting shots on their recent dive trip to Bermuda, I thought. Maybe he snapped Lori riding a rickety tourist bike along the beautiful beach. Or got an underwater shot of her swimming near the reefs alongside brilliant, tropical fish.

Curious, I looked at the open pages.

For a moment, I was confused. Who was that? The woman staring back at me from photo after photo, as Rob turned the pages, had smoky eyes, tousled hair, and wore more feathers than clothes.

“Hey, hey, look at that one. She looks great, doesn’t she?”

Lori?

“Yeah, that’s Lori.” He raved.  “Stunning, isn’t she?” By “she,” he meant “glamour shot Lori.” The very real Lori standing next to him, fairly pretty but ignored, drew no compliments–at least not while the illusory, fantasized-about “Lori” was on proud display.

Actually, I thought Rob was stunning. Stunningly insensitive. Demeaning, too.

They divorced eighteen months later. No kids, just scuba gear to divvy up.

I wasn’t surprised, really. But I wondered if they’d gotten some bum advice along the way.

These days, the go-to resources on relationships and marriage sound a common theme: married couples should freely indulge in sexual fantasies about “someone else,” even while making love with their spouse.

Some therapists go further, saying it’s “unhealthy … to not have sexual fantasies.”  These  marriage “experts” argue that mental movies—of an airbrushed, made-over spouse (like Lori), an imagined, seductive stranger, or a memorable past lover–harm no one.  As long as the fantasy stays in the head, why not?

Besides, they say, fantasies spice up a couple’s love life: mental “action” with the fantasy partner stimulates creativity and physical energy with the real person between the sheets. It’s passion refueled by the imagined responses of a wished-for lover.

The problem with this “fantastic” advice is that it’s all wrong.

For starters, passion rekindled by a fantasy lover is passion for a substitute, real or imagined—it’s not passion for the spouse at all. The spouse in bed functions as a placeholder, an understudy to the real drama occurring in the other’s mind.

Sooner or later it becomes obvious.

Have you ever tried to have an important conversation with someone whose mind was elsewhere? It doesn’t work. Most people can tell if the other person’s not really “there.” The conversation is unsatisfying; the lack of engagement insulting.

But if it happens during one of the most naturally intimate moments a couple can share, the damage is sure to be even greater. Fantasizing about a desired lover—and disengaging from the real spouse–has the potential to inflict deep wounds on the spouse who is displaced. Even therapists who encourage fantasizing warn that fantasies should be revealed cautiously, if at all, to a spouse, because the non-fantasizing partner naturally feels offended, hurt, or cheated upon. It’s human nature.

Fantasies hurt more than feelings, however. They destroy love.

And that’s the real flaw in the sexperts’ advice: they worry more about maximizing individual pleasure than expressing mutual love. In their world, sex is merely a physical dance always in search of more imagination, better choreography, or even a new, inspirational partner. The dancer aims to please him or herself—dancing in sync with another is only a means to exquisite personal pleasure.

Love—and lovemaking between spouses—can’t be reduced to a solo performance or expanded to a mental audition, open to all.

Sexual love is an intimate, person-to-person encounter. It has deep meaning precisely because of who the two people are: a married couple who have given themselves to each other, with a promise of exclusive, committed love.

Pretending that a spouse is really someone else is just as contradictory as smuggling a third person in under the covers—even an imaginary person.

And as a practical matter, fantasizing quite literally makes the “unthinkable” thinkable.  The heart and mind are halfway out the door once permission’s granted to mentally pursue someone else.  So it was for Rob and Lori, anyway.

So forget the “experts.”

Put your energy into real love. You just might discover it’s way more satisfying than any fantasy trip ever could be.

 

(c) 2010 Mary Rice Hasson

More of Mary’s columns can be read at Catholic News Agency

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October 14, 2010 · 5:41 am

The Duke Sex List: What She Didn’t Say “Tells All”

Two studies, of sorts, made headlines last week.

The first, by Australian researchers, says that personal choices, reflected in our priorities and goals, have the greatest impact on our long-term happiness. People who prioritize God, family and altruistic goals (e.g. helping the homeless, being generous, or volunteering) are more likely to find happiness than those who pursue self-centered or material goals. And personal choices that result in healthy living, strong friendships, stable marriages, and the right balance of work and leisure all have a significant effect on long-term happiness.

The second “study” that grabbed the headlines last week was the work of

Karen Owen, a 2010 graduate of Duke University. Karen created a tongue-in-cheek senior “thesis” on “Excelling in the Realm of Horizontal Academics,” a.k.a. random, frequent, mostly-drunken sex. In great detail (and no one disputes the truth of her account), she lists and evaluates her too-many-to-count sexual hookups with 13 “subjects,” mostly members of Duke’s lacrosse and baseball teams, during her four years at Duke.

Karen’s PowerPoint presentation, stuffed with details, images, analogies, and explicit dialogue, was a time-intensive effort. She included descriptions of her partners’ attractiveness, physical “hardware,” and performance (ranked on a ten-point scale—actual scores range from a humiliating “1” to an over-the-top “12”).  Her ratings also factored in athletic skills, creativity, and “entertainment” value, including “dirty talk.” She named names and included photos of each “contestant.” Finished, she emailed it to three lucky friends; it was a guidebook for future fun with these “top dogs”—the guys that “everyone wants to be or be with.”

Karen Owen names names

But one friend forwarded it on to another and, within hours, Karen’s PowerPoint went viral, reaching millions on the Internet.

In a hasty quasi-apology, Karen says she originally created the slides to amuse her friends—not to expose the guys to worldwide public humiliation. She claims that she “would never intentionally hurt the people that are mentioned.”  Still, she backpedals, arguing that it’s really nothing different from the standard frat house practice of ranking coeds on their sex appeal.  The notoriety prompted her to shut down all her social network profiles—the Gen Y method of disappearing—but book deals reportedly are in the offing.

Public reactions to Karen’s “study” have focused mostly on the privacy issue– her publication of explicit details, with names and photos, without the consent of the young men involved.  Several commentators also chastised her for making snide remarks about Asians and Canadians.

But Karen’s promiscuity—the source of her problem–elicits a ho-hum reaction in most quarters. Chalk it up to college-as-usual. (And if the comments ricocheting around the Internet are any indication, her hookups reflect a disturbing college norm for many young women.)

A few writers admit that her drunken bed-hopping is “sad” or “immature,” but the chattering media typically characterize her as sexually self-confident, empowered, and even admirable.  The Duke student newspaper calls her “a funny, actually intelligent lady who likes to show people a good time. And she has nothing to be ashamed about.” And one feminist blogger hailed her as “another reminder that women can be as flip, aggressive, or acquisitive about sex as men can. And there’s nothing wrong with that, as long as all parties are consenting.”

That’s the Cosmo line, after all.  Strip sex of any meaning beyond selfish pleasure—and women are free to be equally as aggressive, detached, and utilitarian as the cads of yesteryear. No wrong, no shame. Be happy, right?

Wrong.

Remember that other study, the Australian one? It tells us, first, that the best way to be happy is to prioritize God, family, and others over our own selfish pursuits. Karen’s tell-all reads like a chronology of self-gratification, on her part as well as her fleeting partners. Any regard for others as persons, not just anatomical parts, is completely missing: 42 PowerPoint slides devoid of compassion, caring, affection, or even basic respect for others.

The Australian study also reminds us that the choices we make about important things–like friendships, a healthy lifestyle, and choosing a marriage partner–directly affect our long-term happiness.

How do Karen’s choices stack up? Again, it’s what she didn’t say that tells the story.

Karen’s tales contain no hint of genuine friendships with any of the guys involved. She duly notes any “enjoyable” conversations, pre- or post-sex. She seems to consider it a success if it’s not “awkward” when she sees the guy later on campus, fully clothed, She derides “clingy” behavior, whether on her part or theirs, and refuses to accept Facebook “friend” requests from the guys who sleep with her.

No, Karen’s sex buddies are not friends. Friends don’t exploit each other for momentary–or even hours of–pleasure. They certainly don’t tell tales, like Karen and the guys themselves did.

On that score, her girlfriends fail the true-friend test as well. One of the girls who received Karen’s PowerPoint pressed “forward,” hoping to raise her own social status, perhaps? And what kind of girlfriends let a friend repeatedly get drunk and leave with any guy—or multiple guys–sporting two legs and an athletic scholarship? Karen betrays no sense of her own dignity and value. It’s not surprising that the others don’t either.

Without friends who really care about her, Karen receives little encouragement to make good choices in terms of her health.  Healthy living doesn’t share space with random, drunken, hook-ups.

What does her thesis tell about her prospects for a stable, enduring marriage? It’s what’s missing that matters.

Her exploits describe a young woman practiced in sexual techniques but utterly clueless about the inevitable emotional connections that sex generates. Karen ridicules the tugs on her own heart that leave her “extremely depressed” after a final hookup with one particular man. She can’t afford to be vulnerable. Caught in the inevitable contradiction of the impersonal hookup, Karen wears the emotional armor of indifference to protect against the natural intimacy of sex.

Her sexual “fun,” disconnected from personal intimacy and commitment, is really a solo ride towards unhappiness.

What’s missing from Karen Owen’s thesis—and her life? Trust. Kindness. Friendship. Self-Giving. Love.

Everything that will make her happy.

Isn’t there anyone who cares enough about Karen Owen to tell her the truth?

© 2010 Mary Rice Hasson

 

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July 8, 2010 · 10:07 pm

Selfish Parents: Embryos on Ice and Utilitarian IVF

Meet Gillian St. Lawrence, a new breed of IVF mother: fertile utilitarian.

She’s blonde, 30, married for nine years to a nice guy named Paul, and she heads a real estate investment firm in tony Georgetown, Washington, D.C.

Unlike other women who pursue in vitro fertilization, Gillian is blessed with fertility, inconveniently so.  Writing in The Washington Post, Gillian recounts how she and Paul want to be parents. Maybe.  Someday.

But definitely not now, at 30 and 32.

A child might disrupt their carefully laid plans, which include career, money, and planning to be perfect parents: “My husband wants to be able to coach little league, and we both want very reduced work hours so we never have to look at day care or a nanny…[We] just want to give a future child every bit of our time that we can without dealing with financial stress…” (Um, you forgot to mention winning the lottery, and sailing the globe without a care in the world. Wake up, Gillian, and shake the dreamy visions from your eyes.)

Sadly, unrealistic expectations are the least of her problems.

Gillian anticipates another 10 or 15 years before they will have enough time and money to make room in their lives for a child. That perfect timing, however, has one flaw: infertility increases with age and, as Gillian explains, they risk “higher miscarriage and genetic disorder rates… in babies conceived from parents older than 35.” (Translation: We’ve got exacting standards: an imperfect baby won’t pass muster.)

So what’s a young, naturally fertile couple to do? Change their plans and embrace reality? Buy a minivan instead of a Lexus, eat burgers not shrimp, stay home, and hey, here’s an idea…go make passionate love and thrill each other with the awe and mystery of creating a new life together?

Nah, too pedestrian. Gillian crafted an innovative solution, now complete with explanatory website (is a consulting business far behind?) and carefully totaled expenses and records of 15-minute office visits. She and Paul spent a year and roughly $20,000 to “create embryos, freeze them and, essentially, donate them to our future selves“ through in vitro fertilization, as “insurance against future infertility.” Gillian calls it “Preservation IVF.” (Pardon my skepticism…but for a couple cramped for time and money, that’s a rather pricey solution, compared to a good bottle of wine and a romantic night together.)

Their IVF purchase, which their website bills as “Freedom From Our Fertility Clocks,” buys them the ability to “pursue our goals without giving up the chance to be parents.”

Having their babies and freezing them too.

Let’s be clear.  Gillian and Paul are parents already. They created five little embryos and put them on ice for the next 10-15 years, until Gillian is “ready.” (Imagine the convenience: Freeze-dried children, ready when you’re ready. Defrost, implant, and presto, instant children.)  It kind of reminds me of the compulsive shopper who buys five pairs of winter boots in summertime so she can put them on the shelf for later, “just in case” they fit her fashion whims later on.

Only we’re not talking about shoes here.  We’re talking about real people.  Children, however tiny.

I’ll let more knowledgeable voices address the morality of in vitro fertilization, whether to remedy infertility or preserve “all options,” as in Gillian’s case.

But as a parent, I find Gillian’s story appalling. In spite her meticulous plans and growing bank account, she’s running a catastrophic deficit in the three “must haves”  of good parenting.

First, love. In her pages of analytical discussion about wanting a child and the painstaking research to find the “best” way to make one, she never mentions the word “love.” Not even once. She betrays no awareness of the spousal love factor –that when a husband and wife love deeply, their love yearns to create, to expand and express itself in the creation of another person who becomes a unique reflection of their union.

In this, Gillian’s probably not alone. Scientists predict more couples will join her in severing love from baby-making as they pursue a highly desirable commodity–the perfect child.  A recent report on technological advances in IVF says that, within ten years, some couples will forego the natural context of lovemaking because the quality control features of IVF technology will eclipse the results of natural conception.

IVF, and selective embryo destruction, may eventually yield a better product, (i.e. child), than loving conception, but at what cost to our humanity? At what cost to love?

Fast forward to the future, and Gillian’s love void becomes even more tragic.  She seems tone deaf to a child’s deepest needs—for love, unconditional, unlimited love, regardless of parents’ naturally finite supply of time and money.  In addition, Gillian gives no hint that she anticipates the joy of love, which delights in another’s growth, fulfillment, and flourishing. I suspect she will be too busy measuring her personal return on their joint parenting investment.

Which brings me to the second essential of good parenting: sacrifice. Gillian, being a mom is not all about you.  Good parents, like good spouses, put the needs of others first. They want what is good for the other and will sacrifice their own desires—even their own needs (sleep comes to mind)—in order to provide that.

Parenthood teaches us that life does not revolve around our wants. Rich fulfillment grows when we sacrifice and give to our loved ones. It’s a hard lesson, learned reluctantly, and requiring daily practice.  For the next ten or fifteen years, however, Gillian will ingrain the habit of putting herself first as she elevates her personal goals—career ambition, wealth, fitness, fun–over the children she’s already created and who languish, frozen, waiting for their mother’s heart to thaw.

Her careful planning betrays a stingy disposition, measuring out servings of attention and money according to her own selfish inclinations rather than others’ needs. Pity the poor child who arrives needing more attention, sacrifice, and effort than Gillian and Paul plan to give. After decades spent hoarding the best of their time, energy, focus, and money for themselves, Gillian and Paul will be poorly positioned to learn generosity and true self-giving in the face of a child’s unpredictable and inconvenient needs.

The third vital factor that’s missing is this: a good parent welcomes each child as a gift, a person with an inherent value and dignity, regardless of usefulness, talents, eventual achievements, convenience, or lovability.

Utilitarianism lurks beneath the surface as Gillian discusses her expectations of parenthood. Embryos—children—are a means to an end, helping to secure an idealized vision of parenthood for the real stars of the show: the parents. They will enjoy plenty of time, money, and energy, and a perfect child who will eventually achieve great things and send reflected glory their way, with little or no parental sacrifice required.

But Gillian’s utilitiarian mindset really breaks out into the open when a reader asks her what she intends to do with any “leftover” embryos who are not implanted in her womb. Although they created five children, Gillian and Paul intend single embryo transfer sometime after age 40, meaning they’ll try one at a time. In typical IVF, remaining embryos are destroyed when their expiration date arrives. Not so for Gillian.

Those leftover children can still benefit her: “Statistically, with five embryos, we may only be able to achieve one or two successful pregnancies so it is likely we will use them all. If not, we plan to save them because with advanced technology, 20 or 30 years from now one of us could get a bad disease and those embryos could save one of our lives because of the DNA being from us.”

Using your own children for spare parts. Cold-hearted. Chilling.

But fitting, I suppose, for a utilitarian mama who puts her kids on ice.

(c) 2010 Mary Rice Hasson

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June 11, 2010 · 11:11 am

Shopping for Perspective: Lessons Learned from Ordinary Folk

A full cartHave you ever gone to the grocery store and wandered the aisles, nagged by the feeling that there’s something you need…but you just don’t know what? Two days ago, that was me. By trip’s end, though, I took away more than a cartful of groceries.

I found something I didn’t even know I needed.

Once a week, or when thrift outweighs convenience, I shop at a discount grocery store.   It’s not the cleanest, they don’t carry all my favorite brands, the produce is hit or miss, and it’s an extra ten-minute drive.  But you can’t beat the prices on the staples, especially milk, eggs, bread, peanut butter, and bananas. (That’s important because my strapping, hollow-legged son is home from college and my 15-year-old rivals him in size. The two of them put away a gallon of milk, six eggs, a dozen bananas, and countless peanut butter sandwiches by lunch.)

On this day, I was a reluctant shopper. Begrudging the time spent (don’t we always prefer the work we’re not doing to the task at hand?), my mind was cycling down a pessimistic path.  Work, money, schools, this kid, that kid. All my worries hopped on for the ride. Negativity and discouragement filled my thoughts faster than the groceries filled my basket.

Just past the produce, in front of the doughnuts, I saw them: a mom with five kids, ages 12 down to about 3, I guessed.  As a mom of seven, I tend to notice other moms with a passel of kids, especially lively, energetic kids. (Someone once told me that women relate in “same-same” mode, meaning we connect with other women by discovering what we share in common.  “Me too. The same with me,” creates an instant bond.) Normally I would smile as I passed by and say something encouraging. Not this time, I’m embarrassed to say.

Their presence broke through my gloom only long enough for me to note three things: there were a lot of them (kids, that is), they seemed happy enough, and their clothes looked worn and many seasons old, suggesting money was tight. I hoped they’d get their doughnuts.

As one of ten kids growing up on a professor’s small salary during the inflationary Carter years, I remember gratefully my mom’s willingness to splurge for occasional treats.  A doughnut or pack of gum was a treat, even if divided ten ways.  In fact, we older ones grew up assuming that every stick of gum ought to be split in two and shared. Didn’t everyone do that? Five sticks to a pack back then…of course we’d share. Buy two packs of gum? Extravagant!

Maneuvering through the aisles, I glimpsed the mom and her kids a few more times.  In the pasta aisle, the kids bunched around mom as she gestured over the options. What’ll it be tonight?  Spaghetti? Rotini? I marveled that the kids didn’t seem to be the bickering sort.  Restless kids and endless aisles make for trouble where I come from.

I felt a pang of guilt.  Usually, as part of my small, personal prayer mission, I pray silently for people as I notice them in the grocery store.  I pray for their unknown burdens, their inner struggles, and (for moms of little kids) for patience and peace as they shop.  Weighed down by my own problems on this day, I hadn’t done that.

But awareness–plus guilt—does motivate.  I prayed for them then, in that moment, asking God’s blessing on them and for patience and kindness to fill the mother’s heart. Then I moved on.

Bread, bagels, done. My inner storm was beginning to blow over as I headed for the checkout.  Almost outa here.  By the time my order was half checked through, another woman lined up behind me, and the mom and kids wheeled into the third spot in our checkout lane.  (That’s another drawback of the discount grocery. Never enough checkers.)

As the checkout lady scanned, I glanced behind me.  The five kids were still happy, older ones hovering over young ones as they waited to unload their cart. The mom of five included me in her smile as she chatted with the woman between us.

Only then did I notice her funny head covering. From afar, I thought she wore a bandanna.  Up close, I realized she wore one of those soft wraps that cancer patients use to cover their scalps after their hair falls out.

Its significance instantly zapped my own magnified worries down to size.  Car repairs, paperwork, tuition payments…they were nothing compared to whatever this woman was facing. The woman behind me asked the mom of five a question, which I couldn’t hear. But her reply was clear.

“I had brain surgery last month…But the hair’s starting to grow back in already.”  She lifted a corner of the head wrap and, sure enough, light brown stubble was visible on a scalp recently shaved.

This woman’s reality delivered a strong dose of perspective, a new perspective in fact.  As moms of many, we were “same-same.” As moms facing personal challenges, we were not even close. The ordinary stress of taking five young kids to the grocery store would tax most of us. Money seemed to be a problem and she needed brain surgery on top of that. But she seemed peaceful…even grateful.

It was an unexpected word that came to mind. Grateful? Why would she be grateful?  The burdens she must be carrying…

I didn’t know the half of it.  A moment later, the conversation continued–brief words about her treatment, recovery, and concern for her kids. And then, she spoke softly.

“But I’m just glad to be alive, you know?  My sister was killed last month. A car accident. Her daughter was in the car with her and she’s still not better.  Never missed a day of school and now been out for a month. But my sister, she was killed.”  She shook her head, smiled a half-smile, and said again, softly but firmly. “I’m just glad to be alive.”

Perspective.

She was alive—and glad for that.

Undoubtedly this mom had struggled at first with the news of her own illness, her worries over caring for the kids and paying for her treatment. But the tragic loss of her sister reframed her own losses.  It gave her the gift of perspective, and the resilience that follows from that.

And she, in turn, gave me that same gift: a new perspective.

Shelving my own (now miniscule) worries, I wanted to talk with her, to ask a million questions, to know more about her story.  What sustained her? Did she have faith? Support from a husband or family or church? How will she help her children see their own difficulties and losses from the same grateful perspective?

But there was no time for that.

“Ma’am?  Ma’am? Slide your card, please.”

Time to pay.  (What is the price of “fresh perspective,” anyway?)

Awkward now, because I was rushed, I sensed I owed something to this mom.  I wanted to do something for her and her children, to acknowledge the sudden clarity she brought to my own troubles.  And to say “thanks” for the gift she did not even know she had given.

But as I paused to find words, the moment was gone.  In two seconds flat, the checker rushed me through–a funny time to be speedy–and pushed my cart towards the door.  The noise and commotion precluded further conversation.

I could only catch her eye as I left, smile, and pray fervently for her and her children.

I came shopping for food that day, but left with much more. The difficulties that weighed on my spirit when I entered that store are still very real.

But so is the gratitude borne of perspective.

(c) 2010 Mary Rice Hasson

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May 28, 2010 · 3:03 pm

The Starbucks Lady: A Latte of Kindness

Fueled by Starbucks, I can go anywhere. A few months ago, my odometer scaled a new peak–86,000 miles–as I, the soccer-mom equivalent of a cross-country trucker, crossed the border into North Carolina. Again.

Now don’t get me wrong, North Carolina’s grown on me. It’s green and beautiful, the weather’s not bad, and the people I’ve met have been warm and hospitable.  The past two years I’ve been a spring and fall repeat visitor to the highly competitive tournaments here, pursuing necessary “exposure” for my college-bound players.

One thing’s for sure, as a soccer tourist I see a different slice of North Carolina than I do as an Outer Banks vacationer.

And idle moments on field after field offer ample time to reflect on lessons learned in the Piedmont. The best lesson? Served up, unexpectedly, by a Starbucks lady.

Saturday morning, a 6 a.m. wake-up call, and my sluggish, caffeine-dependent body stubbornly insisted on a Starbucks. Fortunately, my internal Starbucks radar found its target (not so easy here in the land of “Biscuitvilles” and furniture stores). I rattled off my order –“grande, non-fat, extra-foam latte”–and plunked down some bills.  Out of habit, I surreptitiously–and compulsively– started checking my blackberry, like I always do when I’m waiting at my Starbucks back in D.C.

Inexplicably, I caught myself and looked up. Something was different. The Starbucks lady, for starters.  Not a tattoo or facial piercing anywhere. In fact, she was 60-some, with permed gray hair, a maternal bosom, and comforting smile.

And she was slow. Really slow, at least by my Washington-calibrated patience levels.

“Good morning!” she now said, as if my order had never been given.

“Now what’s your name? Mary? All, right, now let me write that down, right here on this cup for you. ‘Grande, non-fat, extra-foam latte, right?’ I’ve got it honey.”

She paused, then smiled warmly and continued, as unhurried as if I’d pulled up a chair and leaned in for a good chat. “So tell me now, where y’all from? You visiting family?”

Her calm manner gave her time to meet my eyes, to smile, and to make conversation.  60 seconds had elapsed and, cup in hand, she still had not finished putting my order in, nor had she taken my money.

But she knew my name and she wondered what brought me to her neighborhood. Her eyes saw me, not a generic customer. The point hit home.  What was my hurry? No line in front of me, no line behind. The game wouldn’t start for an hour.

More importantly, a real person—not a vending machine—was serving me coffee. A person whose daily work in life was less about pouring shots of espresso, and more about showing interest, kindness, and respect. She treated each customer as a person rather than latte #47 in a two hundred-latte day. Surely I could respond in kind.

It was the slowest cup of coffee I’ve ever ordered, but one of the fastest lessons ever taught. John Paul II once said that, in a world of materialism, the mission of women is to see others with the eyes of the heart.

I’ll bet my North Carolina Starbucks lady has the sharpest vision around.

In a small-town coffee oasis, the loving eyes of a curly-haired, kind Starbucks lady awakened me from my sleepy self-absorption. I no longer remember the taste of my latte.  I will always remember the kindness with which it was served.

Three-eighty-nine for a coffee? In one Starbucks in North Carolina, at least, it’s a spectacular value.

A version of this blog was originally published at www.phasesofwomanhood.org

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