My story starts out traditional enough. My parents were part of a generation when it was still possible for people to work towards a life that was better than their parents’ lives. So, as an up-and-comer from modest means, my father turned to the automobile production industry at 18 to care for his young pregnant wife. He chose a back breaking, blue collar existence but this choice allowed my mother to stay at home until her three little ones were all in school. Seems traditional enough, for sure.
But that story ends at age 12, when I became one of the first among anyone I knew with divorced parents. I gained a step-father and step-sister at 13, a step-mother at 14, and tried my best to navigate the roles of step-daughter and step-sister as well as maintain a relationship with my father, who was a noncustodial parent. High school was a blur of keeping my grades up for college and a series of weird boyfriends (minus the one that became my husband three years ago but that story is for another time). This was a time when too many of my peers were getting pregnant or generally floating through life with no real direction. Despite risking the label of “nerd”, I focused my attention on trying to make something of myself by attending college. As a student in a public university, my new set of peers were more interested in late night binge drinking than academic success, so I didn’t fit in there. As an art student, followed by psychology major, others did their best to suppress their obvious doubt when discussing my “future”. Possibly for the sole purpose of proving them wrong, I went on to graduate school. From a rare bout of optimism came the thought, “Finally, I’ll be sure to fit in here”… Nope. These new peers were from the privileged upper class. They could hear my “Midwestern accent” and looked at me with, “How did she get here?” eyes.
In my mid-twenties, I found myself separated from family, living in Maryland with years of graduate school ahead of me. How did I pass the time? I got around to marrying one of the few halfway decent men I had met in college. We could not have been more incompatible but we were both nice enough to keep trying…for 7 years. Then I found myself divorced and 30 years old! Oh, the horror! J Follow this with a remarriage to my high school sweetheart where I instantly became a step-mother of two with no prior knowledge or experience with children other than being “Awesome Aunt Amanda” (as named by my niece). I took on the almost daily chaos of “the ex-wife” with as much dignity and compassion as I could muster. As many in my home state can sympathize, my new husband lost his job after less than one year of marriage. In his infinite grace, God granted me a job with enough to sustain our new family. When I came to desire my own child, I couldn’t even manage to do that in the traditional way. I had to go by way of in vitro fertilization and now have a 7 ½ month old son. Given our need for that above-mentioned blessing of a job, I was back to work after three months and my husband takes care of the daily childcare duties. Of course, that’s another issue that brings the cocked heads and confused looks from others. I can almost see the smoke coming out of their heads as their brains struggle…”Man at home? Does not compute.” But I digress.
In contemplating my new blog, I realized the relative nature of the term “Nontraditional”. It’s certainly possible that the idea of traditional is a simple fallacy. Maybe there is no one whose life fits our cultural ideas about tradition. Regardless of the reality, it seems that many people still try to uphold an illusion that we measure ourselves against. With this blog, I hope to rid myself of this illusion. My path to this point may have been a mess of twists and turns but I have a feeling yours may have been too. That’s why I think it’s important to let go of our ideas of tradition and embrace the nontraditional. Will you embrace with me?
