My friend Alana wrote a post about struggling with a crisis of purpose in her life. I responded with an open letter that i had been meaning to write to her anyway.
Now she has returned the favor witha letter that is sweet enough to make me uncomfortable about showing it to anyone else….
Moore’s law states that computer power basically doubles every two years, and it pretty much has held up for 50 years. The fact that if we build more roads, we will get more cars should be referred to as Moses’ law. Robert Moses loved roads, and he liked the freedom of cars. When the roads he built got too crowded he just built more roads- without ever stopping to think about Moses’ law. In some ways Moses’ law is just one subset of the law of unintended consequences.
There are those however who do look backwards before walking into a wall, and some of those bright ladies and gentleman took note of Moses’ law when they pushed to massively increase the number of bike lanes in NYC. Naysayers complained that there weren’t enough bikers to justify the lanes. Elementary!!! This morning on Bergen and 3rd Ave in Brooklyn I was surrounded by at least 15 other bikers as we all waited for the light. It was like a bike superhighway. Over the last few years as i have commuted my kids around brooklyn I have seen a huge uptick in the number of bikers on the roads.
20 years ago i was a bike messenger and i don’t recall seeing any bike lanes to speak of. I wasn’t a crazy reckless biker, but it was pretty dangerous nonetheless and i had my share of lucky breaks- a couple of door opening incidents that almost did serious damage and one taxi incident that i can still recall in slow motion. On 47 near 5th a cab screeched to a halt in the middle of traffic flow- and incidentally right in front of me. i braked so hard and hit the cab while holding on to the handlebars with a death grip that as I sommersaulted over the bike I flipped the bike over me- and it cushioned my fall. Somehow I ended up on my ass in the middle of the street shaken but not stirred. A UPS driver jumped out his truck and hauled the cab driver out his seat- and told the person getting in the cab to find another one. He then helped me to my feet and made the driver apologize. i was pretty out of it but otherwise ok. We all went on our way.
Now i bike with two kids, and while I take a lot of streets without bike lanes I’m super grateful for the ones that i have to use. As i biked along with so many other bikers this morning i thought a lot about how we humans often get overwhelmed by too much of a good thing. If i was a food manufacturer (which i’m not) and someone came to me with a product that would make my food much more appealing to the average person and not really cost me much more at all I would likely jump at it. If this product was sweet cheap corn syrup that didn’t appear too have any bad side effects when added in small amounts I would laugh at my good fortune all the way to the bank.
Now say I make something that normally isn’t really sweet, like… say… bread. I add just a little bit of that magic stuff, my bread doesn’t taste “sweet” like candy, but the people who try it prefer it over the bread that doesn’t have that corn syrup. Soon i’m selling bread by the boatload and my competitors find out- so they add a little bit more than me. Well the juice company realizes what’s going on and they figure out that they can put 90% less juice - add a bit of the magic stuff- and use a bunch of water- and charge the same amount despite spending so much less on ingredients. Who could blame em. Now each one of these things in themselves probably wouldn’t have much of an effect on anyone’s health….. but when everything people eat has the magic stuff- the magic stuff turns to tragic stuff.
The unintended consequence of this process is an explosion of obesity, diabetes, death, and out of whack governement shennaningans involving money, politicians, more money, subsidies, corn that doesn’t taste like corn, corporations, and pain. As a parent the worst part is having to chose whether or not to bring my child to the supermarket because i get tired of having to fight and show her that corn syrup is one of the largest ingredients in everything she wants me to buy.
Which brings me to blogging. I have been blogging for all of two weeks now, and having put forth that road I am packing it with cars. Soon i will learn to choose my subjects more wisely, and I will shape them more skillfully, but for the time being I am just opening the floodgates because for the first time in a long time my thoughts have somewhere to go.
I don’t know that the bike lanes will significantly decrease traffic but I know they have benefited me from a health perspective. When I bike instead of drive my kids I get my exercise without having to think about it. Soon the bike lanes may be too crowded and we’ll have to eminent domain some sidewalks…. or parking lanes to make more room for the bikes (actually this recently happened on Dekalb Ave near me.) One of the unintended consequences may be a healthier city.
there’s a ny times article today that deals with surrogacy. The main focus of the story is when to tell the kids- and the answer is early. kids need to know what’s going on.
As i mentioned in an earlier post a current donor wrote in to the dsr listserve with issues concerning contact with families that has used his sperm. I’ll post his note here- and the response that i sent in to the listserve.
I feel a great deal of empathy for both parties and this is one of the reasons that I feel compelled to wade into this discussion- and this film.
title of post was “am i cold hearted”
I havent been a sperm donor for that long. Recently i told this lady by email i want no contact with the child after AI or NI…except for a few pics. Then she goes off on me about being cold hearted and mean. I’ve spent lots of $ travelling to help couples & singles get pregnant and never received a thank you.
my response
As a former donor who has been following the subject for a couple of years I would say that you aren’t cold-hearted- but you are probably not as well informed about the emotional implications of what’s going on as you could be.
i dontated 20 or so years ago and was not made aware in any way that there would be emotional implications. I thought of it all in an abstract kind of way- and didn’t have a sense that the children born from my donations would feel any connection to me- nor me to them. Then I had kids of my own and …. well- there’s no denying that they are partly me- and that is an intense fact.
As i have followed the subject I have also found that the children born of donor fathers are often intensely interested in knowing more about where they came from. I don’t imagine that all of them have this desire. Of course everyone is different but i have talked to a number of donor kids and they feel cut off from a part of themselves- as someone who recently lost my father i can totally relate to that feeling- as someone who has children i can totally relate to that feeling.
As such- if i had the ability to do it over- i think that I would still consider donation- but i would only do it if it was a much more open and supportive process for all concerned- taking into consideration the emotional needs of everyone involved-
You are clearly giving these people a gift- and it should be lauded and supported. At the same time that gift has hidden emotional time bombs attatched that you need to be aware of - and think through- in the best interest of the child that will come from your gift. I can completely understand why you might not want to have a relationship with that child- at the same time- closing the door on that possibility may not be the best thing for them or for you in the long run.
Obviously it’s a complex issue and I don’t mean to preach at you in any way whatsoever- when i donated there was no contact with the clients- yet now i wish there had been- as it would have made me ask myself the hard questions that you are asking yourself now. your actions are far more generous than mine were at the time- as you are giving not only the gift of your self - but also of you identity.
If you can take the point of view of these parents for a moment.
They, like you- probably entered this realm with less information than they probably should have had. Now they have a child and they are becoming more informed about how to best handle things- what they are hearing is that donor kids can benefit emotionally from having a better sense of where they came from- from their roots- and you are a big part of their roots. perhaps they are overstepping lines in their desperation to provide what they now find is neccessary. I hope that you can find a way to give them a little patience, and I hope that they can find it in themselves to appreciate what you have done for them.
you might also find that 10 years from now you want to know more about these children- because these children can help you learn a lot about yourself. i know that i am a very different person at 40 than i was at 20- i probably wasn’t emotionally mature enough to accept the responsibilites that came with donating at that time.
I listed myself on the dsr about a year and a half ago and I haven’t been approached by any donor kids. however, a couple of weeks ago I posted an op-ed about this issue on a blog and through that I met a 23 year old donor kid who has spent many years thinking deeply about her roots- I wish that she was my daughter, and I look forward to meeting my donor kids some day.
here’s a link to that op-ed i hope that it helps to clarify some of these issues- and i am happy to discuss any of them with you - just email me directly.
michael
Back to how to make this a film
I ran into a friend the other day and I told him about how i was working on this film. For years now i have had a pretty clear sense of the first 20 minutes- so it’s kind of easy for me to kick off- but then it spirals into the unknown…
he quickly said “keep it simple”. I agree that it needs to be simple- but the issue is complex- and my feelings and thoughts are pretty explosive at this point so i am going to just keep on putting it down on paper- logging footage and planning.
This is going to be a multi year process but right now I feel like I am that guy who is supposed to set the pace for a race (the rabbit) - and I’m going a little too fast- there’s way too much coming out- and not enough time to make sense of it.
Over the last few years I have had some periodic problems with sciatica- pain in my leg and back- at times it’s been pretty severe- both times it’s gotten really severe i had a daughter that was about 1.5 yrs. old- and both times it stuck around for a little under a year. I KNOW that the pain is related to stress - and believe very firmly in the practice of Dr Sarno (healing back pain) - another doc we are trying to find a way to make- last October i had been suffering for a long time and I finally went to go see an acupuncturist at a store front in the E Village- I did this in the same week that i started to go to a pool. After 5 sessions in 7 days I was pretty much pain free for the first time in nearly a year. Since then I have been pretty regular about going to the pool and riding my bike. For me the pool has been only partly about exercise- it’s more about meditating. I try to use that time to clear my head- I don’t have the patience for yoga (I would like to gain that patience) so in the meantime i kind of treat the swimming as if it were yoga- and do it very mindfully-
i also use this time to think about the projects i am working on - i’ve been flooded with thoughts for this film/blog/book and i am struggling to get them all down - so that i can make use of them- and I’m doing it imperfectly in this bloggy way- because I’ve found that it’s helped me to stay focused- it’s helped me to continue to be goal oriented.
i tend to put off a lot of things because i can’t complete them properly- or i psych myself out before i even start- i think - i won’t get that grant so why bother- etc
with this project i’ve decided to simply move forward at any cost- and so far it’s really helped me blast ahead- so again - forgive the bad grammar- the lost structures- this is all brainstorm so please continue to read at your own risk of….. boredom insanity etc.
earlier today i mentioned a speech that my father made at my wedding. My mother dug it up and emailed it to me. It’s shorter than i remember and twice as prescient 12 years later.
I would like to share with you the secret of successful living — filmaker’s version.
Central casting has assigned you a role in The Human Comedy. You have to accept the role but view it as a continually changing and evolving part. Above all do not hold to the false belief that you are audience, not actor, that you are a watcher of other’s foibles and pratfalls.
You are both actor, audience (ie, observer of your own performance), script doctor, editor, and director. The script and performance are always being revised — this is a work in progress. The better you understand the comedy and your own behavior as an amusing player — the lighter your touch, the better you become at improving and enriching your performance. Those who deny they have been cast in parts become sterile, inflexible caricatures, while those who embrace their roles and keep working to improve their performances, grow, change, and expand their selves.
Above all, remember the script is not Long Day’s Journey into Night nor the tale of woe of Juliet and her Romeo, but it is The Human Comedy, a warm and endearing script. Play it well and your days will be mostly joyful.
Words Spoken by David Galinsky, 9/13/97
