2022-10-26

• The name of the barista in my favorite coffee shop is Wheeler
  
• Been reading a book about romanticism, marriage, modern love. I find it quite good and useful. Gives me a lot of stuff to think about in romantic relationships ofc and also generally in long-term, close relationships. One thing that stood out from yesterday’s reading was about the concepts of recognition and prestige. The book contains both a narrative about a fictional couple that represents a standard path of sorts for a modern romance and also commentary about various situations the couple finds themselves in. The narrative piece is pretty standard. A man and a woman fall in love, get married, and start a family. The division of household labor is something they try to split evenly, but they still run into contentious situations. This brings me to the example from last night’s read. The two are getting ready for bed when the wife asks the husband to take on the chore of ironing a duvet cover. The husband responds by calmly saying he thinks it is her responsibility. The wife is exhausted and exasperated that her partner seems to be unwilling to help her when she’s at the end of her rope. The husband is also exhausted and thinks he does pull his weight, based on their existing agreements about chore splitting, and reminds himself that he makes most of the money for the family. Ok, fine. Here’s the thing I like. This example has happened for many, many generations. It will almost certainly happen to me and my friends in our long-term partnerships. This is especially true if I/we don’t spend any time trying to understand and address the underlying cause. So what’s going on here and how do we avoid it? The thing that stands out here is that neither of the people involved expressed any recognition or gratitude for the contributions of the other (and they haven’t been doing that generally). They adopt a common perspective that I see across close relationships broadly: that the contributions of their partner are just them “doing their job,” so they don’t deserve special recognition or praise. Recognition and praise are held back until something important is achieved. To me, that perspective is really limited and sad. What it misses is that adulthood is really all about setting your own definitions of success. The married couple here have adopted definitions of success in their own family that result in neither of them feeling particularly special or valued. Wild choice. This results in them feeling that the work they do is banal and meaningless. Neither parent feels like they are doing prestigious or important work. What a shame. Also, what a misread of history. When it comes to the history of civilization, the broadest and most accurate read would reveal that the only way anything meaningful or good has ever been accomplished by anyone is based precisely on the work that these two people do in their home! There would be no trophies at all, in any domain, without the contributions they each make to building a family. So, where does that leave us? Recognition and prestige are important. It is important to decide consciously, and explicitly, with your partner what you want in this area. Do not cede this territory to the broader culture. Own it yourself and together. Accepting standard cultural frames in this area too reliably leads to resentment, frustration, depression, etc. There are better alternatives. We can choose to recognize and cherish the contributions of friends and family. Even and especially the little things they do. It’s also interesting is to look at how we got to this kind of framing in the first place. There’s a lot to add in that area. But this is already pretty long so I’ll save it for another time. I’ve been sitting in this coffee shop typing on my phone for like 40 minutes and I need to go to work.

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