WELCOME
SEX AND THE SINGLE MUMMY
Posted 09.18.09 by annajohnson
Not so long ago I saw a man in Tshirt that said I HEART HOT MUMS. My heart went all fluttery. I wanted to take it as a personal homage and compliment but then paused to note the plural. Yeah, we’re hot, thanks….from, um, ALL of us. I don’t particularly HEART HOT DADS, but that’s just because I’m too busy studying their form, and stealing their football chucking secrets and a statement like that would look socially disruptive brandished on the chest of a woman. Dads are taboo because they belong to other mothers. Plus, the playground is a somewhat uninspiring environment for flirting. Latte breath. Exhaustion. Interruption. Pitiless daylight.
I am a mother and I am single. I never stop to consider the subversive possibilities or the supposed drama of this until I am drifting along on the magazine racks at the supermarket on a Friday night looking at Jennifer Anniston’s anguished face (headline: DUMPED AGAIN!) or am at a dinner party where some fervent married parents are giving me some hyper moralistic advice about sex, or the mere whiff of its possibility outside the temple gates of wedlock. “Don’t bring just ANYONE home” a concerned father of three crowed down the phone “I have heard horror stories about one night stands and their impact on children….” I got a choking feeling at the back of my throat. I think it was rage. Sex and the single mother. It’s always presented as something closely related to child abuse. Or at its very root: neglect. Recall Sandra Oh in SIDEWAYS, ignoring her small daughter while she drank wine with a sleazebag. Letting her daughter bond with the sleazebag in question, then after the penny dropped, whacking the sleazebag over the head with a motorcycle helmut. OK, let it be said that this is NOT my current line of action or future plan.
My best friend Karen has a three year old son and is very uncomfortable with the label “single mum”. I found her thoughts on the subject illuminating because she has had several social encounters where she was treated as a predatory threat, rather than the very lovely person that she is. “I hated being branded as single long before I had a child and I especially hate it now! I’m am myself, an individual, I’m Karen and no, just because I am the only single woman in this room, I do NOT want your husband.” Now see why I HEART HOT DAD’S wouldn’t cut it at the playground? Un-partnered women with children exist in a partnered world with subtle lines, social rules and prejudice. But honestly it’s not as if we are all out there snapping our garter belts at cocktail bars, most nights I’d rather listen to my son breathing gently while I slip into a short novel.
On a very banal and fiscal level dating involves childcare. And the simple fact is that time alone is expensive. I have to really like someone to invest ninety bucks worth of babysitting on the sheer right to be with them. And, I’m bloody proud as well. In some ways being a single mum takes all the worst gender biases about prone womanhood and magnifies them. Instead of imagining a fantastic gutsy role model like Julia Roberts in Erin Brockovitch, with a baby on one hip and a revolutionary grenade on the other, I have read so many doleful domestic abuse stories about single mums shacking up with convicted criminals, stalkers and worse. Must be the marriage police again, stressing how safe that institution is for women, and for families. Ahem. But hey, sorry for getting all heavy. I am more amused than stressed by this terrain.
I think the potential for comedy in this situation is far greater than tragedy. At my favorite toddler recreation center today a beautiful dancer (and mother of three) suggested I go to a Latin nightclub. Oh, sure. The last time I went to an tango bar in Surry Hills, Sydney, a complete stranger thrust his leg so deeply between mine that I was hoisted across the floor like a human broom. Not the most romantic gesture. Other friends, ever helpful, like to physically point to men who seem interested, and then, make wild hand gestures if I fail to register their message. On Tuesday night I went to a pub and was subjected to a loud and drunken plea from a girlfriend. “See that guy on the couch? The big one? He wants your number, he wants it now!!!” Well, thanks for the invoice but do I get to choose as well? When you have been married for a long time you simply forget what all this is like. Perhaps you WANT to forget. The ancient Romans had a place for the emotional and social untouchables of society. They were put in a place called a feelly box (OK, the latin was somewhat more elegant) and basically left to grope for their future partners in the dignity of darkness. Is that next??? At the toddler recreation center I jokingly told the dancer mum that I could sense a whiff of dissent in the air and dangerous thoughts were bubbling through the regimented haze of my days. “Bring on the carpenters!” I cried out loud. “The band?” asked the dancer in confusion. “No, not the band, God I detest The Carpenters. But I must say wood workers smell like cedar and sweat and claim to be able to build a whole shed over the course of a weekend.”
Life has been busy lately and I’m not given to a great deal of fantasy but maybe it is high time to lash out with my own message t-shirt for the slightly less married men of this world. Because truth be told I HEART HOT CARPENTERS, and yes, plural is fine.
Till next time, KEEPING IT YUMMY.
XXX ANNA
Image Caption: “After these pizza’s are done Im’ goin’ dancing!”
Samantha Says:
September 19th, 2009 at 1:55 pmI love your writing! I hate that this whole debate even exists, but you’ve managed to make it less irritating and more entertaining!!! What I’d like to add is why do single mom’s have to have an image. I don’t want to be the neglectful sleazebag-bringing-home mom, nor do I want to be Erin Brockevich. And why aren’t there prominent images of the single dad. While there are some very good ones out there, mine is awful. Whats worse is he is encouraged to date, to spend money he doesn’t have, to be neglectful of his son and no one thinks a thing about it. But everything I do is scrutinized and manipulated to make me out to be a bad mom… Dam society, and dam the worthless non-custodial parents that put the responsible custodial parents into these situations.