Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Fifty Plus Cohousing + ?

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

On Thursday, February 20, 2003, at 10:32  AM, Jeanne Goodman wrote:
> As a parent, I have been following most of this discussion and noting 
> my own
> reaction to it. I discovered that my initial reaction was to want to 
> defend
> the children then it occured to me that my real problem with the 50+
> cohousing is that I feel discrimated against as a parent. At times
> parenthood feels like a disability.

I felt exactly the same way when I had small children and it was a 
great surprise to me. I just had never realized people could be so 
inconsiderate of a young mother trying her best. People not holding 
open doors for strollers at shopping centers was one that really got to 
me. Or no sitter in the nursery at church. Or people giving me rude 
looks because my baby was screaming at the top of her lungs in a plane 
that had circled over the Chicago airport for an hour without after a 5 
hour flight.

Now that I'm older I feel the discrimination in the other direction -- 
loud music and yelling kids, which I never cared for even when I was a 
kid, is now a physical discomfort and renders conversation impossible. 
Young adults (30-40) not listening to anyone who actually has 
experience because they want to "do it themselves" or "have better 
ideas" so I have to adjust to another round of some else's growing 
pains. And pay for their mistakes while I'm at it.

Cohousing has taught me of the value of my grandmother who ruled the 
roost and put her foot down when the youngins got too frisky. As much 
as I resented it then, I do wish I had her back. Somehow cohousing is 
going to have to deal with this issue.

But all of this is just life. Life is hard. It takes constant 
adjustment to change and letting go (in Zen terms) and in 
sociocratic/cybernetic terms, "steering". Any living system has to step 
back evaluate and adjust, over and over. Like riding a bicycle, you 
have to be alert.

Sharon
-----
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org

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