The Persistent Lure of the Hypothetical Grandchild
The much-anticidreaded step into grandparenthood: Is it really the final phase of adulthood, or just generational wish fulfillment? Inquiring minds want to know!
Although many people my age — or, admittedly, considerably younger — are grandparents and have been for a while, I am not. I’m fine with that, at least for now. You won’t catch me standing with my nose pressed against the glass of Grandparentland for the foreseeable future. One of the benefits of having kids relatively late in life — aside from never taking parenthood for granted — is that when they get to be teenagers, as mine are now, you can easily convince yourself that you’re WAY too young to be a freaking grandparent. No matter how many of your high school classmates are crowing about their kids’ kids and posting pix of the adorable babes in question all over Social, that is just something that’s NOT on my radar. At all. No hurry for that, thank you very much. That does not compute.
(Preemptive apologies to you, dear reader, if you’re one of those people who’s chosen not to have offspring, and thus no grandoffspring; you’ll get no judgment on that from me, it’s your life not mine and I’ll assume you’ve long ago made your peace with/are quite happy with that decision, but that’s not what this little blog post is about.)
The quotidian, it adds up. Enough repetitions of the morning assembly, breakfasting showering dressing and maybe shaving, caring for your small humans and pets, shoehorning yourself into footwear, stepping outside and bringing the car’s engine to life. And enough then of the nightly disassembly, the shedding of the day’s clothes, maybe leaving the contact lenses bubbling in the overnight disinfectant, dishes in the dishwasher, slippers by the bed. Sunrise sunset ad infinitum. And finally your once-newborn babies have flown the nest, off to college or who knows where. And then what?
Having grandchildren: Is it the final step of “becoming an adult”? Discuss. (Face it: When you’re a grandparent, nobody but nobody refers to you as a kid anymore.) But more to the point, why exactly do people love their grandchildren so much? I have a few theories:
— Second Chance Syndrome: You get to correct the mistakes you made screwing up your original kids (or as my wife refers to them, your first batch of Chiclets). How can anyone resist? You’ve teared up for years at those videos of your offspring at ages three or four or seven in school plays, holiday pageants, birthdays, summer camp, or just average days at home. Their voices were still high, their innocence poignant. You long for “those days when the kids were small.” Well, presto! Suddenly, as if by divine miracle, your progeny have had their own progeny and babies have returned to your family! Your flock has increased! How cool! Cute, innocent little babies who soon become even cuter toddlers! Your personal universe has been restored to its Golden Age, only with you much wiser than you were back then. Plus, this time you’re not responsible for the brats 24–7 and can happily and sans guilt hand them over to their actual parents when you’ve had your fill of them, so what’s not to like?
— Indulgence Run Wild: As a grandparent, you usually have more free time than you did when you were a busy thirty- or fortysomething (or even fiftysomething) raising the rugrats. Maybe you’re even retired empty-nesters just boppin’ around the four walls, with maybe a bit more spare cash floating around for discretionary expenses. Obvious solution: Be grandparents! Hey kids, who wants to go to the Olive Garden? Or Adventureland Park? Hey, here’s a tenner for candy, don’t tell your folks…
— Ah, the Potential is Nuts! In the first flush of grandparenthood, the G-children are young enough to be all potential, no disappointment. (It’s probably for the best that most people don’t live long enough to see their grandchildren ending up as 50-year-old twice-divorced losers with horrible political views. How were they raised, anyway?) In these early days, it’s just More photos to post to Facebook!
— You Will Live On Through The Rugrats: I imagine a cartoon from the Onion, where the worst cartoonist in the world draws a crazy cackling guy saying, “The line continues! Immortality is within my grasp at last, even though all my other pipe dreams never came true, ha ha ha!
“So, I’m 90 years old. I’ve never been awarded a Nobel, a Pulitzer, a Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, a Kennedy Center Honor, or even an Emmy for Best Costume Design, and I’m for damn sure not a Disney Legend. I may have won Employee of the Month a couple of times. But goddammit, I’m Aidan and Charlotte’s grandpa, and that’s good enough for me! My grandkids are my TRUE LEGACY!”
— You Get to Leave a Mark on Your Grandkids, Hopefully Not a Noticeable Bruise: When you get to a certain age, let’s say old enough to be a grandparent if not actually one, your thoughts inevitably turn to your own grandparents, who at that point have probably been in their graves for quite some time. Even though Grandma and Grandpa, Oma und Opa, Abuela y Abuelo may have been bullies, bigots, undiagnosed bipolar cases, or just plain mean, they were still your grandparents, of which you’re issued no more than four in the best case (barring parental remarriage and step-grandparenting, but for God’s sake let’s not get into THAT). People generally want to give their grandparents the most generous benefit of the doubt, until in the worst cases it’s no longer possible to do that.
Nobody really expects you to turn into your grandparents when you get to be that age (thank God). But if you’re lucky enough, your grandparents were your favorite people when you were a kid — or at least one of them was. And if you’re really lucky and wise enough (or have wised up enough), you might eventually end up becoming one of your grandchildren’s favorite people, too.
