Yes, fucking do LSD and go wander Barcelona. But also, why not get married and have kids? Because that’s a whole other crazy fucking experience.

- Patton Oswalt, 8/2009

Patton Oswalt, like many Americans, is married and has a child. This otherwise ordinary turn of events is actually something of a big deal. We’re talking about a man who used to refer to babies as bags of crap.  It is safe to say that something fundamental about Oswalt has changed. And, maybe, he thinks you might want to change, too.

It would be easy to take a swipe at him for completely turning around on this issue — but frankly, I’m not interested in trying to give him shit for it. People change their minds, sometimes. It happens. Actually, I’m happy for Patton Oswalt.

I appreciate that he’s not being a jerk about the awesomeness of parenthood, even if his weakly formulated nudge at the child-free to get married and have a baby already rankles a bit. Okay, you rich, straight guy, thanks for the advice! It’s a little like someone in a game of hide-and-go-seek standing at the base, shouting, “Man, being safe is totally awesome! All you hidden people out there should try it!”

But enough about him, for now. We can burn his name into the surface of the moon, later. In the meantime, let’s broaden our focus, a little bit. If you’re ready for some long-ass rambling, follow me past the jump.

Those of us who choose not to have children must be very frustrating to deal with. Parents look at us and, sometimes, they see must themselves as they used to be: Subliminally conflicted. Obliviously bereft. Unknowingly incomplete. Childless. And, sometimes, they want to help us to see how amazing having a child is, they want to help us through the threshold.

But they know how difficult it is to express the wonder and awesome power of the experience, because they were once childless. They remember what it felt like — or, perhaps what it was they didn’t feel. Because you can’t know what it’s like until you have a child of your own.

I imagine it must be similar to the what the Apollo astronauts have to deal with. How do you explain what it’s like to set foot on another world? To look up and see the Earth hanging like a big, blue marble in the sky? Well, you can’t explain it. You just can’t.

I’m willing to accept that I’ll never know what it’s like to have a child until I have a child. That seems like a logical assertion. But, it’s dangerous for a child-free person to admit, because it’s also an assertion that’s been used to cudgel and silence people without children. In its own way, it’s been a weapon of infantilization. It’s also the polite, public face of an philosophy that sometimes justifies abuse: “Don’t tell me how to raise my kid.”

But it helps no one for people like me to claim that we have any inkling of what it must be like to have children of our own. It’s a real lotus eaters type situation.

* * *

Here’s what I find really interesting about people who rail against the thought of getting married and having babies, and then go on to get married and have babies: It’s that they are often surprised at how good it feels.

Why shouldn’t it feel good to be married and have kids? How long do you suppose human beings would have lasted if it didn’t? Millions of years of evolution have honed every aspect of human biology into a baby-generating machine. Making more human beings are what human bodies are for.

Beyond (or, intertwined with) evolutionary considerations are some pretty serious cultural ones. On these pages, I occasionally refer to something I call the Western Adulthood Narrative, which is basically the story we tell ourselves to describe the stages of our maturation. In its most basic form, it goes: Childhood, then Marriage, then Parenthood. A person’s level of maturity on this scale determines how much attention everyone else should pay to what that person has to say.

It’s cod-sociology, of course; but it’s a shorthand way to express why married people tend to dismiss single people, or the way parents tend to dismiss the childless. In each case, the person who’s further along the in the narrative feels justified in not really listening to anyone further back, because those behind him lack crucial experience and information.

So, let’s get back to why people shouldn’t be surprised by how natural and right it feels to get married and have kids: Because you were raised in a society that’s been pushing you towards getting married and having kids. It feels good to do what the mass culture tells you is the right thing. Get married, have kids, and you will be rewarded. For one thing, you’ll no longer have to hear people ask, “When are you getting married?” and “When are you going to have children?” because — well, because there are no more quesitons after that.

You know why it feels so good? Because you’ve won. And now that you’ve won, it’s over — you just have to keep on living. As far as the Western Adulthood Narrative is concerned, there’s no higher high, no next level to ascend to. That’s it.

But you keep on living. You live through the tantrums, the school problems, the car pools, the soccer practice, the tedium and frustration, because once you’ve won, you don’t just keep on winning forever. The game is over for you, as it begins again for your children. And so on, until the sun blows up and kills us all.