Irish Bull
By raincoasterYes, yes, I know, I’ve become the Queen of YouTube lately, but I can’t help myself. In fact, I defy you to watch the following video and say it isn’t absolutely priceless.
Not only does it have an impeccable media pedigree, coming as it does from the esteemed Guardian (not even slightly peccable, I don’t care who you are!) but it also brings to life an amusing cliche, if obliquely.
So maybe it’s not a bull in a china shop; it’s funnier! It’s a bull in an Irish grocery store frightening all the staff, who then summon (who else?) the butcher to deal with him.
And you just know he thought they were busting his chops.
April 28th, 2009 at 10:09 pm
I also used to roll my eyes at the “as long as it’s healthy” cliche from expectant parents, but shortly after I became pregnant, a friend of mine lost his 3-year old daughter to cancer. You always assume that your kid will be perfectly healthy, but then it hits you like a ton of bricks that some people DO have kids who have horrible conditions, some of them fatal, and there is absolutely nothing that makes any of us exempt from that. So that’s when you start saying “as long as it’s healthy”, and you really, genuinely do mean it, because the alternative is too horrible to contemplate.
As far as the name thing goes, I can sympathize. We were thinking of Jake for a boy, and I told a few friends, one of whom said that her parents’ dog was named Jake, and to her, Jake is a dog’s name, not a person’s name. Maybe it’s the hormonal hypersensitivity, but it really did spoil the name for me a bit. We’re still considering “Jake”, but it’s hard to get that comment out of my head.
But yeah, some women are definitely smug, when they start acting as though having a baby overshadows any other life event or accomplishment. I’m very, very happy and excited that I’m having a baby, but let’s be realistic here: I’m not curing cancer, climbing a mountain, or becoming a head of state.
I do smile when I feel the kicking, though. It’s such a goofy, unusual situation, and so very novel to me, and it’s just really damn neat to feel that early connection with this tiny little person.
April 29th, 2009 at 6:23 am
Honestly, I don’t really care what these two women think about pregnant women. Some women are smug, period. I may come off as smug when I’m pregnant, but I love being pregnant, and I love other women who are pregnant, and I love talking about pregnancy even when I’m not pregnant. So whatever.
April 29th, 2009 at 7:36 am
They aren’t saying that its wrong for women to say they want their baby to be healthy. All they are saying is that it isn’t really an answer to the question “Do you want a boy or a girl?”, the two are unrelated.
April 29th, 2009 at 8:22 am
Having lost a much-wanted pregnancy to a fatal chromosome condition, you bet your damn socks I mean it when I say “as long as the kid is healthy.” Does that make me smug? I don’t care, really.
We don’t discuss names with people, either. As you say, they’ll find out when the kid is born anyway. It’s not a big secret, but we smile and say we haven’t decided yet, then change the topic. Some people don’t want us to change the topic – they believe we’re entitled to their opinion, whether we want it or not.
Some people are smug. Some of those people are pregnant women. Some people are also willing to take offense at anything another person does that isn’t EXACTLY what they think they would do in a similar situation, you know? I’ve had people get bent out of shape because we found out the sex of the baby, simply because THEY wouldn’t have done so. Other people felt deeply offended that we weren’t sharing the name we’d chosen, because if it had been them, they would have shouted it from the rooftops.
The song is cute. And I’m sure some of what they say is true. Perhaps I’ll go write a song entitled “People Who Poke My Stomach In Line At The Grocery Store And Talk About Vaginal Tearing When I’ve Never Met Them Before.”
April 29th, 2009 at 9:59 am
I keep a tight hold of a lot of those cliches because really a lot of it is keeping perfect strangers out of your personal business. I hate it that people think you become public property if you are pregnant. My smug sayings help keep me from murdering people because I am hormonal and they just asked a really stupid question.
Oh and the healthy kid comment is seriously out of line especially when you are talking to a parent of a kid who was not born healthy. I was thrilled that my second son was born with a healthy heart after my eldest had (and still has) to go through so much with his heart defect. I would not wish that one anyone even if they wanted a specific gender. It would be nice for me to have a family of two boys and a girl but I am not going to trade my unborn healthy boy for a girl that has health issues.
April 29th, 2009 at 10:04 am
Perhaps it depends on your perspective. If you lose your baby at ten weeks, then perhaps someone who gets to have a healthy baby looks smug no matter what the reality is. 🙂
April 29th, 2009 at 11:55 am
We kept the name a secret because, contrary to your assertion, people do not share their stupid “I hated Jean in elementary school” stories once you present them with the name as a fait accompli. Think how rude you would have to be to say, “Oh, you named the baby X? I really hate that name.” If you tell them before the baby is born, however, they think it is negotiable and you may change your mind if they describe Jean with enough particularity. Why put up with that?
April 29th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
I loved not telling people the names we had picked out. It was a really delicious secret just for my husband and I, and in some ways, the baby to-be-born. It was one of my favorite parts about being pregnant. I love anticipation, though, and am one of those people who wait to find out the sex. That probably drives you crazy, too! 🙂
I will say that it puzzles me when people get SO bent out of shape over your choices, to find out the sex, or tell the name. What difference does it make, and why would it bother someone else at all if I make those choices? Seems like a funny thing to care about, but people, in general, really really care.
April 29th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
Also, I agree wtih class factotum. As a person who has been pregnant 7 times yet only has 2 living children, every pregnant woman seems smug to me. Well, at least the ones that are far enough along to be visibly pregnant.
April 30th, 2009 at 12:57 am
I’m staying out of this because the last time I tried to comment the whole blog network went down!