This is beautifully written - and its intimacy courageous in our society as it is today.
The jarring of: "“Ahhhh, you don’t have much time. You know, after thirty women’s eggs start to diminish and you don’t produce as many”." is such a strong illustration of the arrogance of men who assume that they know more about a woman's body and its very life, than does the woman who owns it.
This is a brief but powerful story that, the reading of which, can benefit both women and men. Some women because of the reassurance & belief in themselves & the inegrity of their personal intimate relationship whith their own minds and bodies; for men because my sex understands so little and yet assumes so much.
As Bob Dylan sings in, 'My back pages': "Ah but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now', at 72 I can look back and see my ignorance, my instinctive or socialised assumptions, my black and white view of so much.
That ignorance of indoctrination and youth is the one mitagation I would offer for the general failure of male society to recognise that it is not for them to give women the right to equality & recognition as full members of human society, for it is not men's to give. The female sex is as essential and valuable to human life as is the male, dare I say it, perhaps even more-so.
No, even at my age and after many relationships with women and a love of them, I don't pretend to have outstripped all of my conditioning and its continued reinforcement by elements of society.
However, neither do I have that youthfull and thoughtless arrogance, assumption and opaque unawareness of women as people, as human beings, rather than simply objects of my desire.
It is, perhaps, far too late but also, perhaps, 'better late than never' but now I can respect, admire and cherish in a holistic way, the attributes, capability and contributions of women to the human condition. I can also see that each is a unique individual and that, as with the male, there are positive and negative traits in all.
I may still mistake much and sometimes stumble or tread carelessly but not, any longer, for lack of motivation to better myself as a person, as a human being, and as a male who can and does respect the reality, the role, the contribution, the wonder of women and all they give to human society.
My back pages are filled with regret & sadness at what I've been, how I've viewed, who I've judged but rather than cry about it, I am trying to learn from it because: 'I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now.'
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Thank you for the story, Virginia.
More such as this must surely help to right the wrongs and illuminate the misapprehensions, false assumptions and learned/conditioned/inherent ignorance that is sexual bias & discrimination.
