Push!



Rant start.

I was reading a Davis Sedaris essay when I came to finally understand why childbirth is treated as such an ordeal among us humans. The short answer is capitalism, that panacea that isn't.

I'm pretty homophobic. Contrary to the common tagline, I actually don't have any gay friends. Not because I refuse to have any. But because none have crossed my path. And I admit I haven't gone out of my way looking for any. So for me to like Sedaris' work means I must really like his writing. And I do.

In his essay "Stepping Out" he talks to a cow that's grazing while giving birth. He asks her why she can't stop eating for five minutes in order to focus on childbirth. Five minutes for childbirth? Where did that time estimate come from? From capitalism, of course.

I'm speaking from some amount of firsthand experience here. I contend that childbirth is treated as a gland slam version of passing a kidney stone only because society has conditioned us to get it over with in about five minutes.

Push! that familiar refrain we've all heard in delivery rooms urging mothers to vacate the premises so the bedsheets can be replaced and the next expecting mother on the assembly line can be wheeled in.

The cow in this story has no such compulsion. There's no heartless nurse demanding her to push! So, the cow is merrily allowing nature to take its course while it grazes. It could take hours for that calf to finally drop to the ground, perhaps even twisting its neck from the fall. And that would be fine.

Ironically, I picked up Sedaris' book (wherein I read this essay) at Costco, that most capitalistic of all ventures, i.e. making money on volume sales. Because we have no qualms about over-consumption or wastage, as long as it can be couched in some sort of fake justification about saving money even as we actually spend more and more.

Rant end.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Milwaukee Appliance Hand Truck

Image
Milwaukee Appliance Hand Truck, leaning against my shed Also known as a cart or a dolly. The model is HDA700. I paid around $120 for it. Here's a list of the features. Wrought iron frame 800 pound load capacity 6 inch non-marking wheels (solid, non-inflatable, never go flat) Stair climbers to help move loads up and down stairs and curbs Padding to prevent the cart from damaging the appliance (this is the white strip in the picture above) Belt or strap that goes around the appliance to secure it to the cart and keep it in place Manual ratchet belt tightener, the buckle-like part at one end of the belt (more on this below) Belt tightener handle (this is the red handle in the picture above) to add more tension to the belt once the manual ratchet has been used to the tighten the belt  I recently used this hand truck to move a big ass 320 pound refrigerator out of my garage (where it was delivered) and up a couple of steps to the deck, up one more step through the doubl
Read more

My Experiments with the PICAXE 08M2+

Image
PICAXE 08M2+ I generally prefer to do things the hard way. For example, you can either microwave a frozen dinner or cook from scratch. The microwave option is a good backup plan, but cooking from scratch has far too many advantages, as I outlined in a recent blog post on the do-it-yourself way of life. In the electronics and robotics world, the analogy of cooking from scratch is to build circuits using a bare bones micro-controller chip (e.g. the PICAXE ) rather than a fancy board (e.g. the Arduino ). Therefore, once I get a circuit working with the packaged Arduino approach (e.g. this robot I built recently), I usually try to replicate the circuit using more basic components like the PICAXE. My decision to consider the PICAXE was influenced by Charles Platt's coverage of it in his awesome book Make: Electronics . But essentially, I am a minimalist and I want to see how much I can get done with a bare bones chip rather than a bulky board-based micro-controller like the Ar
Read more

Utility trailer buying guide

Image
Introduction I recently bought a utility trailer . (I'll explain momentarily what that is and why you might consider buying one.) Going through the process (research, preparation, purchase, registration, setup and maintenance) has taught me that it's not a simple endeavor and very little good documentation exists in the public domain (e.g. on the Internet). Hence, this post. Research In dictionary terms, of course, "to trail" means "to follow" (or to trace the path of a primary vehicle). Alternately, Wikipedia defines a trailer as an unpowered vehicle pulled by a powered vehicle. So, let's get acquainted with what a utility trailer is and why you might consider buying one. If you're a hardworking, blue collar American you probably already have one -- it's the back half of your pickup truck . Well not quite, but that's the reason Australians refer to a pickup as a utility vehicle. A pickup is characterized by the presence of a flat
Read more