Hi everyone,
It's been a long time since I last wrote, so let me start with an apology. I'm sorry.
As you know, I found myself unemployed when the university I was working for decided to close its campus in my city and I became a stay-at-home Dad. End result: I decided to finish of a Masters of Environmental Management degree that I started the last time I was in this situation at the start of 2010. In short, I've been spending every available moment either taking care of Evan, working two days a week at the local Tafe, or chained to my desk in my home office completing my latest distance university degree. As a result, after spending so much time sitting down and writing, my blog was forced to take a back seat as in what little spare time I did have, I was busting to get out of the office and away from the computer. And for this, I apologise.
However, while I was spending my 20+ hours per week studying up about Environmental Management, something did strike me as being particularly pertinent to parenting. Whilst studying about the evolution of the environmental movement, I learned about the rise of trading schemes in the 1980's across Europe and the U.S. This was to do with trading carbon and other pollutants. Essentially, carbon trading schemes and others were developed as a response to the realisation that people tend to only really care about things that affect their hip pockets. At its heart, the concept of a carbon trading scheme is an attempt to economically rationalise a commodity that previously had no value.
Market-based environmentalism can be directly linked to parenting. Prior to having a child, sleep was a given: you could expect that you could go to sleep whenever you wanted, sleep the whole way through, and wake up only when you needed to. Most nights, for a newly married pre-child couple, this would also lead to 'special cuddles'. It was a given. However, once the child arrives it quickly becomes apparent that this is no longer the case. Sleep, and other assorted benefits, very quickly find themselves to be tradeable commodities. For example, you and your partner will find yourselves making deals such as 'If you let me sleep tonight, I'll let you sleep the whole weekend'. And as for 'special cuddles', well that becomes tradeable too. If you haven't already had this conversation, here's a sneak peak: 'If we can just sleep tonight then I'll X your Y with my Z next Wednesday', or 'Alright, but you have to do all the work and we go to sleep right after'. And don't kid yourselves Dads-to-be, you'll be saying this too. Am I right Dads?
The heart of the matter is that sleep becomes the most precious commodity in the household. It isn't always a child which can cause this shift in household economies. A significant change of lifestyle can do the same thing. For us, it was living and working in South Korea. Despite negotiating prior to signing an employment contract, and it being included in said contract, we were put onto split shifts. We were teaching English, and taught from 6am til 10am and then again from 5pm til 9pm. Not only was the energy level required for 8 face-to-face teaching hours in one day huge, the paperwork and marking was also proportionately higher. Also, depending on the time of day it could take up to an hour to get to and from work. The split shifts meant that this energy output had to be maintained relying only on naps between these shifts. As a result, sleep became a very, very precious commodity in our household and thus the household economy suffered a major shift, with stress and conflict suddenly arising from something that had previously not even been on the radar.
So what is the answer to this conundrum? This humble blogger doesn't have the answer. A tradeable carbon market was proposed in Australia by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and it cost not only him his job, but his entire party the leadership. And this was thirty years after they first appeared in Europe meaning that we had plenty of history to learn from with regard to making sure we did it right.
What I do know is that now when my wife tells me 'You were wonderful last night honey', she's actually thanking me for getting up through the night with the baby and then letting her sleep in in the morning!
Cheers,
Ben
