Weird Things Our Mothers Teach Us

A post on abstinence-only education and the, frankly, baffling belief that waiting until marriage means that sex is the reason to get married dredged up this memory for me.

I was a teenager-- high school, anywhere between 14 and 19, old enough to be perturbed but young enough to be driven around by my mother. I don't know how we reached the topic, but I suggested that cohabiting before marriage was a good idea because how else will you know if you're compatible? Like, what if you're neat and they're a slob? That's totally grounds for divorce! Clearly the solution is to find these things out beforehand.

My mother disagreed, and told me "why would you buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?" Meaning, why would a man buy a cow. A woman would buy the cow, because women think differently from men.

I'll never forget that moment, because it shot straight from my ears to my gut and coiled low in my belly like molten lead.

1) I was a cow.
2) Men only want me because of sex.
3) If I am to marry, I must entrap a man with the power of my pussy.
4) If they can get the sex without being coerced into marriage, they will never marry me.

Ergo, men are scum.

But I didn't want to believe it. I don't remember precisely what I said, but I was definitely thinking, "...because you should enjoy the milking and want to make sure no one else buys it? Because you like the cow and want to spend time with it? WHY AM I A COW!?"

She gave me a sad look when I protested that marriage was for love and for purposes other than sex and cohabitation. "That's the way it is."

I know she was trying to sell me on waiting until marriage, but all she was really saying is "men are bad." They only want you for sex and living with and nothing else. There is no benefit to marriage other than these two things, to men.

Men are incapable of love. QED.

I couldn't buy it. That half the world was populated by these homuncoli who couldn't feel the most human of emotions. Men, my mother essentially told me, are not fully functional people. But rather than feeling trapped in a loveless marriage, I reasoned then I can never marry. To hell with men! If I am nothing more than a sex-dispensing machine, then I don't need a man. If someone can't marry me as a person, then they are not someone I-- or anyone-- should be marrying. Maybe I'll have sex with him, but I won't marry him. I can't. Because marriage is what people do when they love each other.

"But what about dad? Is he like that?" I asked, floundering, because my dad is a pretty cool guy and I don't think he'd be like that. Surely he's capable of love, right?

I don't know if I realized how hard-hitting the question was at the time. Either my mom had to continue with the ruse and say that, yes, even my father was a terrible human being, or admit that what she was saying wasn't true. I remember she spluttered, but not what she said after. The fact that I felt no vindication afterwards tells me she was committed to this bizarre cow analogy. All I felt was a sense of betrayal. Even my father. All men.

So it was a relief that I never felt any urges to hook up with men. I could just avoid them altogether and go about my life without having to engage this conflict. But what always confused me about this story is that mom didn't tell me this to say "never marry a man. Seriously, they're gross" but "wait until marriage." What? I don't want anything to do with a dude that thinks like that! How can you tell me to marry some guy who only wants me for sex!? Don't you want better for your daughter!? Seriously. Your kids deserve better.

Growing up I don't believe it, because men are people with all sorts of opinions and they're not a monolith. It still stuck with me, though, like that nagging voice in the back of my head. "You're just a cow, and he's gonna use you."

In retrospect, it makes me wonder: who is this cow roaming around that you can milk? Who owns her? Why do they let you milk their cow for free? Why wouldn't you want to buy the cow and feed it grass so you can sell the milk as organic at a huge mark-up? Also wouldn't the cow already have a kid if she's producing milk, rendering the whole "wait until marriage" thing moot anyway? Who wants to marry a cow?

WHY AM I A COW.