{"id":3846,"date":"2011-04-16T16:14:00","date_gmt":"2011-04-16T10:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indiauncut.com\/?p=3761"},"modified":"2011-04-16T16:14:00","modified_gmt":"2011-04-16T10:44:00","slug":"this-terrible-process","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indiauncut.com\/this-terrible-process\/","title":{"rendered":"This Terrible Process"},"content":{"rendered":"
In a lovely little profile of James Taylor<\/a> in the New Yorker<\/i>, he is quoted as saying, about his wife Kim:<\/p>\n If I went online and tried to find the perfect mate—and I think that that is probably an excellent use of the internet—I couldn’t have done it better. That’s such a smart way to do it, by the way. I think that a couples therapist and a computer geek should form a company and shepherd people through it. For so long, there’s been this terrible process where we find a mate through our worst instincts and our reiteration of all our family mistakes. We always become one parent and marry the other one.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n That sounds like a fabulous little insight to me, though I think that it is also true that some people do it the other way around, and find a mate who is nothing like their parents, so that they don’t end up like one of them. Who can say who is making the greater mistake?<\/p>\n * * * *<\/p>\n I am reminded of Philip Larkin’s great poem, “This be the Verse”, and even though it has appeared<\/a> on this blog before, I shall reproduce it again:<\/p>\n This be the Verse—Philip Larkin<\/b><\/p>\n They fuck you up, your mum and dad. But they were fucked up in their turn Man hands on misery to man. \n
\nThey may not mean to, but they do.
\nThey fill you with the faults they had
\nAnd add some extra, just for you.<\/p>\n
\nBy fools in old-style hats and coats,
\nWho half the time were soppy-stern
\nAnd half at one another’s throats.<\/p>\n
\nIt deepens like a coastal shelf.
\nGet out as early as you can,
\nAnd don’t have any kids yourself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"