The Isolation of the Suburban Child of Wealth
March 11, 2015
HERE is a thesis that I cannot prove at this time, but I believe to be true:
Never in history have children of comfort and wealth experienced more physical isolation as a rule than do American children who live in large suburban mansions. In previous times, those who lived in mansions had servants. Their houses were generally filled with activity and people at all times. American individualism and egalitarianism abhor the hierarchical arrangements involved in domestic servitude though they do condone nannies and babysitters, who generally replace others rather than adding to the number of people in the home at any one time. In much of European history, ordinary people, even farmers, favored clustered villages, not individual houses on large tracts. It’s an anomaly that is opposed to the social nature of children, a subject to which the feminist woman is entirely indifferent, believing as she does that she should further the isolation of children by not even being home.
I thought of it this after reading about the very sad case of a Pennsylvania 13-year-old who left his family’s mansion, surrounded by their 13 acres, on an evening last week and committed suicide on the border of the property. Was he alone at the time? Would he have done the same thing if he had passed others on his way out the door? Would an encounter with even one other person who knew him have broken the spell of his self-absorption?
Sandra writes:
In the 1960’s my mother, brother, sister, and I were forced to move into our grandmother’s home. We had lots of outdoors to roam around in and there was constant activity. We all took piano lessons and played in the band from 5th grade till graduation. Our house was full of noise but never to the point where it was a distraction. Bed-time was strictly enforced. We knew all the people who lived on our street and we would go in and out of their houses whenever we wanted company or needed to ask a question or to borrow something. If you wanted isolation you had to make an effort to find it. I’d walk to the near-by woods or climb a tree to sit there alone and to think and wonder. Isolation was the exception, not the rule.
That house is gone now and most of the people on that street have passed away. Life in that small town is still much the same. Once I left there for good it was a struggle for me to learn to be alone and to enjoy my own company. Those experiences and memories of life in that neighborhood have sustained me many times over the years.
I’m sorry for any child who doesn’t have an intact family with no knowledge of his/her extended family. Solitude will be a part of everyone’s life but pity the children who have nothing but.
Mrs. T. writes:
I can’t help but wonder if it is the same for children who are not alone on a daily basis but are surrounded by people who simply don’t care enough.
Case in point, my cousin is a career woman, married with two small children ages seven and six. From birth both of the children have been in someone else’s care for a majority of their lives, save six months when mom “tried” to stay at home with her children. Usually a sitter would stay in the house when the children were infants, but once the youngest reached the age of two they were put into a day care.
This was an extremely tough transition for the youngest child. Her mother would complain on social media that she wasn’t getting enough sleep because her daughter would stand at the foot of her bed every night and cry for four hours. Everyone was willing to give the standard advice of “she just needs to get used to it,” or “it’s harder on mom than it is on the kids”, etc. I gently suggested that the child probably just needed her mother, but was quickly shut down. After taking her to the pediatrician to find out what was “wrong,”she decided to let the child sleep on a mattress on the floor of mom’s room so they both could get some sleep. She was adamant that the child would NOT lay in bed with her.
I can’t properly explain how angry this made me….that a helpless toddler was expressing frustration in the only way she knew how and was rejected when she needed her mother most. She desperately needed the physical interaction she was denied during the day. Because in daycare, you’re just a number. Surrounded by activity, but without the one person who knows you so well, you are alone.