St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Copyright 2005 St. Louis Post-Dispatch

 

Being cool, relatively speaking
By Jeff Daniel
Of the Post-Dispatch
Wednesday, Aug. 31 2005

Trevor Richards once knelt down to greet his young niece at a formal event - to
which she responded by launching herself onto his back for a piggy-back ride.

"We're in the middle of this formal occasion, and my brother-in-law shoots me
this look of 'Trevor, you ought to know better!'" Richards, of University City,
remembers with a laugh. "But I hadn't planned it. I was just trying to get her
feet back on the ground."

Who can blame the kid for trying? Richards, after all, is a cool uncle - in the
formal sense. Joined by the cool aunts, these are the child-free adults who
often play a unique role in the lives of their siblings' kids. It's a role that
gets a full examination and a chapter of its own in Jennifer L. Shawne's new
book, "Baby not On Board: A Celebration of Life Without Kids."

Filled with humorous anecdotes, lists, quizzes and illustrations, "Baby
not On Board" is, for the most part, a witty affirmation of life in
a child-free-by-choice zone, that place where couples can maintain their
bodies, sanity, free time - and nice furniture.

But as such couples with siblings usually come to discover, kids don't exactly
disappear from the face of the Earth: They take the form of nephews and nieces.
And that, explains Shawne, can often lead to child-free adults taking on the
cool aunt and cool uncle role.

"The stereotype is that people who choose not to have kids are child haters,
and that's totally not the case," Shawne said during a recent phone
conversation from her San Francisco home. "In fact, the cool aunt and cool
uncle thing stems from the fact that I actually really like kids. Plus, you get
to play an important role, which is to bring and show new perspectives.

"Just the fact that your family doesn't look like their family, that's usually
something new in itself."

Shawne, for her part, appears to play the part to the hilt. She and her husband
send the nieces and nephews Arbor Day gifts rather than Christmas gifts - "It's
about planting trees, not cutting them down," she says - and she's always up
for showing off her nose ring, when requested. But being the cool aunt goes
well beyond the superficial.

"I hope that we will be adults - adults that aren't parents - they can come to
whenever there are questions that they need answered," she says. "The kind of
advice you can give a niece or nephew is different than the advice you might
give to your son or daughter."

Or if not giving advice, then perhaps attention. Richards and his wife, Anne
Myers-Richards, get together with family on most Friday evenings, and it is at
these gatherings that the couple get the opportunity to become something
special.

"By the end of the week, the parents are pretty well exhausted, as you might
expect" Richards says. "So, we're usually the adults most interested in playing
with the children or who still have the energy to do so."

Seeing the kids is a change of pace, he says, an exception to the rule. The
freshness lends itself to fun. Myers-Richards mentions that her husband is
worthy of his nickname: the Human Jungle Gym.

"I definitely see Trevor as the cool uncle," she says.

"I'd like to categorize myself that way, and I'm definitely aware that that is
a choice on my part," Richards says. "I guess I could be the stern
disciplinarian if I wanted, but why?"

Although "Baby not On Board" focuses for the most part on couples,
the cool aunt and uncle label can also be attached to childless singles. Think
John Candy in the lead role in the 1989 film "Uncle Buck," or Ruth's New Age
artist sister on HBO's "Six Feet Under." On its Web site, the WB television
network describes the main character of its "Summerland" series as "the cool
aunt who would occasionally drop in on her nieces and nephews at their isolated
Kansas farm."

Bill Lee could be added to that group. But the lifelong bachelor, 55, isn't
sure if he's so much cool as he is "different." His goal, he explains, is to
broaden the perspective of his teenage niece and nephew.

"I try to bring something new to them, something more than just the ordinary,"
says the recently retired sheet metal worker from Affton.

A world traveler who has backpacked to the top of Venezuela's Angel Falls, Lee
passes his experiences on - all in the hope that his niece and nephew will
capture some of that adventurous spirit. He contrasts this with his own youth.

"There was this script for life back then," he recalls. "You graduate high
school, get married, get a job, have 2.7 kids. All of that. But I broke the
script. Maybe they think I'm weird at times, but I'm just trying to show them
other options in life."

Not to mention the occasional fun time. During a recent meal at a local I-Hop
restaurant, Lee overheard a couple of women discussing grandchildren. One
talked lovingly about her "pride and joy." Unable to resist, Lee walked over to
the nearby booth, took out his wallet, and showed the women a memento he always
carries: a card depicting a bottle of Pride laundry detergent and Joy
dishwashing liquid.

"They seemed a bit stunned," says Lee, talking about the reaction to the
time-worn gag. "But my nephew was dying, he just cracked up laughing."

A definite cool uncle move.

Suzi Schrappen of Kirkwood just may have the ultimate cool aunt move. The aunt
to 12 nieces and nephews, Schrappen provides each with an annual "name day." In
other words, if your name is Sarah, then Sarah Day means an overnight stay at
cool Aunt Suzi's. The next morning, the niece or nephew gets to choose the
itinerary.

"They get to do whatever they want," Schrappen explains. "They really do think
the whole thing through. One wanted to go biking on the Katy Trail. One wanted
to go to Forest Park. One niece had never been up in the Arch. We try to do
things that they might not have had a chance to do before."

Richards and Myers-Richards echo that credo. They might try to get the nephews
and nieces to a film they've missed, or maybe take them to paint their own
pottery.

"Because Ann and I don't have kids and probably aren't going to, we're passing
along things that we could have passed along to our own children," Richards
says, specifically mentioning the couple's interest in arts and crafts.

As for Lee, he tries to spend as much time as possible with favorite kin,
regularly making his way to their home base Kansas City or welcoming them here
in St. Louis. He may not have kids of his own, but his is hardly a kid-less
existence.

"I want to be in their lives," Lee says. "When I'm the 80-year-old guy in the
nursing home, drooling, I want them to remember who I am."

Baby not On Board: A Celebration of Life Without Kids
by Jennifer L. Shawne
Chronicle Books, $14.95

Reporter Jeff Daniel
E-mail: jdaniel@post-dispatch.com
Phone: 314-340-8399

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