Thoughts On The Infant Invasion

2011 is the year I buy onesies in bulk. The year of diaper cakes. The year I finally get to feel up all of my friends bellies. The year I try not to freak out over the baby invasion upon my shores.

This is not the first time that the infant army has crawled towards me but the procreation waves that crested when I was a young adult never felt threatening. Many of my acquaintances did me the favor of having kids really early so that I in no way had to question my life choices. I was perfectly comfortable with my decision not to have children in my early 20s so that I could focus on the really important things like watching The Gilmore Girls and developing a finely honed appreciation for cheeses. I knew that there was plenty of time for babies. But this new onslaught of birthing hangs like that picture of Uncle Sam pointing menacingly at me promising that I too must now go to war.

Last month I turned 33 cementing the fact that if I ever become a mother it will be at a later age than when my own mother birthed her first child (me). “Mom was 32 when she had me.” was always my internal mantra -- translation: “No need to worry! You’re not old yet! The eggs are fine!!!!” I’m officially past due on my #1 excuse for being fancy free and childless..... now what?

The problem is that when you’re 23 and thinking about having a baby you have no idea what you’re doing. You think babies are cute and obviously you’ll love it and everything will be awesome. At 33 you’re almost too well informed to ever consider actually having a child. Occasionally it will not be cute. You will not always love it. Everything will not be awesome. When you’re a knocked up 16 year old and MTV is at your door with a herd of video cameras everyone knows that this baby is going to ruin you life. When you’re 33 and staring at the cute designer jeans that you’ll never fit into ever again you have to absorb the knowledge that this baby is going to ruin your life all by yourself

The project manager in me is obviously freaking out. After all, I’m late! Worse than that If I don’t have a baby in the next say.... 3 years? NO BABIES FOR ME. What biology doesn’t understand is that I need more time. More time to sleep until 10am. More time to enjoy my (by no means perfect but still totally nice and mostly flat) stomach. And someone else I know? Someone with half the ingredients needed for baby making tucked away somewhere in his corpus? That dude needs a lot more time.

I can’t blame G for putting things off. I know exactly how trying to get pregnant is going to go. That is going to be an awesome time for my baby daddy. “Better get it up and do your job or I will take you off this project!” (ROMANCE!!!!!) Secondly, God is for sure going to fuck with me. He’ll be all “Oh-ho-ho! Look who wants a baby inside her NOW. Why it’s Lil Miss ‘Please God do not let me get pregnant!’ Oh how the tides have turned!” And so then it’ll be at least 3 exhausting months of freaking out and reversing all of those prayers and spiritually eating my words.

It does not help that everyone makes babies sound like demon spawn. In addition to obvious crap that sucks like never sleeping and touching someone else’s poop apparently moms can also look forward to boobs that hurt so much that you cry for hours, weeks of depression caused by hormones up and leaving you without warning and never ever looking hot ever again because your whole body is stretched out and ugly. It’s hard to look at that list and think “sign me up!”

I’ve always taken warnings at face value. “Drugs are bad.” So I didn’t do drugs. “Sex will ruin your life.” So I was a virgin until 24. “Babies are hard.” So here I am. I’m sure all of the parents out there and the entire Christian Right is thrilled to see me lumping children in with drugs and sex but you have to admit that I have a point -- all three seem to offer unconditional love but often they just make you their slave.

So do I want a baby? Too many people never really ask themselves that question. Thanks to biology or society or poetry we just assume that love->marriage->baby in a baby carriage. When love can just as easily point to trips around the world or a shared appreciation for bourbon or leisurely weekend mornings sans a soundtrack of Dora the Explorer. I suppose after these paragraphs of whining it seems like I must want (or at least deserve) to be childless, but truthfully I have always loved children. I don’t get bored talking about the milestones of month 4. I sometimes watch Sesame Street all by myself. I’ve always clicked with kids, always wanted at least one of my own someday. But the idea that “someday” is almost here has me suddenly indecisive. So I weigh the options, consider the risks, hem, haw, but it never feels like I come any closer to confidence. Even the most well researched act of procreation will still require a leap of faith. Can someone give me a push?

My Biological Clock has Cold Feet

Despite my acute fear of getting knocked up I have always loved kids and though I was never one of those girls who listed "Mom" as my life's ambition (in fact I spent a good year mocking my brother because his pat 5 year old answer to "what do you want to be when you grow up?" was "A dad!" which, while cute was also ripe for 8 year old sister ridicule.) I did always think that I eventually wanted to reproduce if only because taking myself out of the gene pool could be considered an unfair attack on the future of the human race. You gotta respect the need of Darwinian evolution but as the expiration date on my ovaries looms I find myself more and more interested in selfishly spending all of what might have been diaper money on lavish vacations and booze (Ok, fine, we're not expiring over here. I'm 30, I know I have time but at most I have what? 7 years? 8? Honestly I think I need at least 10 just to mentally prepare for routinely having to get up before 8am on a Saturday).

Throughout high school and college I had reoccurring paranoid dreams about finding out I was 6 months pregnant the dreams appropriately ended with some serious freaking out and/or crying an/or getting grounded. My faith in birth control must have increased over the past few years because my dreams have ceased to resemble a surreal after school special despite a welcome upturn in activity likely to invite babies to my womb. But Monday night, deep in REM, my subconscious dreamed up a new version on the surprise bundle of horror craziness. In the dream I was happily going about my life when I suddenly remembered "Oh shit! I told Kajal I'd have twin babies for her and now I'm 4 months preggers!" Dream Brianna was deservedly annoyed with her expanding belly but in a striking bout of optimism decided that "at least I can go off birth control, it's probably bad for the babies anyway." Sadly, in the world of nightmares it turns out the you can get EXTRA PREGNANT and I quickly found out that in addition to Kajal's 6 month old twin fetuses my body was also home to a 3 month old fetus of my very own meaning I would be pregnant for an extra 3 months AND have to be a mom. Total bummer.

I never went through the all too common liberal college student "maybe I won't procreate at all!" stage. When friends would cringe at the possibility of crying and diapering and overpopulation I would counter with adorable baby shoes and reminders that babies grow up to be kids who will totally do chores for much less than minimum wage. I have always been the first person to volunteer for babysitting gigs or hanging out at the kids table and even today I can't help but dote on my niece to the point where my boyfriend occasionally feels a certain amount of present neglect come birthday season (things might improve if he'd just warm up to the concept of frilly dresses...). My deep desire to (someday) have kids has often made me super stressed out about my proverbially single status. I once even had a long phone conversation with my mother about how I would probably have to adopt a baby on my own since my poor sad pathetic whiny ass would never ever ever find a boy to lover her. I was 24 so you can understand my concern (I believe this was the same year that my EIGHTEEN YEAR OLD cousin commented that she thought it was sad that I would never have kids. You know, because I was a dried up old hag).

These days I know a lot of new mommies all of whom, unlike the mommies I knew in high school, are having bundles of joy under socially acceptable circumstances and their babies are cute and not on food stamps and very rarely annoying. My baby love has not waned and I love spending an hour or so eating their bellies and making monster faces until they giggle, but, unlike all of the babies I've thought about in my years of paranoia and day dreaming... these babies are REAL. Watching close friends of mine go through pregnancy and birth and motherhood has made the idea of babies suddenly very daunting. There came a point 7 months or so into one friend's pregnancy when I suddenly realized "Oh! She's going to have a baby! And it's going to be around all of the time. FUCK." This is when the new and improved freaking out started.

It's not that I no longer peer into my future and smile at the idea of a little blond haired terror of my own, it's that the future is coming at me at warp speed. The irony of waiting for babies until you're financially and emotionally ready is that when one really starts to think seriously about the reality of babies it becomes clear that no one in their right mind is EVER ready for this insanity. I'm convinced that almost all babies are born out of ignorance or denial. As far as I can tell the "Where to babies come from?" monologue should be edited so that it reflects reality:

When two people love each other very much and they pray really hard they slowly lose their minds and then they decide to go off of birth control and bring a child into the world. This child will make them stay home every night and spend all of their money on tiny spit up rags and environmentally conscious diapers and breast pumps and these two people will never again have a good excuse to spend $150 on one sushi dinner.

If Only I Had a Hope Chest to Bust Open*

Apparently my friends Amy and Joe own china. I have not noticed this because although I eat dinner at their house at least twice a month I am lucky if they so much as provide me with a spork. I am also lucky if I do not physically have to cook the meal myself but I can’t really complain about this since cooking meals for other people and basking in the “you’re such a talented chef!” accolades is what nearly 20% of my self esteem is based on (25% my job, 10% feeling superior to former high school classmates, 15% cute outfits, 20% people commenting on my blog, 10% boys smiling at me on the subway). Despite my paper plate meals I never should have questioned the thoroughness of Amy and Joe’s wedding registry, of course they have china! Married couples are required to own china because it is very likely that once you achieve matrimonial status you will be asked to host a state dinner. Many couples leave the chapel only to find that the president himself will be escorting them from the ceremony to the reception and he demands a nice plate.

I am single and therefore have never experienced the joy of forcing all of my friends to purchase overpriced kitchenware however I am constantly feeding people due not only to ego related needs but also because of an unrestrained mothering gene and the desire to eat really fattening food that I would never be able to justify were I supping alone. Sadly, my dishes are crap. All of my "silver"ware was purchased at a thrift store which I know sounds pretty sketchy but seriously it was $.10/piece and the frugal grandma who lives in my soul just could not resist. My collection of mismatched plates comes to us via Target the bowls are from Ikea and the large majority of my glassware was procured from an establishment in Tijuana Mexico that I will refer to as a market mostly because using a more accurate term may implicate me in a variety of cross border crimes.

Despite my inability to land a man I have still been forced to start referring to myself as an adult. This is unfortunate for a number of reasons (full price movie tickets, expectation that I purchase my own toilet paper, denied access to ball pits) but one of the most trying is that people will soon start expecting me to have things like matching towels and different glasses for red and white wine. Since I see no registry related opportunities on the horizon it seems possible that I may be forced to use up valuable space on my Christmas list for this kind of crap. Somehow I doubt that a 600 thread count sheet set will bring me much comfort when I’m jonesing for a round of Mario Kart. As a society can we establish some sort of “I ain’t getting married soon enough to meet the material qualifications of adult hood” buy out rule? I propose that under this rule everyone who is single at age 30 gets to register as if he or she were getting married and all of their friends and acquaintances have to buy them shit no questions asked. In return singles will forgo gifts should we ever decide to cross over to the world of joint tax returns.

I received $150 in Crate and Barrel gift cards for Christmas and since I don’t foresee my friends and family stepping up with a “Congratz on being single!” gift of plates I should probably use these to outfit my cupboards (and ultimately the top of my coffee table where all guests are forced to eat while sitting on the floor because I don’t really have any place to keep a dinning room table but that’s a whole different set of complaints) with adult-like plates. In an effort to be practical about my dish ware choices I have been trying to convince myself to purchase plain white plates and bowls but I haven’t yet done this because it smack of boredom. Much as I have a hard time purchasing a plain black sweater (New Yorker or not) when a bright pink version is available I feel completely broken by the idea of white plates. If I buy the boringest of dinner ware in the universe can a willingness to wear khakis be far behind? I have even tried to bribe myself with permission to purchase a fun set of salad/dessert plates to go with my boring white dishes but I’m still hesitantly poking around the Crate and Barrel website cursing the overpriced offerings and hoping that a more interesting plain white option might suddenly appear (and, ideally not cost $8000 which seems wholly unlikely given C&Bs inflated sense of self worth).

Here’s a related conundrum: Why do all dish ware sets come with mugs? I have no need for matching mugs. Do married people drink a lot more hot beverages? Is this preparation for the coffee drinking required by being a new parent?

* Does anyone else find the term "Hope Chest" decidedly hopeless? Why not just call it a "Good Luck Miss Ugly Pants Chest"?

A PSA for My Adult Readers

First I’d like to say, Congragulations on making it to adulthood! As you’ve probably already noticed it’s pretty sweet here, we get to stay out past our bedtime and drink booze and it has been at least 6 months since someone called me a doodyhead. But like all of our freedoms this paradise ain’t free (you don’t get your habeus corpus without a little waterboarding).

The following rules are not suggestions or nice to haves – the’re actually requirements for being the kind of person who isn’t classified as a huge douche, so pay attention.

1. Adults return people’s phone calls and emails
2. Adults say “Thanks you” when they receive a gift (preferably in writing)
3. Adults arrive on time for appointments regardless of how casual the commitment
4. Adults remember and acknowledge the birthdays of family and close friends

If you’re “bad at” some of the things on this list that’s ok – everyone has challenges in life but, as I said, these are not optional skills, this is your job. When you’re bad at your job you either get better or get fired. So you need to be working on getting it together and in the mean time you need to be apologizing profusely when you fail at any of these.

Tomorrow we’ll return to your regularly scheduled mildly humorous blog posting.