Years ago, right after high school graduation, my friend Ryan, with whom I had drinks a few weeks ago, during which he said he doesn’t remember saying this to me, told me he could never see me as a mom.
He looked me dead in the eye, serious as a heart attack, over pie at Baker’s Square, and said, “No, I can’t see you as a mom.”
And, well, I agreed.
In the defense of both the high school versions of ourselves, we were 18, and the only thing we were sure of was that he was going to University of Illinois in the Fall, and I was going to Bradley, and the world was wondrous, vast and filled with infinite possibilities, and for two kids from Joliet, “parenthood” didn’t compute. And why should it have? I mean, I get that some women and men are born with that gene, but I am not one of those people. I didn’t really play pretend family or with dolls, and my Barbies were never tied down. Even when they married Ken, his feelings were only an afterthought at best.
Me, me, me.
Until I met my husband, that is.
I’ve said before that when I met Scott, I just knew. From the roots of my hair to the tips of my toes, I just knew. About everything. And so I hold my tongue often. I let him have the last bite. I make sure he has peanut butter (Jif, creamy, reduced fat) in the house at all times. And this isn’t to say he doesn’t do ten times over for me, because good Lord he does, just that happily doing something for someone else is a new feeling for a self-absorbed, petulant, ego-maniac like me. For as bat shit crazy as we drive each other, we love each other just as intensely, and neither of us could do a damn thing without the other.
We readily admit that in meeting each other, we met our best half.
Two months ago, we thought it would be a good idea to start trying to bring another member into our tight-knit crew.
Though I’d like to think we’re always trying – something, anything, everything – this particular trying is done within the context of creating a human being. After a certain age, a couple need only get the word “try” out of their mouths and people are hoping and wishing and assuming you’re going after a baby. It’s all very public and involved for an act that includes me, my husband, our bed and a locked door.
We even kick the dog out. I mean, we are people who have anthropomorphized our dog to such an extent that we leave the television on for her all day. The dog walker says she has walked into the apartment to find Glin on the couch watching TV, mid-day, so I feel confident in our decisions to ask Glin to leave the room when we’re having sex.
Anyway, you have to sate your loved ones with something, though it cracks me up just the same. At this point I’m sure our entire family knows we’re off the pill, and not using any substitution players. As far as I’m concerned, that’s as intimate as they all need to be with the inner workings of my biology. After all, turning off the safety on the loaded, ahem, gun, gives them all ample warning that, if all goes according to God’s plan, eventually there will be progeny.
I’m totally fine with the Internet knowing about my bedroom business, obviously.
Which, of course, is another funny bit about the whole pregnancy deal. It’s the only time people will talk in painful detail about sex in general – positions, timing, tricks – and not get all puritanical about it. But it’s hard for folks, I think, to shut off the switch to their sexuality and then turn it back on after all those years, simply because the sex you’re engaging in now has A Greater Purpose. All that fun sex was just icky and for nothing.
We are not approaching this with any particular structure or strategy as of yet, though I have been keeping track of my cycle this past year. While we’re not obsessive, we also are not stupid. I’m 33, he’s 34. Plenty of people – people we know, in fact – produce plenty of babies without such tactics, but we decided that the more we know the better. And thanks to the wonders of technology, we know exactly when we should be having sex, for how many days, optimum positions and, if we so choose, which month we should pay attention to all of those things if we want to have our kid born at a certain time.
Luckily for us, we’re settled in throwing (most) caution to the wind and having a baby now. As it turns out, this is the perfect time to get pregnant if you want a Spring baby, which I do, because it means that if I’m on going to be on maternity leave for three months, I’ll be able to leave the house without the aid of a snowblower and a Saint Bernard. Sue me, but I’d like to make it so I can go outside and get some fresh air after being couped up with a baby for hours on end. Still, tell me that all isn’t the pinnacle of hubris?
Of course the best laid plans being what they are we have yet to get pregnant. Make no mistake, it’s really only been in the last month that we’ve calculated the whole process with any effort. As it turns out, travel can screw up when you ovulate entirely, which would explain why my period is a week early this month. For all of you who were jealous of our big Mediterranean summer vacation? Clearly it had a drawback. I’m not worried or panicked, really, I’m not, it’s too soon, but…
Yeah. I was a little sad yesterday. Disappointed, maybe. All that sex for nothing.
So we’re trying, and I’ll probably start taking my temperature shortly, simply because my cycle is really out of whack and while I know you can’t really control it, dammit, I want a maternity leave that includes nice weather.
Kidding. Kind of.
I don’t know exactly how much I’m going to be talking about all of this, if only because there isn’t much to say, and like I said, I was never much to give altogether too much thought to being a Mom in the same way I’ve thought about other things. All I know is that everything about this man I am married to makes me certain that I want a family with him. That’s all it is for now.
Wish us luck.
