Superbowl XL
A few months ago, I talked about how I don’t really talk about myself much here on my personal blog, and how I should work on that and learn to open up more because that was the whole point of the blog. This post is me opening up. It might be gone tomorrow morning if I decide it’s too frank, too… exhibitionist, but for the moment, here it is.
There was a baby at tonight’s Superbowl party, a darling little three-month-old, and for a while I was playing with her and talking to her mother instead of watching the game. There were other women there as well, and in the middle of our conversation, one of them abruptly asked, “Do you ever feel like you want a baby?”
The question was addressed not to the childless married women but to me and the other single girl in the room. We both said we didn’t and changed the subject, but the question, it rankled. It left a nasty taste in my mouth that had nothing to do with metallic medicine. Because, really, what kind of question is that to ask somebody in a crowded room? What kind of question is that to ask at all? What’s up with your condescending commentary on my single status?
I know she didn’t really mean anything at all by it, but I wanted to kick her in the gut as hard as she’d verbally kicked me in mine. I’m not sighing over a baby. I don’t feel my biological clock speeding up. But even if I were, it’s not a topic I’d like discussed in public, and it’s none of your damn business.
Tonight was also the umpteenth time I was told I didn’t know what tired was since I didn’t any children to show me. I’ve heard this particular sentiment before, and the bald audacity of it never fails to shock me into speechlessness. I’ve never been kept up by a cranky baby, but I have been kept up by a cranky server. I don’t get the spa days, or the shopping sprees, or the long leisurely birthday lunches. And if I’ve just spent twelve hours holding hands with my colleagues, doing my job and helping them do theirs, surrounded by footage of people digging bodies out of a subway tunnel, how dare you tell me I shouldn’t be tired because I haven’t spent the day chasing after children. I should be tired, and I am tired, and also horrified and numbed and saddened.
I’m not saying being a parent is easy because it’s not in the least. But in the same way that I do not denigrate what you do, I’d like you to respect that I too am busy, that I too am fulfilled. Our experiences shouldn’t have to be alike to be considered equal.