When I was young, my family played a lot of board games. I enjoyed board games very much, so one night when we decided to play a new one, Scruples, I thought it'd be enjoyable, too. Essentially, you are asked ethical dilemma questions and had to provide your answer to them. I got one question about what would I do if after a divorce my teenage daughter said that she didn't want me dating a new beau. I said that'd I'd tell my daughter tough! If I was ready to start dating again, then it was time to start again. My aunt, sister, and mother looked at me in horror as if I couldn't possibly be that callous. I didn't think I had said anything wrong and was confused why they all thought I should have answered differently. This was the first time it became clear to me that perhaps mothering was not something in my future.
Don't worry, Kid. You and I'd probably get along just fine. It's my own species that confounds me.
Upon further reflection, the not interested in baby-makin' mindset has always been there. As a child in church, I would get incredibly impatient with babies crying or children who misbehaved or parents who wouldn't just take those out of line children out of the church. They eventually put in cry rooms mind you. I thought that addition was long overdue. Keep in mind that during this time, I was not yet out of elementary school. In fact, I was not any older than third grade. I simply couldn't stand how disruptive the cranky kids were to the whole service. I'm sure I had my moments of disrupting services when I was a baby or toddler, but I have no recollection of this.
This Crybaby? Probably safe from my disdain.
As I grew older, I became eligible for the pre-teen rite o f passage known as babysitting. I prefer to call it torture for money. I had some truly wonderful babysitters along the way including a young man who regrettably was peed on by my beagle, but I digress. He clearly was made for the job whereas I was not. I babysat 4 boys once. Omigod. I vowed never to babysit more than two after that. The boys were not all that bad at first, but then they became mischievous and decided to concoct a "potion" in the bathroom and they locked me out. I tried the butterknife in the lock trick that usually worked at my house to no avail. These young evil-doers then proceeded to put the potion on one of them thereby creating a most horrendous allergic rash. When the boy began to cry because his skin was breaking out in hives, they finally opened the door. I called his parents and asked about administering a Benadryl. They came home shortly thereafter, got the full scoop from me, admonished the boys, and sent me away with a little extra pay. That was nice, but I never babysat for them again.
Baby Groot is probably also safe. He's in a pot for cryin' out loud . Besides he's adorable and we could get our dance groove on.
There was another babysitting event where the youngest of the household snuck out his second story bedroom window to go skateboarding after 10pm. His sister was a wonderful kid who stayed in her bed and went to sleep, but not this punk. When I went to check on him and discovered him gone, I panicked. I looked high and low and when he finally came home, I told him that I'd be informing his parents of his shenanigans (he begged me not to and as I later found out, this wasn't the first time he'd done this. Perhaps a warning next time would be helpful.) I also made him sleep on the sofa while I watched TV so I could keep an eye on him. Babysitting and I were never to become friends. In fact, I turned to delivering newspapers at 445am instead. Alone, peaceful, early morning calm *sigh*
Not your mom, Stewie. Definitely staying far away. I think I babysat you once and that was plenty.
Later in my adolescence, I sat in my Senior Sampler (prep for life) class as we were discussing adult life and what it would take to build a relationship with a spouse and run a household etc. One of the inevitable questions was how many kids would you have. I felt annoyed and more than a little apprehensive at this. One of my friends wanted as many as God would grant her and another friend said she'd want a dozen. Their answers both mystified and horrified me. I thought why do I have to have any? Of course, peer pressure struck over this question and boom! I wrote down two. There were two in my family and that seemed reasonable. Who knows, maybe one day I'd feel like procreating.
Yeah, I didn't buy that one either, Jimmy.
I share these tales because over the last weekend my husband and I went camping. Camping always means a lot of families with children running amok in the campground. Thankfully, not a lot of loud criers and most kept their distance. I saw one young kid in Spiderman jammies and snickered. I saw another one in a brown and orange plaid shirt with bright green shorts and cowboy boots and remembered the camping rule that thou shall not judge fashion choices when camping. I snorted when I saw him causally strolling to the outhouse. Then there was a family with four children two of whom were playing with lightsabers; clearly their parents are doing parenting right. My husband took some items to the recycling bin and saw the dad of this family digging in the back of their car, the mom was digging in the under storage area of the trailer, and the kids were all running around, yelling at each other and shaking their lightsabers. My husband returned to tell this observation and said, "Here's to not having any," and he handed me a beer.
That's right, Buffy. Beer good.
On the web you can find all kinds of articles in defense of childless marriages. You can find articles that celebrate, articles that explain, articles that ridicule, and articles that dispell myths about opting out of reproduction. Some even speak to how we have a moral obligation to stop procreating for a while. I tend to agree with that assessment. My article is not really any of those, except maybe explaining my own journey toward not being a mom. However, in those dispelling ones they inevitably bring up how childless women don't hate children. Well, I don't hate them (C'mon, be real. "Hate" is fairly harsh phrasing), but I'm not overly fond of them either. Children at a distance work for me. While I love our niece and nephews, I just didn't get them at first. I am not one to do a lot of playing around or wanting to hold the baby when someone offers. Mostly, I was/am stiff and awkward about it. I guess I'm a little ambivalent or even indifferent to children in general. I do play board games with our niece and nephews, I have watched hours of the same movies with them, I have played keep away in the yard, and I have gone swimming in their above ground pool and enjoyed all of it, but why anyone feels the need to have their own mini-me's still baffles me.
Oh don't try that, Jon. You caved in to the baby-makin' machine, too.
While a lot of the information in those other articles about how you shouldn't tell a woman who doesn't have children things like "Who'll take care of you when you're older" or "You'll change your mind some day" etc. are absolutely true, it's also true that not all of us childless ones want to spend a lot of time with kids and we don't all want to hold, play with, or try to have a conversation with you while your kid runs around doing those things that kids do. Some of us just don't get kids and never have--even when we were one.
It's ok, Baby Moose. We're cool, too...from a distance. Your parents prefer it that way.
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