My Biological Clock is Unplugged

Wow, I had a full inbox of emails today! Thanks for all the support, everyone. I feel so loved.

Big news, everyone. My sister is pregnant with her second child. Yep, I get to be an aunt again! Needless to say, the whole family is elated. Especially my mom...she's really groovin' on this grandmother thing.

My sister and I are polar opposites on a lot of things. She's married with a house in the suburbs, conservative, dog owner, country music fan, and drives a brand new minvan. I'm single and live in a dinky one bedroom apartment near the university. I'm far from conservative. I have a cat. My musical tastes range from classical to industrial, but nowhere does George Strait fit into the equation. I've been driving the same car for almost ten years. The only things holding it together are bungee cords, rust, and a stubborn sense of determination. We may be from the same parents, but my sister and I are definitely both individuals in own our beliefs.

Nothing drove that point home more than a trip to Chicago we took together about six years ago, back when the car was still reasonably shiny. After a brief battle over what radio station to listen to while we were passing through Indianapolis (we compromised on a classic rock station playing the Eagles), we got around to the time-honored subject of "What Do You Want to Do with Your Life?"

"You're gonna think I'm crazy," she began. "But all I've ever wanted to be was a good mother."

"But what about a career?" I asked.

She thought about it for a second. "Well, I guess I'll have a career. But it'll have to be one where I can take time off for my kids."

"What about travel? Stuff like that?"

"Naah, that's not ever been all that important to me. I just want to be a mom."

Now, I'm not knocking her choice. My sister is a wonderful mother, and she and her husband were blessed with a beautiful daughter. I love her to death. As the aunt, it's my job to be the playmate. I'm the first one on the floor with her working jigsaw puzzles or offering to read a book. She even suckered me into doing the Hokey Pokey with her three times in a row one night. That kid got the cute genes, and she knows how to work 'em already.

And I do love kids, really. I just don't want any of my own.

I've known this for a while now. I remember the first time I dropped this little bombshell on my mother. We'd been arguing about something - my grades, my messy bedroom, take your pick - and we'd reaching the screaming and crying part of the fight. My mother laid the ultimate guilt trip line on me.

"You'll never understand how I feel until you have children of your own!"

"Oh yeah?" I shouted back. "Well, I guess I'll never understand then, because I'M NEVER HAVING KIDS!!!"

I think I was eleven at the time.

My opinion hasn't changed over time. Children are great, as long as they're not mine. I'll play Hide and Seek and Candyland, I'll change stinky diapers, I'll read the same books to them over and over again if that's what they want, but at the end of the day, those kids will be going home with their parents and I'll be going home to watch TV alone. Call it selfishness, I guess. I like the fact that I can go out at night, change my plans at the drop of a hat, even leave for an impromptu vacation, and the only living breathing creature I have to take into consideration is my cat. No babysitters. No two o'clock feedings. Food bowl full? Check. Water dish? Check. Litter box reasonably clean? Check. Bye, kitty. No wild parties while I'm gone. (He's not happy when I'm gone, but he's pretty self-sufficient.)

Actually, the best part of my sister being pregnant is that it takes the heat off me for another year or so. My grandmother, a product of her generation, is convinced that my life is not fulfilling because I'm not married and haven't started procreating. Every holiday dinner ends up the same way:

"So when are you getting married?"

Gaaaaaah.

I don't blame her. She wouldn't understand my lifestyle any more than I would understand hers. I can't explain to her that I have my friends and my writing and my cat and my job and tickets to a concert this weekend, so finding Mr. Right and getting hitched ASAP is not Priority #1. It would be nice, but my sun will rise and set without a Bridal Registry. And repopulating the family is right out. That's my sister's job.

But I still hope I get to go to the birth again, and hold the new baby, and take a million pictures. I want to be there when he or she cracks that first smile, takes those first steps, says that first word. And then I want to go out, get a beer, and drive everyone I know in the bar crazy with the new pictures and goofy stories.

Besides, there's only room for one child in my life - me. I need to learn to take care of myself before I can think about taking on another one.