Friendly Baby Boom

Today I received a Valentine's Email from a one-month old baby. My good friend Stanna, whom I've known since the first grade, had little baby Ava at the end of the year. A real cutie, eh?

I mentioned it in passing previously, but there seems to be an unusual baby boom going on around me. Not literally, thankfully.

The fact that I have lived in so many different places, has meant that I have also had friends in different places, of all types and ages. Yet, they seem to all have gotten together and agreed to get knocked up around the same 18 month period. Just now, off the top of my head, I'm counting seven babies, either just recently expelled, or getting close to it. I didn't know I still knew seven people. Just last night I got an email from a co-worker back in NYC who I haven't talked to in awhile -- quite obviously since she's due to give birth in two weeks! One of my closest friends from the same job just got back from her own maternity leave this past Monday.

Most of these pregnancies were planned, some not-so-much, as in my own sister, who just a few months shy of graduating from college (from a school, no less, that has put my mother "in the poorhouse" for my sister to attend), is getting ready for her own birth. I have to hand it to her though, she has celebrated her own pregnancy with more gusto than many of my friends, which is really saying something. I don't know anyone else who got their swollen stomach painted in festive colors and then took artistic photos (which were pretty cool looking, actually).

I hope I don't sound callous. I've been a teacher, and loved it, so I do like children. But I also have a lot of weird, uncomfortable feelings toward other people's children and their excitement in regards to them. And don't get me started AGAIN on my boiling rage toward a woman wielding a baby stroller!

I guess I just don't know how to process it, so I'm writing, cause that usually helps me out. In this case, it doesn't seem to be. What am I feeling? Jealous? Hmm, no doesn't feel like that. Annoyance? Only sometimes. I really am happy for my friends' happy packages. Longing? I only get that every once in awhile after a vivid dream or stray pensive moment.

Hmm, I don't know. I'm 34 and still don't feel rushed about babies, though I admit to thinking about it more than when I was 24. It's still basically the same thought though, "Yeah, I want to, just NOT NOW." And if my aunt (who is 3 years older than I with 3 boys, spaced far apart), tells me ONE more time "You better hurry, J, TICK TOCK!" I am going to put my hands through the phone and strangle her.

I still want another cat though.

So, I'll just try to be "happy with the question" instead of reaching for the answer. I guess it's like one of those things where you see everyone going in one direction and even though you're not going that way, you think, "Well, it must be SOMETHING important if they're all going there."

And of course, I am happy for all of you who have recently or are getting ready to give birth (YIKES!). CONGRATULATIONS! I do admire those who make the conscious decision to go ahead and completely change their lives, forever. There's no more sleeping in, no more wild sex in the living room, no more selfish vacations, no more ME ME ME!

When in New Zealand, I went with Beau to a end-of-semester drink fest at the local bar with several other teachers (all women, all Maori). At one point, two of the younger ones I was sitting near began an interesting, deeply emphatic, conversation on their views of giving birth. They described it in terms I had never heard of before.
- "It was great! You feel like you're superwoman!"
- "You feel like a goddess! You are so strong and amazing!"

Had to be the first time I ever heard a woman describing the birthing process as "great."

They continued on to talk about their profound love for their children and the overwhelming honor and love they felt in being a mother, as well as the utmost security they got from living in a small "family" village, where they knew their children would always be cared for, and always loved. One woman showed me a beautiful bracelet she wore of three, intertwined silver bands. She said they represented her three children, that she never took it off, and she never wore any other jewelery. Despite the fact that raising children in a small village was completely NOT what I was interested in, I still was deeply touched by their feelings, and it has stuck with me today.

So, go on with your bad selves, Superwomen! Goddess of Maternity! Hooray!

Just one request, please please please do NOT send me a photo of the ultrasound. I don't mean to offend, but i have ZERO interest in that blurry, warped picture. I'm sure YOU can see the fingers and toes (and penis!) and all that. To me, it's a fuzzy mess. I don't even know how to comment on it when I get it. "Ooooh, loooook. Um."

Instead, just send me a pretty K-Mart photo after the baby is born. Put yourself in it too! I find YOU just as interesting as your baby and love the parent-child pics. Now THAT'S something I can really ooh and ahhh.