I pull a greasy strand of hair loose from my bun and twirl it around my finger. With every twist, I feel the sting of the cuticle I picked bloody earlier. I swipe up, closing the app, and then open it again.
Nothing.
The meme is funny, I think.
I want to write again, to explain. I just thought it was silly and maybe even clever. Plus, Jen’s single and childless too, so she’ll get it.
There’s a green dot next to her name, so I know she’s active. Or was recently active. I don’t really know. And my message has a little ‘Seen’ underneath it, which clearly means it was seen. She saw the message and didn’t respond.
I swipe out of the app again, open my recent calls, and hover my pointer finger over Neva’s name. I imagine our conversation.
Me: “So, I saw the funniest meme today.”
Her: “Okay….”
Me: “It was a woman standing with an iced coffee in one hand and her phone in the other, looking incredibly chic, and the caption read- ‘Having a baby looks really hard. If you always have the baby in one hand and your phone in the other, where do you put your iced coffee? Does the baby hold it?’”
Her: “Okay.”
Maybe she’d laugh or maybe she’d give me that dead inside response that she serves me from time to time. I feel too frayed to take the chance. I didn’t even run through my brain telling her what I wrote when I forwarded the meme. I fully understand that throwing babies in the trash is an unseemly thought, but at the time it felt funny. Ish. Funnier to add that when coffee is finished, it is best to use one’s free hand to hold your bestie’s hand.
Or perhaps, not funny at all. Was I tasteless? Was my hastily crafted addition to the meme thoughtless? I was just trying to celebrate the single, childless woman. This was my attempt to score for our team. The team of women bucking the social norms that were put in place ages before we agreed to this shit.
It’s challenging for me to remember when I realized that my dream of having children was likely something that wouldn’t come to fruition. There was some moment in time when another well-intended human told me about their cousin in Philly who just had a child using a sperm donor at forty-five and my insides emulsified. They did. Everything mixed together to form a steaming pile of resignation.
“Good for her,” I said.
Horrifying, I thought.
Sometimes I eat an ice pop at 2 a.m. when I can’t sleep. Occasionally, I go out for a run at 4 a.m. before a flight. I spontaneously pop out to Trader Joe’s from time to time, and I have, more than once, booked a last minute, entirely irresponsible weekend out of town. I’m wildly unencumbered, save my six low maintenance plants. And if they die, I’m not sure anyone would mourn or freak out, except for me, of course.
When colleagues tell me their kid was up all-night vomiting and I tell them how sorry I am, what I really mean is that I’m sorry you are standing in my vicinity, you selfish, germ-spreading, egocentric shit.
Do I find babies and children cute? I sure do. I love their silly expressions and dimpled elbows. I love their fine, wild hair and their incredible learning journey. I love their teeny, ridiculous teeth and absurdly adorable toes. I adore how they pronounce words and the magical and incredibly simple way they tend to see the world. I love their pronouncements and questions and boundless energy. I love holding them and smushing them and feeding them squishy food.
I say that I feel sorry for the parents of screaming infants on flights, but I really want to parachute them or myself the fuck off the plane. Making that fake sad face when a kid is having a Grade A meltdown is second nature, but I want to give them whatever ludicrous thing they’ve been denied causing this insane behavior. A cupcake at 8 a.m.? Yes, of course.
People who hurt children should be punished beyond the fullest extent of the law. One of my truest passions is helping children in vulnerable situations get the help and attention they so desperately need. I’ve more than once volunteered to babysit for relatives, friends, and neighbors, and I’ve enjoyed every second.
My perspective, my feelings, are complicated. It’s possible that things should have gotten clearer over time, but somehow, they’ve gotten murkier.
In the beginning of this Great Resignation, I muttered “what’s meant to be, is….” more often than I’d ever admit in public. I mourned the loss of that thing that I always wanted and knew I wouldn’t ever have, even though Stacy and Kim both found their way to true love and a family in their forties. I lamented the mistakes that I had made and time I had wasted.
And then, I forgave myself. Not in that really noble, therapized way that most people on the Internet have, or at least profess. I forgave myself in that way where I was so tired that it felt like I had no other option but to stop expending energy flogging myself. I had no room for good stuff, because I spent so much time on regrets, on would-have-beens and could-have-beens. So, one day I just decided I was done. I couldn’t change certain events, certain facts, but I had the power to shift my reaction, and that would have to be enough.
So, I did, and it is.
I stopped telling everyone that I just haven’t found my person yet. No longer would I say in a mopey voice that clearly it isn’t my intended path. The amount of time I spent daydreaming about my possible life decreased until it was barely anything at all.
I stopped holding a memorial service for a life that wouldn’t be.
There came a day when a friend told me she wished she could go to the concert or on that trip and I cheekily responded: “single, no kids.” Better than that- I felt nothing. Not a stitch, not a tug. Just speaking a newer truth.
Now, I sent a meme to a friend, and I am anxious. Did I misjudge the space between acceptance and being a complete shithead and somehow tread into that territory? Have I become one of those bitter women where people look at me and say, “she’s just like that because she couldn’t figure it out, poor thing”?
I mean, I don’t really care. Not really.
“I did figure it out!” I want to scream.
I’m contemplating my evolution into the gorgeous, mystical land where all the tattooed, Diet Coke sipping, hoe hoop wearing crones reside, and my phone vibrates in my hand.
A little red one has appeared next to the Instagram icon, so I open the app and then, the message with Jen. I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until I laugh, and it feels like the first time you enjoy anything after a loss.
“LOL, obvs,” she wrote.
LOL.
Obvs.
x
L.
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