Where we are on Kids

We are in our mid 30s and we’re thinking of kids. In many ways, it’s looking like writing a paper a day before it’s due.

This is the year to have one if we want one, my wife tells me.

I’m not sure about next year, she says.

She would know. She’s a neonatal nurse.

But I’m not sure why we need kids.

I know we’d be incredible parents, if that’s reason alone. The kid’d have a great childhood, and if she’d be anything like her mother (I’d like a girl), she’d be pretty cool, and incredibly good looking (everyone sort of is thesedays). May be that’s reason enough.

I’m hesitant. I’ve been unsure for months. For one, my parents haven’t really put any pressure on me. They did, on my brothers, and they gave them four grand children.

I’m sure they haven’t forgotten me? But I don’t want to ask them.

I think of my friends who have kids. Two of my more recent friends do, two each. They’ve followed the typical template – get great education (phds), work work, marry well (phds), keep working, then kids (two at least, bang, bang), keep working, retire at sixty, play with grand kids.

Now that doesn’t look too bad. May be a little tiring just thinking through it. And if you’re impressed by their phds, don’t. It’s like choosing the most difficult route to climb a mountain when we (the FIRE tribe) know better.

But that’s coming from someone who does not have those credentials (so sometimes disgruntled). And who’s to say what experiences we’re after. It’s the journey, they say, and the sweat is always more uplifting, more lightening. Comfort and growth don’t go together says Ginni Rometty, and she must know.

But she has no kids.

Of my classmates from high school, only five have kids. A few aren’t even married. We’re all in our 30s. Surely they know what they’re doing. They’re all incredibly smart. The girls, in particular. All of them.

I think of my cousins. And some of them aren’t married either.

Surely I’d be okay.

When we’re old, I’ll look after you, I’d tell them.

In that, I’ll call on you, I clarify.

You do the same. Can we make a pact?, I’d tell them.

Please sign here.

We’re of one blood. Or close enough. We’ll even move to New York (or Toronto). New old folks in cold cities. Now that’d be something. I tell my wife she must start preparing.

Can you learn to start enjoying hot tea?

On our drive to the mall yesterday, my wife asked about adopting in the future. We’d always spoken of it, but this felt like an alternative.

I felt a sense of relief.

I’m not sure if I’m being fair. My wife deserves everything that she wants. If she’d push me just a little harder, cry, make a scene, beat me – may be that’ll strike some sense.

Or may be not – I’m not sure.