Reasons For vs Reasons Against...

Now that this school madness is behind me, I can focus on other goals. These goals may or may not include: getting thin, getting knocked up, starting some kind of home-based business, and organizing my house so well that it makes everyone else feel bad about their house. I might also start learning how to do my hair in the morning, but that goal is totally unlikely. Blowing my hair dry makes me cranky. Is it a coincidence that all things called "blowing" actually suck? I think not. (Side note: Did you know that the other kind of "blowing" got it's name because a famous jazz artist way-back-when termed that act, "playing the skin flute"? Betcha didn't.)

Moving on....this past week offered Hot Husband and I some opportunities to think about reasons for and against having kids.

For instance, we went out to dinner with some engaged friends of ours, and they both expressed their passionate conviction about wanting children. Which frankly, made me feel stupid for not having made up my mind yet. I mean, there was no uncertainty there. It was like, yeah... we're totally having kids a year after we get married! And then I was thinking... well... where are the normal doubts? How are you going to pay for daycare? Or stay-at-home-mom-ness? What about autism or schizophrenia?

But they were sure. Maybe they haven't checked out the price of cribs lately?

Then, we went away for the weekend, and there was this couple in the hotel room next door with this little fuzzy rat of a dog. And they let it out of their room, and it ran over and plopped itself on the blanket I was lying on. And the lady said, "Oh Pepper, come here. Get off of there." And while I was politely waiting for the lady to come collect her mutt, the lady sighed and went back into her room, leaving her dog. Hot Husband and I exchanged a WTF glance, and I collected my blanket by yanking it out from underneath the dog, while HH swatted the thing in the head with his (paperback) book.

I pointed out to my husband that some people have kids so they don't end up being the crazy dog people. And he pointed out that we might already BE the crazy dog people, since I'm pretty darn convinced that my dog is smarter than your seven year old brat, so nyah.

Ok, have you all seen the movie, "UP"? If you haven't: do that. If you have: "I HATE squirrels!" I will wait for you to stop chuckling to yourself. I was a wreck during the first five minutes or so of that film. Like... bawling. In the movie theater. Yes, it was one of my finest moments. The point is, I don't want to leave my husband alone. What if I die when we are eighty, and there is no one to take care of him because I was too selfish with my rental space in my uterus?

But then again... I watched a Grey's Anatomy re-run, and it had a dood with mental illness on it. And I'm thinking... is it terrible of me to say that I would prefer to stay childless if I knew my son or daughter would end up mentally disturbed and try and choke me in my sleep? Am I an awful person for saying that I am scared for my children's health, and what implications that health has on me? Is that horrendous for me to think about? And if it is, does that mean that I shouldn't have a kid at all? Does it make me selfish if I only want to change my child's diaper for two years, and not thirty-two years? Am I jinxing myself for even writing this down?