Biological Destiny

I have had a very busy weekend. There was a festival and conference in town that I participated in all weekend. I don’t know if you get to go to many conferences or what they are like when you do but for me going to a festival and conference means that I was spending my days in workshops and panel discussions, my early evening at concerts and arts events and my nights at the bar. Needless to say I a pretty tired this morning. It wasn’t a terribly interesting conference but it was great to see friends from across the country and get caught up on the good gossip and the holiday stories everyone had to tell. The most interesting evening – and by interesting I mean horrifying – I had was on Saturday night at the bar.

I was sitting at a table with various people from across the country and chatting with my fabulous – and by fabulous I mean gay - producer friend who I only get to see a few times a year. We were talking about life, work, sex and children. Yes Children. Both of us over the last year have been approached by friends who have asked us if we would consider having children with them. He told me that he said no to his friend and had lots of concerns about having children and a career and the relationship with this person wasn’t one that he ultimately believed would be healthy for having a baby.

I said that I had and still am considering it, but that I too have many concerns and reservations about having a child with someone I am not romantically involved with. I had seen my brother and sister in law work very hard every day they were home for the holidays to keep up with my amazing and wonderful nephew and thought at the time I can’t even doing this without someone else to help. My fear I explained was that I did not want to end up in a situation where I was a single parent because I know how hard that life can be (as I have single mother friends) and that I didn’t want to go down that path and at the end of the day be the one “holding the bag”. From the other end of the table this man I had met earlier in the week pipes up and says “Oh no. Having children is a wonderful thing and what you will realize is that that bag that you are holding is actually a baby.”

Duh!?!?! It was a metaphor you idiot. I didn’t say that, instead I tried to explain to him calmly and rationally that I wasn’t saying that I didn’t want children I was just saying that I didn’t want to be a single parent as I worried that neither the child or I would get everything out the experience we wanted because I would feel pulled in too many directions and feared resenting the child or my work. Good stuff I thought, honest, thoughtful … but no he came back at me by telling me that I would be a great mother. That he has seen so many women just change and become mommies instantly and that having children is ultimately why we are all here on the earth. It is our “biological destiny” to have children.

My jaw actually dropped. Biological Destiny … do people really still talk like that? I had nothing to say. Well that’s not true I had a bubbling rage inside of me but as the Lady said to me one must pick their battles and defending my destiny on a Saturday night to this man was not a hill I wanted to die on. Luckily the rest of the table had to go to another event – and by event I mean party in a hotel room – so I was able to excuse myself before I either punched or throttled the man.

As an epilogue to the story we left the bar I commented to my friends just how infuriating that was and how offensive I found the whole exchange to be. I mean Biological Destiny what kind of old school conservative bullshit is that? My good friend from work agreed and let me know that she too was offended and shocked by the whole exchange. Then the other woman that was with us – a very liberal and thoughtful woman from what I have seen in the past - actually said “Yeah that is pretty bad to say but he is such a nice man …” That was when my head actually exploded.

The not so destine Single Girl