Knowing

Last night I dreamt that I had decided, along with two friends, that we would all try to get pregnant at the same time. For some reason this then involved me giving a lengthy, detailed lecture on how in vitro fertilization works. We then all bought thermometers and decided to start taking our temperatures and tracking when we ovulated so we could get pregnant at exactly the same moment (more or less). When I got home and went to take my temperature i thought to myself, what the hell am I doing? I don't want another baby. I'm so exhausted as it is and I've got an easy one! And I knew, in that minute, that I would never have another baby.

This morning I walked past the local elementary school, P.S. Upper Middle Class White Kids (P.S. 122 might be the official name). All the kids were saying goodbye to their parents as they went off for their first day of school, dressed in carefully planned outfits, carrying shiny new plastic Sponge Bob backpacks. As I watched the kids saying goodbye and skipping into school, and the newly childless mothers wandering around aimlessly in front of the entrance, I thought about how I would never, ever be able to let Milo go to school. I would never be able to be apart from him for that long, to send him into a big, impersonal space where horrible things might happen that I wouldn't be there to protect him from. Or at least, if I did, I'd have to have another baby at home to replace him. And I knew, in that minute, that I would definitely have another baby.