BOO!

Well, Halloween left me about 50-50 on how I'm feeling about children. Adorable children in the neighborhood took us on a guided tour of their 'Haunted Trail' and it was a lot of fun and they were so cute! (Actually, they would kill me for saying that- they were actually very spooky!) Then we went to some friends' for a drop-in which was fairly kid-heavy. An infant, a 15 month old, a 2 year old, a 2.5 year old... and on and on up to about a 5 or 6 year old. I was very much aware of the situation, the mothering that was happening all around. Rampant mothering. Negotiations over toys, candy, costumes. Diaper changes, bottles, goldfish... So when we left I said to my husband "Well, what did you think of all of that? Make you think you're missing out on anything?" He basically said he didn't know what I was talking about, so when I explained he said "No, I really didn't notice a difference." "Yeah," I said, "that must be because even though there was some Olympic level mothering going on, the fathering was incredibly minor- it wasn't so much fathering as it was 'being guys talking about golf in the other room.'" Anyway, he basically said that he certainly didn't feel he was missing out, he was happy, as he has been every time I ask him about it. I am obsessed with knowing he doesn't feel that I'm keeping him from fatherhood, probably in part because he just doesn't talk about it, but mostly because his sister and mother and father have all managed to convey that they think he really does want kids but is too selfless to ask me to try again... So I'm a little paranoid. I'm not big on things like Halloween anyway, so I wasn't feeling all weepy about it, and the kids were tired and hopped up on sugar, so they weren't very enticing.

Then we went to dinner and in the booth beside us were twins about 6 months old and their parents were about as proud as any parents I have ever seen! Which meant lots of cooing and trying to get the babies to smile at us. Actually, it wasn't very annoying, they were cute babies, and I can excuse new parents of twins from acting goofy, they were probably just hungry for some adult interaction.

So, we survived another kid-centric holiday basically unscathed. Oh! Except this: we were in the mini-van, so at a shop the guy helping us said "Well, I know you have kids, so this would be great for you!" "No, no kids," we said. "What? But you have a mini-van! You must have children!" (You're right, we are just lying because we don't like them very much. We keep them in the cellar, but bought a totally sweet mini-van for them anyway.) Ok people, hear me, and hear me now: I have a mini-van and no children. You are not, astounding as this may seem, required to have children in order to purchase a mini-van. If we tell you we don't have children, believe us. Don't go on and on about how unbelievable it is that we don't have kids, don't say 13 times in half an hour that you have NEVER met anyone with a mini-van and no children. We're out-of-the ordinary, we get it. Let it go already.