Challenging tradition

I’ll take them after 11 years, but until then, they’re all yours.

Nothing annoys me more than dealing with a little loud-mouth who reeks from refusing showers, finds boogers to be a satisfying snack and turns a deaf ear to any response synonymous to “no.”Children are my pet peeve, and I’ve struggled to find only a handful of exceptions amongst the 2.2 billion kids worldwide.

My roommate and I joke that we’ll one day “share” our children – her raising them from the womb to middle school, and then me taking over and doing my part. By that time they should be able to be somewhat independent (clean, cook, entertain), but still impressionable (bring on the Nancy Drew, mixtapes, EPL soccer).

Don’t be scared for me; I’m well aware molding mini-mes is not the way to go about parenting, nor should it be a motivation to have children. The more I contemplate my future, my dreams and what I want in life, the less I see myself actually having children. My family totally agrees. “I see you as that crazy aunt coming back from like India with gifts and crazy stories to share with my kids,” Chelsea told me, after she divulged that my parents also think I’ll be a jet-setting, well-cultured wife with no little-ones.

Doesn’t sound bad to me.

For whatever reason, I feel guilty. Call it even selfish. My mother did not want to have children for majority of her life and now she has two daughters. She made that sacrifice to bring me into the world, should I?

Children make the world go round. Without them, we’d be extinct. Like Carol Pateman touches upon briefly in her examine of contractualism, women provide a great civic service by bearing and raising a family. I agree, and to a degree that I feel negligent if I do decide not to have children.

The whole situation is hypocritical from my position. I was once a bratty, know-it-all youngster, so how can I even say I dislike children? I just do. Everyone dislikes screaming babies and tantrums, but they suck it up. They somehow find joy within the little rascals. Maybe I just need a stronger magnifying glass.

While I wallow in my thoughts, my boyfriend can rest assure; I’m not dating him to get pregnant and married. I can almost hear his sigh of relief all the way from Minnesota.