Before we had a baby, we were on the fence about having children. Some years, we would inhabit the 'no' side of the fence, and we lived that. Then for a few minutes, we would sometimes inhabit the 'yes' side--a few minutes because we could never stand to live there for long. While we finally made up our minds to have a kid, it wasn't an easy journey getting there. I think we were always looking for a definitive reason to HAVE a kid, to go through all of that, to be responsible for another human being--and were always coming up short. Aside from reasons of ego and legacy, there isn't a solid reason to have a kid--the world sucks, there's no hope for the future--in short, having a kid in the 21st century seems like the ultimate act of selfishness. And the reasons other people gave me were not good enough for me--'oh, just do it, it will change your life' or 'having a kid will make you less self-centered' or my favorite, 'you have to have a kid or you won't have fulfilled your purpose as a woman and human being.'
Fast forward to now. The 'arguments' people gave me as to why one should have a kid, still ring hollow, but I get now why people spout cliches--there is some truth to cliches, a comforting quality that reassures us that our actions are larger than us, that we are somehow participating in some great human cycle, blah blah blah. Do I have the answer for you or anyone else besides myself? No, and I don't claim to. Truth is, there is no overarching reason to have or not to have a kid, at the end of the day--if you argue both sides you will soon realize that there is no rational argument for or against, there is only 'having a kid' or 'not having a kid.' That is all.
What's my personal reason for having a kid? It's going to sound cheesy, so brace yourselves. This is my reason: because life, friends, is boring (to quote John Berryman). Before Baby, we were looking down the barrel of the rest of our lives spent doing whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted--sleeping in on weekends, drinking, going out whenever, seeing movies whenever, buying things we wanted whenever, never taking anything really seriously, the ribbons of life were frizzing into boredom around the edges. In that pre-kid reality, it was the same shit day after day, with no onus placed on us for anything, other than to continue to live and to consume day after day, year after year, decade after decade. Now? I have a baby daughter, and she requires that I pay attention. Not just to her, but to the choices I make in life, even ones that don't seem to concern her directly. And time is no longer this open-ended thing that I can squander at will. I feel the flow of time much more acutely now than before, and I've learned to work with it and make better choices so that I don't squander it unnecessarily.
It is much more acceptable nowadays to choose not to have children, and that is a completely valid lifestyle choice now where it wasn't even 30 years ago. Life has progressed beyond the need for base procreation, as the impetus to reproduce is no longer as strong as it once was, since we have reached a unique point in human history where we have more luxury than we could have ever dreamed of, and basic survival isn't on our minds, and it doesn't take 2 hours to go a mile up the road. We aren't as afraid of dying as we were 100 years ago, so without the daily threat of imminent death, we lose the impetus to procreate and leave a bunch of people in our wake. In my opinion this new childless reality puts too much pressure on us as individuals and on the significant others we share our lives with to be extraordinarily clever and interesting ad infinitum--just thinking about it makes me tired.
Having a kid is like re-injecting your life with that imminent fear of death--suddenly everything matters again. Everything is new--your old dried-out soul starts to feel excitement again, anticipation for holidays, traditions, life. I know it sounds like living vicariously through someone else, except you're not living through them so much as actually prepping the stage of their experiences. You're the puppet master! And at the same time you're keenly aware that this kid ISN'T you; they aren't yet fucked-up, haven't yet been disappointed and rejected by life, and there is still hope--in YOU for THEM. (Remember they don't know what the fuck is going on yet, so all of this takes place inside your head.) This puts intense pressure on you to make their experiences good ones, and causes you to want to do all that fun shit that your parents did with you--and so the cycle continues, but with a difference, because each person is an individual with their own experiences and thought patterns.
I can verify that as a parent you irrationally want to protect your kid from the shittier parts of life, but of course you can't--the shitty parts are what make us who we are, in the end (show me a person who has never been vexed or crossed in life, and you will show me a very boring person indeed)--but still the desire to protect is there. So yes, I'm gonna say it--I think having a kid taps into the better part of human nature, the hopeful part that somehow believes there is still hope for the human race despite the shit we see everyday to the contrary. The part that is so often a bezoar in us by the time we're 30.
There, I'm done. Take it or leave it, I really don't care. It's my opinion, just like everything else here.
