8:34 p.m.

Tonight, at about 8:34 pm, my biological clock went off.

I felt it ring like an alarm in my body. I've wanted a baby for years, it's been one of the most stable aspects of "the plan", in fact I used to want seventeen, but as I've gotten closer to a time that such an undertaking would be a good idea I've lowered the number to one or maybe two. I've also started wondering "oh yeah, when is *that* going to happen?" as I've gotten out of 'too-young' and into 'exceptionally reasonable' child-bearing age. This is true for a number of my bigger life goals; I sat in 'too young' long enough to totally miss the beginning of 'auspicious time'.

I kept meaning to address this issue, the baby thing, here, but I wanted to write some big fancy essay about the history of my desire for motherhood, the implications of overpopulation and my goals as a parent and yadda yadda yadda, but instead, I'm ovulating and in the middle of my first Mindfulness class I had a visceral feeling of a baby alarm. I laughed out loud when it happened. As usual my elaborate and procrastinated intentions get severed and overthrown by immediate reality. I want a baby. Growing, inside me. I want to be pregnant and I want to raise a child and I'm scared shitless of it but I want it anyway.

It's not surprising that this happened now. I just got the news this week that my two best friends from high-school, one of whom was my first love, are both pregnant. I've known of their marriages for some time, but the fact of their simultaneous pregnancies felt like a big bowl of cold spaghetti falling in my lap. (This image possibly courtesy of The Sopranos.)

Feelings ranged from the classic: "Holy Shit!?!?!"
to the skeptical: "Really? Both? Married? And pregnant?... Holy Shit!"
to the childishly jealous: "I want a spouse and a baby!...and *I* wanted to knock her up!!!!"

On further investigation of my high school coterie, it seems that most of them are married, and many be-childed. While this may seem like a big ol' duh of normal life, I live in queer San Francisco and I, for one, was shocked. I really haven't heard of so many people I know being straight, married, or breeding....ever. It puts a new perspective on my search for a wife, like, gender aside, actually it's not such a weird thing to want...or to get! Everybody else seems to get them, and some of them used to be the people who projected their wedding fantasies with me. Not just that, but people I fucked! Quite a few people I have fucked are now married. I know, its normal, no one else is impressed, but my mind, she is blown. How this whole marriage thing happens (and so regularly!) amongst 20-somethings remains a mystery to me; most of the people I know in the day to day who are married got married in their 40's or so or did it for health insurance. The decisions, the process, the family dinners...all foreign and intriguing to my little colonialist anthropologist mind.

So now I'm out, not that I was ever trying to be in, but yes; I want a hot, sexy, healthy loving commitment, and make that with a side of progeny. No, it doesn't have to be immediate, but no, it can't be ignored.

Mommy once told me when I was very young and I asked her why it took her three years of marriage to get pregnant with me, "It's fun to be married for a little while before you have a baby." I'll buy that, though if I was her, I'd already be married for two years by now....

Momma says....

Today during a scattered phone conversation with my mother she suggested I find someone (i.e. a partner) I can "do things with", in other words collaborate. Well, gee, why hadn't I thought of that? This whole time I've been hoping for a mate, but I should've been hoping for a mate *and* a co-producer. This is like the apple of knowledge as far as I'm concerned, most tantalizing and most terrifying. It's like the dirty fantasy I can't even really admit to myself I have.
Oh, what of the potential emotional carnage!? It's best not to envision. At this point, I will be pleased as punch if I find a nice wifey and some artist types who want to work with me and leave the rest up to.....well hopefully something with a good sense of humor.


On that note, I am jealous of and impressed as fuck by The Wasteland Comedy Hour, with T.S. Elliot which was directed last winter by my friend Jason in Boston. I always get a little envious when I see groups of collaborators that obviously work tremendously well together.
Someday, my collaboratrices will come.

Work it, Baby!

Some quick thoughts on what my wife might likely do for a living.
(This list is by no means representative of any professional requirements, just an assemblage of the type of people I am likely to meet and get along with and the type of jobs I find sexy or would be useful to me. Not a ranking of preferences.)

Most likely, or most attractive/compatible to me:
chef
sex worker
former sex worker
circus performer
work at a non-profit
non-sex work sex industry work
sex educator
trust fund/independently wealthy
landscaper/gardener/permaculturalist
herbalist
work at a co-op or collective with food, books, sex, art/art supplies
writer
maker of movies
musician
photographer
child care
mid wife
Douala
"alternative" health care practitioner
Chinese medicine
acupuncture
body work/massage
illusionist
librarian
carpenter
plumber
social services
therapist/counselor
witch
food service
small business owner
milliner
street performer
teacher
perfumer
jeweler
inventor
designer/seamstress
sociologist

Second most likely:
geek
yoga teacher
grocery store worker
retail
____ and grad school
cleaning/janitorial services
pet care service
scientist
nurse
stylist
engineer


What she will most likely not do for money:
practice law (unless its non-profit/social service or civil rights based)
police officer
banker
insurance salesperson
corporate......anything
middle management
advertising
tv broadcasting
professional athlete
military