Babies Are Nice From a Distance

I like the idea of human babies. They are small and precious and smell nice (sometimes) and they are very, very easy to love in a single heartbeat.

Or so I've been told.

Pretty much all of the women in my office area are pregnant with spawn. In fact, I'm in the minority because I'm not expecting a little bundle of joy in the next 2-7 months. This doesn't bother me because while I might not be glowing in the family way, at least my feet aren't swollen and I don't feel compelled to dry heave in the middle of meetings.

Actually, sometimes I do want to dry heave, but it has nothing to do with being hormonal and pregnant and everything to do with WHY AM I STILL IN THIS MEETING WHEN IT'S EIGHT O' CLOCK AT NIGHT?

The baby showers have already started, and if there is anything I love more than babies, it's probably baby-things like wee little socks and fuzzy blankets and unscented shampoo. When I'm browsing through these endless registries, I actually get a little wistful, and I wonder if it's time for us to have our own baby.

But then I remember the crying. and the poop. and the spit up. and the crying. crying. cryingcryingcrying. DID I MENTION THE CRYING?

Similarly, all of my "maternal instincts" are of the crazy Asian lady variety.

My kids will play the piano.

They will take their SAT prep classes every Saturday.

Bad grades? No drive!

I also don't know how to, uh, handle babies. The only real-life baby I've ever been around is my niece, and she is already 2.5 years of age, and I've seen her maybe five times in her life.

When she was a couple months old, she was thrust into my arms rather unexpectedly, and I thought I was holding her like the way babies on TV are held, but honestly, it was like holding a bomb. A giant bomb of gurgling poop ready to wail and scream at the bat of an eyelash.

I cannot handle that right now. I would lose my shit and need my own diaper. I think I would cry more than my baby.

And no one puts this baby in the corner.