“Saturday night is perfect for writers because other people have “plans.”
― Mike Birbiglia
I have no excuse, kittens, except Dubai. Here are your links. I’ve got to do some freelance this weekend before heading out to enjoy the shockingly gorgeous and warm weather that’s suddenly descended.
Interesting personal piece on the choice to not have children. If it were up to me, I’d be happy being a professional aunt and godmother, but Jeff definitely wants to be a father so we had to have a lot of conversations and compromising before we married on the subject. How about you guys? Are kids an if/when/never for you and why? (NO wrong answers here, genuinely interested in hearing the full range.)
Greatest Love of All, Whitney Houston.
TED Talks to survive your 20s.
Like attractive French men on the metro? There’s an Instagram account for that.
Well, there goes the neighborhood.
NOPE. Categorically everything about this is evil.
I apologise on behalf of my my countrymen.
Art doesn’t last, but the chemistry behind this particular age-related breakdown is interesting.
Small Dog Syndrome 
That Harpers Bazaar piece is interesting, even though I am in my early 20s, which is too young to be thinking about children IMO (besides, I’m not in a relationship). But I can relate to the writer. I’d been hankering after getting a puppy for ages. It wasn’t a spur of the moment decision and I grew up with dogs, so I knew what having a dog involved.
However, when I got the puppy, it was like adding a whole load of stress into my life: “the tranquility of my morning coffee”, as the Bazaar article said, was non-existent. I really missed sitting down with a cup of coffee and browsing WordPress before starting my day. When sitting down to write essays and prepare presentations, I found myself having to jump up every few minutes to play with the puppy when she wanted to, stop her chewing the furniture/chasing the cat, take her outside so she wouldn’t wee on the floor….
After two weeks I ended up as an emotional mess; any time for myself was immediately taken up by seeing to the puppy’s needs. And babies are even more hard work than puppies! Eventually, I rang the breeder, explained the situation and took the puppy back — as one of my friends said jokingly, “Be thankful. You can’t do that with a baby!”
I love what I do and whilst I think I probably want a baby one day, my career is important to me as well and I wouldn’t want to give that up. Actually, this reminds me: I wrote a piece about this very issue: Advice For Young Academics.
Sorry – long comment!
I’m definitely going to check out those TED talks. They sound great! 🙂
GREAT comment. Some girls and women feel in their bones that they want to be mothers, I’m not one of them. I know I would be happy not having kids, I don’t think I’d feel that my life would have missed some vital component. But I married a man who definitely does want kids and would feel that his life would miss out without them. What’s been interesting for us is deciding specifically to wait and try to have kids much later in life than the culture we grew up in tends toward, and making joint decisions about how and under what circumstances having a family would be possible. It’s a constantly evolving conversation.
Your story about the puppy made me smile, not at your experience because I’m sure that even though it was deliberately thoughtful there must have been some heartache and hard decisions there, but because Jeff and I have wanted a dog for a while. But, whenever we thought about it, we realised we had no idea how working people in London manage to own and care for them. I found the answer a couple of weeks ago when an agent I work with explained that she has daily dog sitting and without it having pets couldn’t be possible. In other words, she needed a nanny without having kids yet.I may have to write a follow up on this topic at some point.
Loved your piece, thanks for the share!
Yes, it was such a hard decision to make and I felt so awful when I made the two-hour drive to take Amy (the puppy) back. I had become attached to her, even though she was a lot of work, and she wasn’t a naughty puppy: she simply needed more time than I could give. It was the best decision, for me and for her. For now, I’m a cat person!
Dog-sitting is great, but expensive!
I am much the same as you. No burning desire for motherhood, no sense of a void without a children filled future. Luckily Cody and I are on the same page and know that children aren’t in our future for now. We aren’t naive enough to think that will never change and we’re open to discussing it in the future as we grow up more. For now, no kids and no plans for kids. We will just be the best aunt and uncle since I know my siblings and our friends will have lots to spoil.
I think that’s a really healthy attitude to be honest. “This is how we feel now, we might feel differently later. We’ll roll with it.”