Popping the Questions

When we first got engaged, the first question everyone would ask was, "When's the date?" I suppose that all adult milestones must have an accompanying first question, because now when we tell people that we're pregnant, their first response is always, "Do you know if it's a boy or a girl?" And when informed that you can't tell until about 5 months, the next question usually is, "Do you think you'll find out?"

This one had always seemed like a no-brainer to me. Besides the fact that one can only take so much yellow and green, calling the baby "it" for 9 months just seems so...wrong. Referring to the bump in Monica's belly as "it" gives it too much of an eerie, alien-spawn quality. It'd be hard to fall asleep next to Monica each night knowing that the "it" growing inside her could bust out and eat me at any moment. Plus, it's hard to think up great baby names when you're using the same pronoun that you use for a spatula.

A few people have also asked me whether I'd prefer a boy or a girl. To me, that's like asking whether Achtung Baby or The Joshua Tree is the better album. Sure, there are pros and cons for each. Girls, in the long-run, bring the nerve-wracking worries of dating one-track-minded boys. In the short-term, though, boys can be much more dangerous when changing a diaper. In the end, I'll take whatever we get. Each will bring its own future of treasured moments, and I can teach a girl how to burn things with a magnifying glass just as well as I can teach a boy.

Some people might get irritated being asked the same questions over and over again, but I actually don't mind. Each time someone asks, it restarts the fun process of dreaming up different images of what life would be like with a little girl or a baby boy. And besides, I know that it won't be long before people start asking, "When are you having another?"


- Steve (and Monica)