Once I arrived, however, I realized just how naïve that ambition was. Most of the items on my friend’s registry were nowhere to be found, and not just because baby stuff is merchandised in a way that makes zero sense. Towels and washcloths are in one place and the baby bath mat thingamajig and accessories are in another.

After going back and forth between the two aisles and finding only the powder and lotion from her registry, I figured I had three options. It was too late to buy online and have anything shipped, so I could: a) Give up, go home, and deal with it tomorrow, b) Gift card, or c) In the words of Tim Gunn, make it work.

So, I punted. I got as close as I could to what she registered for. I’d equate it to eating a Boca burger and telling yourself it’s still meat. Rather than the yellow towel set with yellow fish that she registered for; she’s getting a yellow towel set with a yellow turtle on it instead. In my head I reasoned that, Turtles swim too so that still counts, right? Of course, next to the pseudo fish- turtle towel there was an ample stock of blue and pink towel sets of what I was supposed to be buying. It mocked me. Damn blue and pink fish. Also, damn people and their refusal to find out if it’s a boy or a girl! Jerks.

Anyway, after a few more similar efforts, I managed to load up on baby lotions, powders, washcloths, towels, a duckie faucet cover, bath mat, water temperature gauge, and some contraption that keeps water out of your baby’s eyes. My arms were full, and that’s when I knew I’d made a crucial mistake. A cart! I didn’t get a cart. Shuffling about, bent backward and peering over my stash, I managed to drop every single item while on the hunt. As it turns out, not only should I not be trusted to hold babies, I should also not be trusted to hold baby accoutrements.

Eventually, I found an empty adrift cart and dropped the items down, which is precisely when some 16 and Pregnant episode contestant came out of the woodwork and yelled at me like I was stealing her car or her monies or something. Embarrassed, I feigned cart loss…. “Oh, you mean this one isn’t mine? Hmmmm….silly me. It must have wandered away. Ah ha ha ha ha…” Abort, abort, abort!

Undeterred by my failed cart ganking, I set out to find a better option and was much more successful and stealthlike the second time around. With both hands now free and flipping through the registry one last time, I steered my not-stolen-but-found cart over to the greeting card/ gift wrapping section.

Facing a wall of shiny papers and ribbons and bows and buttons and bags and just everything that a person apparently has to have in order to give a gift, I reached for the largest bag in hopes that it could hold all that I had somehow pieced together. The bag was decorated brightly with a colorful animal…a dinosaur or buffalo or something- I don’t know, it could have been a caterpillar even, I didn’t really look. The thing is, the bag refused to refold once I nixed it. And that’s when all manner of clusterfuckery happened.

Apparently, the gift bag aisle is also an up and coming thoroughfare because as I struggled with the bag, a lady rolled her overstuffed cart- bursting with storage bins- into my ankle. Before I could react or shrivel in pain, a family of four shoved past yelling in Spanish what I can only assume was, “Quick, there’s a run on baby gifts! Get the last yellow towel set, kids! Fish or turtles, doesn’t matter! I’ll corner the gift bag market!”

And then, some hipster dude sporting the saddest facial hair since Mariah Carey’s crustache in Precious, pulled up thisclose to me. I can only assume that the pastel polk-a-dot tissue paper made him thoughtful, as he gazed with a fierceness that not even my blatant stare of disgust could tear him away. I scrunched up my forehead, crinkled my nose, raised an eye brow. Still nothing. Incredulously, I threw the bag on the floor. He walked away. Meh.

I don’t know what I hoped to accomplish by eliciting a response, but in a matter of only 30 minutes I had gone from confident, prepared, unfettered career woman supporting her friend’s life choices to befuddled, butterfingered, stupid, single girl without a clue. I was frustrated and fuming and nothing would just WORK! Baby gift shopping had broken me and I’d *maturely* decided to take it out on a colorful gift bag, which I didn’t even buy.

Admittedly, I had botched the whole thing horribly, comically even. Not only did I not go to my friend’s Baby Couples Shower, but now I couldn’t even get her a proper gift. I was weak with hunger and failure, my bangs were plastered mercilessly to my forehead, and a blister had formed on my right heel. It was then that I looked down at the forlorn, deflated dinosaur-buffalo-caterpillar-mystery animal gift bag and thought; This…this is what my life has come to.

A gift bag was never so symbolic.

Now, I recognize that the kids in the back of the bus are stereotypically your run-of-the-mill “behavior problems.” They’re your Ritalin kids. Your detention after school kids. Your “Phoenix Stereobox, stop jamming your pencil into Phantacy’s forearm. That’s not acceptable behavior!” kind of kids. That’s right, they’re as special and unique as their names let on.

But the part of my brain that has been oft educated about these sorts of things by my school teacher mother failed me this morning. Selective memory perhaps. An overlooked pocket of lingering hope and optimism maybe. Either way, when I saw that little child’s hand begin to wipe the condensation off the back window of the bus, I thought, “Oh, how cute. He’s going to wave at me.”

Just as I was about to raise my own hand from the steering wheel and wave back with a friendly smile, the eight year old’s face appeared. He wasn’t waving. He wasn’t smiling. He was sticking his tongue out at me.

“Well, look at you, you little brat! Your North Shore mommy and daddy must be so proud,” I thought to myself as I relinquished my hold on the steering wheel. I began to laugh at his own stupidity and poorly chosen attempts to insult. “Kid, look who you’re dealing with,” I would have told him. “Try a little harder when you’re looking to offend someone like me.”

But then, something happened. Something untoward and unholy and unbelievably perverted except that it actually happened. The pre-tween, with his tongue still sticking out, began to wave it back and forth. Which was when his hand reappeared. He raised it to his mouth and…YUP. Tongue still wagging. Fingers split to either side.

Insert record screeching sound here. My previously bemused laughter was swiftly replaced with internal screams of horror. “NO. NO. NO! WHAT THE HELL, OH MY GOD, YOU DID NOT JUST DO THAT. NO. HOLY FUCKING SHIT. MAKE IT STOP, MAKE IT STOP, MAKE IT STOP!”

Looks like someone is well on his way to his first STD. Good luck with that, Phoenix Stereobox!

Kill me now.

Can someone please explain to me what the hell a “Couples Shower” is? Because I just don’t even know anymore.

My friend Mara, the same one who got married in all kinds of annoying ways, who went AWOL after ascending to the state of wifedom, and who is now in the family way; has sent me a preemptive “baby” shower invitation via email. While I anticipated this invite, I am completely thrown by her version of it. She’s turned the requisite 3-4 hour baby shower experience into a day long/ overnight extravaganza complete with BYOM (Bring Your Own Meat for grilling- nevermind that it’ll be March and only 30 degrees outside if we’re lucky).

The whole concept of this event annoys me. I simply cannot understand why she has to turn a typical celebration like a wedding or a freaking baby shower into a major production. Why can’t she just do what is expected in these situations? What the hell is her deal?

As for inviting spouses/significant others, maybe I’m missing the point here, but what exactly are the invited men (all husbands/fathers except for my boyfriend) going to do at this “Couples Shower”? Eat pink and blue frosted cupcakes? Play pin-the-diaper on the baby? Commend the diaper cake bringer for her craftiness? Fake smile as the soon-to-be-mom unwraps breast pumps and the like? Really? Why would I EVER want to expose my boyfriend to that kind of nonsense?

I cannot fathom how or why it would be appropriate, let alone expected, that men participate in such antics. I don’t even want to participate. I’d rather just send a fancy gift; spend a little extra to compensate for my absence. Especially since it’s a six hour drive round trip and the shower is scheduled for the first weekend of March Madness. Salt in the wound, people. SALT.

Regardless of my utter confusion and subsequent scheduling crisis, I feel obligated to attend. I feel obligated to smile and ask questions pertaining to Baby, to act like I give a shit. Maybe it makes me a bad friend to admit this (and there’s no way in hell I’d ever say this to her because you just don’t do that sort of thing), but I don’t give a shit and with good reason.  

She’s always told me she never wanted kids, even on “her” wedding day she said “maybe in a few years” she’d think about it, and then swiftly capitulated to her husband who was adamant about having kids immediately. Sure, it’s her choice, but why should I also have to capitulate and support a decision I think is wrong and unfair to both her and the unborn? Does my friendship mean I’m required to be complicit, to condone what I view as a mistake?

I have to wonder though at my apparent inability to feel genuine happiness for her. I wonder why I can’t just be a good friend and be more supportive. It’s her life, her marriage, her choice to have a baby if she wants and it has nothing to do with me. In spite of all that, the truth is she can knock herself out calling this “Baby Couples Shower” whatever she likes. I’ll still be wishing I was watching the college basketball tournament instead of participating in what I feel is nothing short of a train wreck.

No, thank you.

I mostly blame that show, “I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant.” Have you seen it? Who am I kidding, of course you have. That thing is like a freaking car crash. You don’t want to watch it, but you do with that perma-frown of disgust on your face. In fact, if you’re anything like me, you don’t stop at just the one episode, but instead wind up watching all six while TLC marathons the hell out of that shit.

And it’s the same thing over and over; you know what’s going to happen, but it still sucks you in. They’ve got it down to a science. More often than not there’s a toilet scene when the woman gets all confused by what she’s just produced, which is typically when the producers cut to the testimonial from the actual new mother. Every time, every single time, the woman makes a point of saying she didn’t even get to have an epidural. Natural childbirth, she says with those wild I-could-cut-a-bitch eyes. That show is the best birth control ever. Speaking of which….

Yeah. I didn’t get my period last month. I mean, like, at all. For the first time ever in my life. How messed up is that? And the real treat is that because things have been so busy with work and weekend plans lately, I hardly realized I’d missed it until it came time to start a new pill pack. Ooops.

The thing is, I’ve never been one of those girls. You know, the kind who freaks out that she’s pregnant every month and talks about it incessantly. I had a friend in college like that and would make fun of her by drawing pictures in her notebook during American Literature class of an oven with a bun in it. She didn’t like that very much. Anyway…

The whole thing kind of reminds me of when I was 13 and I’d read Seventeen or YM magazine and there’d always be that one article about the one in a million I-Got-Pregnant-But-Didn’t-Technically-Have-Sex/Must-Be-From-A-Toliet-Seat poster girls written as some sort of cautionary tale…BEWARE! IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU!

So despite assurances from my doctor and a glowingly stellar performance by my pee (way to make that minus sign as a clear as day!), you can be damn sure I kept thinking back to that TV show. So what if the test said “no.” My body’s every ache, craving, and odd ailment said “yes.”

Of course, I thought to myself, I don’t know I’m pregnant either.  Of course my recent onslaught of insatiable mid-day hunger isn’t a tape worm as my friends joke, but instead the Thing-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named-But-Begins-With-The-Letter-B’s demand for nourishment. And of course, all of my excessive sleepiness is less a result of subsisting on five hours of sleep a night than the physical exhaustion of cell division. Cell division!

You know, come to think of it, I always was bad at math. Let’s hope it stays that way until further notice.

Just Shoot Me Now

Recently, my boyfriend and I decided (well, he kind of just came along because he’s good like that) to visit Mara and her husband. We planned to stay for one night, after which we couldn’t wait to get the hell out of there.

As he accurately and cleverly put it, he felt as though we were sleeping in the “wedding trophy case.” He had a point: 8 x 10 framed photos in black and white, 25 frame collages of their two faces in 25 different poses, various wedding “artifacts” strewn about. The only room that didn’t beat you over the head with their “Perfect Love” celebrate their apparent blissful wedded state was the bathroom.

Maybe this is just my jaded side coming out, but it turns my stomach. I realize it’s her choice and it makes her (allegedly) happy. I also realize that the friend I had before she was married is seemingly M.I.M. Missing in Marriage. Last known sighting: pre-wedding, maybe even pre-engagement. And, it would appear that the loss of her identity has been willingly given (it should be noted that he has fully kept his).

Mara, it turns out, is the kind of newlywed that is “all about” being married. It is the end all, be all for her. Oddly, she wasn’t this way before she became A Wife, that is to say she wasn’t gunning to get married. In fact, she was a bit of a wild child before she slipped into this form of Stepford wifedom, this domestic mindswap, this kind of identity-stealing vortex. She loves her husband, and God Dammit, that love is all encompassing!

I wish Mara didn’t take Marriage so literally, as in not only the joining of two lives but also the joining of two independent identities. Nearly each time I see her, it’s around her husband’s schedule, and more often than not I can’t spend time with her without also spending time with him. And while I do like him- he’s very friendly and kind, and he’s really the perfect guy for her- he’s my friend’s husband, not my friend.

They eat every meal together, they spend nearly every single night together, they grocery shop together, they watch TV together, they spend time with his their friends together, they golf together, ride Harley’s together. I mean, do they wipe their asses together too? If all this wasn’t enough, they’re “trying.” Which shocks the hell out of me. She hates kids, has always hated kids, claimed to never want any of her own. At their her wedding, she said they wouldn’t have any babies for another two to three years, if at all.

I know that everyone always says that nothing changes from the day before you’re married to the day after, and maybe that’s true, but I can tell you in this case it is decidedly not. She’s throwing away every shred of her independence, her ties to friends, even her own interests to be Married. Because I am not maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about, but I’d venture to guess that such extreme measures are unnecessary to make for a happy marriage. If anything, I could see them contributing to a lot of misplaced resentment and a mid-thirties identity crisis for one or both down the road.

I say all of this in a joking fashion. In actuality, it makes me sad. I miss my friend. We had fun together and confided in one another. And now I feel like a light has gone out. As her friend, where does that leave me?

After the Baby Shower and The Birth and the Congrats on Baby, etc.; I knew I was due to visit them. It was the friendly thing to do! I knew I’d have to stop in with a coffee cake or some junk and meet the little bugger. And I knew I didn’t want to.

While I’m happy for my friends- this baby is a real joy for them, I’m not the kind of person who is going to coo at the Little One. I know my ovaries are supposed to kick into overdrive or something and I’m supposed to be all “Oh, I want one!” But no. Instead, I’m the kind of person who gets more excited about the dog on the sidewalk rather than the baby in the stroller. I figure the dog won’t turn 11, realize I don’t actually know everything, and then decide I’m ruining their life and that they HATE me.

So I guess you could say I dreaded going to see them- mostly because I knew they’d corner me into holding him. My anxiety over this was paramount- something akin to public speaking or visiting the dentist. The thing is, when it comes to babies, I just don’t know what I’m doing and am fearful that all I will ever accomplish is to make them cry. And really, who wants to be the Girl Who Makes Babies Cry? While my fear may seem ridiculous, it’s steeped in Historical Fact.

Once upon a time, I was a 10 year old babysitter (yeah, back in The Olden Days people actually believed a 10 year old was not only old enough to be left home alone but also a suitable watcher of children and babies), which incidentally is the last time I held a baby. The baby I was watching at the time, of course, was blissfully asleep when the mom left- promising that he’d sleep the whole time. Fat chance that happened.

Baby woke up and WOULD. NOT. STOP. CRYING. I tried to feed him to no avail. I changed his diaper without needing to. I picked him up and walked him around the house with a jostle here and a jostle there. In the end, I put him back in his crib and stood back…and joined him in his tears. I kept waiting for the mom to come home and ask how it went. Oh, you know, we were just crying.

Previous history notwithstanding, my friends sat me down on their formerly pristine Crate & Barrel sectional and deposited their offspring into my arms. There I sat dubiously holding their six week old and nothing about it appealed to me. Actually, I kind of felt put out. I didn’t want to hold him in the first place, but how do you say “no thanks” without being rude?

Within 20 seconds he scrunched up his face and began a timid, then audaciously repulsed wail. It was as though he could literally smell my fear…like bees or something. In the meantime, my friends laughed and made no indication that they were at all inclined to alleviate me. Ha! Ha! Ha! Look at the silly single girl! She’s going to cry! It appeared that I was marooned, afraid to stand and force him back into either of their more skilled arms, and beginning to sweat. All the while, an alarm in my mind was sounding. FAILURE. FAILURE. FAILURE!!!

I’ve never been so happy to board a CTA bus and return to my relatively quiet and baby-free home as I was that night. Now I’m just praying that I don’t see my likeness on the family web site. I’ll be the one, the ONLY one, with the constipated look on her face while Baby screams in my unwelcoming arms.

Another friend of mine is getting married this weekend, GDF and her husband got their house and are decorating, baby shower on my b-day friend had her baby, one of my cousins and his wife are expecting, Mara and her husband are “trying,” another friend is closing on her condo next week, and my own brother is shopping for engagement rings. I guess you could say it’s been an eventful summer. For everyone else.

Admittedly, I have very little to contribute to conversations about these sorts of things. Take for instance, a recent round-robin style lunch discussion amongst my home-buying friends. Back and forth they went discussing mortgage rates and wall colors, home inspections and carpet cleaners….and then it was my turn to fill them in on what I’ve been up to. And…cue the crickets.

Mouth full, I smirked a “nada” and was quickly supplied with my own status update- “And you….YOU have a new(ish) boyfriend!”

Is it terrible of me to wonder about a statement like that? To think it a bit ridiculous, if well-meaning? Is that really the only “thing of merit” I have going on?

Taking stock, I own that there isn’t all that much to report. My “major events” in recent months include vacation, paying off debts, a drama-free relationship, planning my next (and our first) vacation, and bangs (yup! I took the plunge!). In comparison to my friends and family, you can see why these “events” seem so….miniscule? Irrelevant? Flimsy? Pointless? Immature?

As more and more people in my life “get on” with the whole Life thing, I’m seemingly stuck in a time warp. I have the same job, the same apartment, and am living much as I always have throughout my twenties, though with less hand-me-down furniture thank God! Still, I’m far from the “adultness” I once envisioned for myself.

In all honesty, very little about being 29 is what I thought it would be for me. I don’t say that with disappointment or regret or even envy. It’s just that, now that I’m “here,” I mostly feel like I’m playing at being a Grown Up.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve seen all the Grown Ups get married and buy houses and have babies, so I guess you could say that’s what I always thought being a Grown Up was about, what it was supposed to look like. The thing is though, I still don’t feel old enough to join in with any of it and I haven’t. The idea of doing so, of making those permanent Life Choices riddles me with anxiety and doubt. Weddings and babies and home buying seem to turn my stomach these days in new and alarming ways. It’s like I get cold feet just hearing about what my friends and family are up to.

For me, I think being a Grown Up might have less to do with joining in than choosing not to.