A Perfect Creature

Hello morning pages. I’m in statistics class right now hoping that I’m not pregnant so that I don’t have to get an abortion. I love the idea of carrying and giving birth to my lovers baby. He would be pristine, the most perfect of earthly creatures, and every fiber of my life would go to sustaining the two of them, lover and babe, because their existence would sustain me. A loving cycle. But he doesn’t want kids, I found out just yesterday. That if he found out I was pregnant he would flee the country. He says he can’t have them. And the idea of bringing a baby into the world frightens him even though he laughs it off. He said it was something about not wanting to pass on his tainted genes. He says there are too many bad people in his family and he doesn’t want to continue the line. Like Rhoda from the Bad Seed, apparently children can be born evil, no matter how good the upbringing and here I thought that all babies were born pure and clean. It’s scary and sad, but maybe true.

I guess I’m a little crestfallen, is all. I haven’t dwelt on the joys of having a baby but when you’re showing signs of pregnancy your mind starts to wander. Yes, I’ve had the nausea, the abdominal cramps, dizziness, lower back pains, all that. But that’s beside my point. I imagined, briefly, a beautiful baby, all mine. I would rock him to sleep every night, wake up every two hours to breastfeed him and hold him close to my chest. I’d take him to fields, open rolling hills and apple orchards and show him the joy of running. In the winter we would catch snowflakes on black paper so he’ll know that uniqueness is the norm, but is to be celebrated. I’d take him to the ocean to swim, see fish, and we could pretend that the sea is where forever starts. I would teach him colors and how to sing and about animals on the earth and about how monkeys, chameleons and seahorses tails’ are called ‘prehensile.’ I would teach him about space, where creation is. We would learn about all the plants of the earth and I would show him healing, caring, love and simple human kindness, by actions because sometimes they speak better than words. We would stand on the edge of the earth, spread our arms and pretend to fly. We would dream together and most importantly, be together. And when he leaves me and is grown, I will be so proud of him and miss him in a tangle of emotions like love, joy and happy sadness because feeling is life. But my lover doesn’t want a baby. Not now, not later.

Not ever.