Non-Breeder: The Hold Out
My huge Catholic family is the reason I want a baby — and sort of don't.
by Johanna Gohmann
May 31, 2007
Recently, I was back in Indiana visiting my quadruplet six-year-old nephews. There we all were, busy with SpongeBob coloring books, when one of the boys looked up at me with a sly grin. "Man Jo . . . " he began. (Man Jo being their nickname for me, derivative of a garbled first attempt at "Aunt Jo.")
"Yes?" I asked.
"Um . . . Are you going to get married and have a baby?" he grinned.
His question caused my other nephews to look up and hoot with laughter.
"Ha!" One of them guffawed. "Man Jo isn't going to have a baby!"
Feeling both bemused and a smidge defensive, I turned to him, an eyebrow raised, and asked why on earth not.
"Because!" He looked at me, shrugging at the obviousness of my question. "You're Man Jo!"
I am one of eight children. That's six brothers and one sister. And my family is growing exponentially. Three older siblings as well as a younger brother have already procreated. As of this writing, there are eleven grandchildren. My sister alone has six kids: the aforementioned quadruplets, as well as a nine-year-old and a ten-year-old (Hayden, Hayley, Hammilton, Harrison, Houston, Holden).
I, however, am still unmarried and childless at the ripe old age of thirty-one. Which I realize isn't so huge a deal in many parts of the world. But back in my hometown of New Albany, IN, it's a bit unusual. And by unusual, I mean I may as well be an albino werewolf. To further garner myself the label of the "bohemian" (see "possibly lesbian") aunt, I am also the only one to have moved away from New Albany. I migrated first to Chicago, and for the past eight years have lived in the land of all things bohemian and possibly A typical Christmas looks more like a cracked-out preschool.lesbian — New York City.
It isn't easy being the one to have left, as my family is a close-knit bunch, and one of my greatest joys. I try to go home every three months, and for almost every major holiday, which is pretty often, considering the distance. Yet, no matter the frequency of my visits, I still feel somewhat dumbstruck by my family's recent metamorphosis. Holiday gatherings used to consist of us siblings elbowing each other around a crowded dinner table. Now a typical Christmas looks more like a cracked-out preschool. Children ranging in ages from one to ten blaze through the house. There's a distinctive din of screams and giggles that rises and falls at intervals — a non-stop soundtrack of child.
While my sister and sisters-in-law and mother discuss how to dry up breast milk with cabbage leaves (who knew?) or the trials of potty training, I sit and listen, no diaper rash tips to contribute. Whenever a small voice calls out, "Mom!" I'm the only menstruating female over the age of twenty-two whose head doesn't turn.
Inevitably, during one of my visits, my mother will turn to me with a wistful smile, and says, "I sure would like for you to have a child . . . while I can still pick her up ." She says this as though seemingly unaware of the swarm of toddlers already crawling about at her feet. To my mother, "the more the merrier" isn't so much a pleasantry as it is a maxim for life. When she was my age, she already had five kids pulling at her pants legs, so it's understandable that my unmarried and childless status proves a bit baffling to her. I try to bear this in mind when she calls — as she did recently — to say that she'd just watched The House of Mirth and become "worried" about me.
©2007 Johanna Gohmann and Nerve Media
About the Author
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Johanna Gohmann is a writer living in Brooklyn, New York. |
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