Repeat Engagement
If I father another baby for my friends, will I be single forever?
by Jack Murnighan
January 4, 2007
The day my son turned one, his two moms and I took turns standing behind him, holding his arms up and keeping him balanced as he stiff-gaited his way across their living room. He's a lucky kid: three parents, zero divorces. His moms are lesbians. Two-and-a-half years ago, they asked if I'd want to be a participatory birth dad. I said yes; Lars is the little magic that resulted, and now we're thinking about doing it again. We are a family, extended.
He's fourteen months now, the little Larsie-man (made out of marzipan). He's skinny but tall, bright-eyed and extroverted, able (if willing) to walk across the room to get a ball or a hug, and the loquacious employer of a five-word lexicon. Ma-ma we know, and they both get called it. Na-na is grandma (maternal), who comes by frequently. I seem to be Da, though da-da is in more common use and clearly means dog (they have one), cat (three), and ball (innumerable). Sometimes I get lumped into that category. Lately, when throwing the da-da to daI'm a never-married man; I can't help wondering to what extent Lars is either cause or effect.-da, he has added a non-ahh sound to his arsenal, an apt response to most human endeavors: Uh-oh. Perfectly articulated, as if he knows already how things turn out. That's my boy.
Happy as our rhomboid family is, we don't all live together. I'm a bachelor in New York City, galavanting away the last years of my thirties. His moms are an eleven-year committed couple in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Krista, the biological mom, is two years my junior; Betsy, mom prime, two years my senior. I spend a day a week with them, maximizing my play time with Junior, giving the gals a little time off, delivering the odd milk bottle and changing a diaper now and then. Part-time as I may be, free — truly — from most of the responsibilities and headaches of infant-rearing, open as I am to accusations from other fathers of "getting off scot-free," I still feel like a dad, kinda. The way the Sunday angler still calls himself a fisherman even as the tradesmen laugh in their nets.
So now the three of us are considering doing it again, and here is where the other shoe drops. I said I'm an un- and never-married man, but I can't help wondering to what extent Lars (and his future sibling, if extant) is either cause or effect of this fact. Cause is somewhat clearer to assess: my last girlfriend and I were six months in when Lars was born. She knew he was coming, but she couldn't foresee the emotions that would come with him. Again and again, she would say "The first time you . . . " this and "The first time you . . . " that ". . . won't be with me." I'd try to explain how different it would feel having a child with her, in the context of a romantic relationship and having him home with us. Post-birth, I pointed out how different it was — how I wasn't even there for Lars's delivery — but she imagined that the wonder would be lost to me, old hat, by the time we had a child together. With all my heart, I knew she was wrong, but I couldn't blame her for feeling the way she did.
Now, it might be easier for a potential wife prospect; Lars lives and breathes. A girlfriend could meet him and take her emotional temperature on the situation from the get-go. Of course, if there's no hot prospect by the time that Krista, Betsy and I do have another child — and we are going to start trying again soon — who knows how much harder it might be on this hypothetical fiancée. There's that old saying: once, you're a philosopher; twice . . .? It will depend a lot on the woman, but I doubt it will be easy.
©2007 Jack Murnighan and Nerve Media
About the Author
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Jack Murnighan is a freelance writer and editor. He lives in New York but busses to Philly two days a week to teach at the University of the Arts and to spend time with his son, Lars, and Lars's two mommies. He can be reached at ondemandediting@gmail.com. |
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