a dialogue

"Your blog post changed my mind about having kids," M announced.

I gaped in surprise, eyebrows raised, "You can't be serious! -all these years of entrenchment and a measly blog-post changes your mind?!"

Truth be told, I hadn't the slightest intention of changing any one's mind. I read it to him yesterday evening during that ho-hum lull between talk of work and talk of what's for dinner. I read him all my posts, sometimes because I am proud to share them, but more often because it helps the editor in me find mistakes when I read aloud. I wrote honestly of a conversation I had had with a friend. I had formed no conclusions in concluding. I felt instead that I had simply introduced yet another perspective into this on-going 30-something debate I had been having with myself of late. But his clear and seemingly spontaneous reversal caused me to question the foundation of reason on which I have stood these many years. We discussed in all seriousness our reservations: the loss of independence and privacy, the threat of global warming and cultural collapse, the financial strains and complications that go hand in hand with trying to raise a family in the modern world. All seemed somehow less important in comparison with the real and paralyzing fear of someday being totally and completely alone.

In the car tonight, on our way to Hopworks for organic brews and pizza, we delicately danced around the topic. I said, "One of my big fears is having an annoying 3rd wheel tagging along with us all the time. I really like just being with you -and only you." He reached across the console to grasp my hand, and shot me a warm, sidelong glance. "I like being a team, you and I," I continued, "What if there was some other person sitting in the backseat right now -it seems like it could be really annoying and disruptive."

M laughed, "Yeah, and imagine if it was a complete stranger, because you really don't know what sort of person you'll get."

We joked that it would be far easier if you could just conduct interviews. Say, you get a tailored roster, based on your preferences, of 5-10 potential 3rd wheel candidates and you pick the one with whom you realistically think you could stand to live for the next 18 odd years. I can be very particular about the sorts of people I want to hang around, especially for long periods of time. I am quickly exhausted by dull conversation and instantly repelled by clingy and complicated people. I find your average American boring. I sum people up in a snap and am seldom persuaded to disregard those first raw impressions (and I admit that I am wrong some of the time, but not often enough to change my MO). I am uncomfortable, in one way or another, with almost everyone, and there have been rare few in my life with whom I am completely and perfectly natural. And I love each and every one of them. Deeply. So, what if I suck up and decide to have a human of my very own and I don't get the sort that I adore?! -what if I end up with the very sort of person I absolutely loathe?! What if I take one look at my spawn and decide, "yup, another American idiot for the consumer machine." What then?!

We settled in at Hopworks and ordered some beers. Hopworks is shaking up to be a real hipster joint, fitting for the hipster town Portland seems destined to be. As for the clientele, piercings abounded, as well as short funky dos and skinny jeans. Bicycle frames hung in neat rows over the bar and bicycle wheels served as mounts for the lighting. Bicycling is apparently the thing to do here. I own a bike like every good Portlander, but it seldom sees the light of day. In my garish orange sweatshirt and late-1990s bell bottom cords, I felt a bit old and out of place. The bicycle lighting was far too family-style for my mood, and I felt exposed and uncool as I blinked back tears. The conversation plodded along, our hands clasped across the table.

"It's not like there is really anything else that I desire. I lack for material desires, and all the romantic dreams of my youth are gone." M said, as he swallowed the dredges of his IPA, his gaze meeting mine, direct, uninterrupted, solid.

I questioned his radical shift. For a fleeting and anguished moment, I thought that he might be making fun of me. The tears shining behind his eyes told me that he wasn't kidding around. I told him that I want him to make up my mind for me, because I can't do it by myself. His complacency was disconcerting, his ambiguity still apparent enough to make me wonder if this conversation was all a dream.

"Perhaps we are just feeling this way because we are growing older," he said. We are seeing things in a new and different light. We are looking out upon a future that appears somewhat bleaker than it did when we were 20, when we first met at an Amoco station in suburban Bloomington, Minnesota . Then, the whole world was a giant, pure, expansive vista opening before us, mysterious and strange, begging for interpretation and understanding, and after that, action. Our options at that time were as myriad as the decisions we would have to make as the years progressed, decisions which would slowly limit our options one by one.

Now, years have passed and we have had to make many of those decisions together. One of which is has been to live, settle down and remain in Portland, Oregon. We reflected on how we have dreamed over the years to someday live in Mexico -to just pack up and ship off and live in a meager way, learning Spanish and living close to the land. I said, "It is sweet, but that dream has always been for the future - and the future just keeps slipping even further into the future. Maybe it is the sort of dream that stays in the future for a while? -because everyone has those." M agreed, and smiled a wry knowing smile. "And whatever we decide, kids or no, it can still be something we someday do," he said. I nodded my consent.

We paid our tab and headed home, emotionally exhausted from the terrible task of dragging thoughts out of our heads and slapping them down on the table, one by one. We are always nakedly honest with one another, but this is one such topic that has always remained a bit on the fringes. It was strangely intimate to discuss it so openly.

I joked, "Well, if we do have a kid, we will tell it the story of how mommy wrote an off-the-cuff blog post one night and she read it to daddy and he kinda freaked out and had a change of heart and then he convinced mommy and well...that's why you're here!"

Needless to say, dear reader, matters are as up in the air as ever they were. No lasting and final decisions were made. What I didn't include here are the raw, disgusting details. Like how we tried to figure out how we'd make ends meet financially -truly not the stuff of engaging dialogue. And then there's health insurance. We have absolutely shitty health insurance. That would obviously have to change before any decisions were made. Oh, and mommy has to quit smoking first, for one thing. That's certain. I mean really quit. No more of this sometimes-smoking thing. And then there is always global warming looming ever larger on the horizon of our minds. I am not sure that one will go away.

In the end I said, "I think I used to be 90% opposed, 10% pro." I had always declared that I didn't want to make decisions for my future self, and then my future self crept out of the future and shook my hand. Now she is me. "And then, for a while it was more like 75% opposed and 25% pro. So, a slight change between 31 years old and 33 years old. And now that I can taste ever so slightly what it might be like to actually be old, I am sitting square on the middle of the fence: 50/50."

M agrees. 50/50. Toss a coin. On which side does it land? I say heads. Tell me it's tails???