I am an Old, and I am also happily free of children. The desire for children is one of those things that has completely baffled me my entire life. Not that children are bad. I have met some very nice children. I like my sister’s kids a lot, and seeing them go from squalling tiny creatures on my living room floor to responsible, kind grown-ups whose company I genuinely enjoy has been a real trip. But the idea of giving up my entire life so that I could have some kids of my own has never been anywhere in my realm of possibility. I remember telling grown-ups that I was never getting married or having children when I was six years old. Of course, I got a deeply patronizing response, one that I would become quite familiar with as I grew up and heard it over and over again: You’ll feel differently when you’re older. And yet? I do not feel differently when I am old enough to render the entire question of wanting children moot due to my Advanced Age.

But as a woman, there is always that ambient societal pressure to pair off and have kids. It’s everywhere, this heteronormative concept of family. And it’s on the milestone checklist for a “good life”: finish school, get married, buy a house, have kids, get a dog (or maybe the dog comes first), raise kids, retire, die. It’s what you’re “supposed” to do. And a lot of people do! This is not a judgement on them. But I cannot fathom it. I seriously hope I don’t die alone in my apartment, my corpse left to rot until a neighbour complains about the smell, because I didn’t birth some people who would feel compelled to check in on me from time to time, but I can’t imagine a day when I would regret not birthing those people.

Which is why a book like Kimi ni Aetara is so fascinating to me. Kiri, a freelancer in her mid-thirties, is married with a cat, but no plans for children on the horizon. She’s in that grey space that I imagine so many women occupy these days. She’s got a great job and a great relationship, a nice apartment; she doesn’t feel any real lack in her life. She’s happy with the way things are. But she also knows biology is thing working against her here, and if she and her husband do want kids, they are going to have to start doing something about that or her womb will fill with desert dunes. She gets to thinking about this seriously when she finds out that a colleague is pregnant, and after an awkward conversation with her husband, she tips over onto the side of yes, let’s have kids. Continue reading “Kimi ni Aetara Nante Iiou: Nemu Yoko” →