Bearing Fruit

I do not have children. And although I’m sure your offspring are the cutest, smartest, most accomplished kids in seven states, please forgive me if I don’t swoon every time they pass gas or paste macaroni onto construction paper. If I sound a bit cranky, it’s because I am. Now that I find myself well past my “childbearing years” — I’m 47 — folks seem quick to pity my lack of little ones.
    “You simply must have a child,” a woman said to me years ago. I wasn’t married at the time and had made no mention of wanting children. To make matters worse, I had just met the woman. Pregnant with her second child, she assumed that I wanted what she had. I hate it when people assume. Really, that’s probably my greatest pet peeve. That and being judgmental. Anyway …
    She’s not the only person, of course, who over the years has caused me to feel “less than” because I did not procreate. Now before you tell me no one can make me feel anything ... that I’m in control of my feelings ... let me say that I’ve actually had women say it to my face: “That’s so sad, that you didn’t have children.” “I can’t imagine living a life without kids.” “At least there will be a part of me left in the world when I die.” Take your pick; none of the comments is supportive of the sisterhood, or even polite, for that matter.
    Maybe I couldn’t have children and did not want to adopt. Maybe, just maybe, I didn’t feel the burning desire to be a mother. Maybe I think the women best suited for motherhood are the ones who dream of it and plan for it.
    Am I less of a woman because I do not have children? In the eyes of some of my peers, yes. But not in the eyes of God. How could I believe anything else? There are many opportunities for leaving one’s mark on the world, and the God I worship wants me to find my own way, not follow the path of others simply because society leans toward motherhood or somebody wants a namesake.
    After I graduated from college in 1983, I went to law school. A mistake from the get-go, I stayed for one semester only because in my family you don’t quit. Wilsons persevere. You don’t take a year off to find yourself, and you don’t call in sick if all you’ve got are a few measly cramps. The thinking seemed to be that if I just stuck it out for the entire semester (I wanted to drop out after two weeks!), things would turn around and all would be well. Wrong.
    At the end of the holiday break I phoned my parents to tell them that my grades were awful — the worst of my academic career — and that I did not think I could return for another semester. “I am miserable,” I said. My father responded: “Stay put. Your mother and I are on our way.”
    We met up at a fast food joint hard by the highway outside Oxford, Miss., where I was in school. The drive from our hometown of Jackson took about three hours. As Daddy stopped his big, black Lincoln town car, he rolled down the front passenger window and commanded, “Don’t say a word. Get in the car.” My mother got out of the car and moved to the back seat, ushering me to take her place.
    Daddy maneuvered the car out of the parking lot toward farmland that has been in our family for generations. It was quiet outside, a crisp day in the country. Inside the car, a booming voice thundered forth from the cassette player in the dashboard.
    “We can’t all be oranges,” intoned self-help guru Leo Buscaglia. “Some of us are meant to be apples.”
    This is how my parents told me to follow my own dreams, and let me know that I didn’t have to be a lawyer just because that’s what my father, one of my two sisters and both brothers-in-law had chosen for careers. (Fast forward to 2009: I am married to a lawyer, and my other sister recently received her law degree at age 56. Enough said.) To this day I don’t know what kind of fruit my parents thought I should be, only that they tended the orchard as best they could and made room for a little variety when their baby girl needed it most.
    I think the lesson holds. Some of us are meant to be mothers, and some of us are not. Some of us will marry; others will remain single. Regardless of what our culture, or even our own kinfolk, might be telling us, our real obligation is to our truest self. Go and be the best apple — or orange — that you can be. Even if you’re (stick with me here) a banana, I dare say God will treasure you just the same.
    P.S. For the record, I am over the moon with excitement about the coming arrival of Baby Cameron, my first great-niece. I feel sure she will be the smartest, most beautiful girl in the nursery.