I am often asked do I want children? The answer a year ago was yes. Today, the answer is maybe I do but not as soon as tomorrow or next month. As I get older I am realizing that motherhood is possibly not something I want to explore. Maybe it is because I am too selfish or maybe I just realize that I am not cut out for parenting. True, I have 4 dogs that I refer to as my children but clearly in a stable, uncontaminated mind there is no comparison. When I see unruly children being scolded by their parents in public I can’t avert my eyes. Train wrecks in motion or otherwise stopped often hold my attention. At that moment of viewing I only lack the popcorn. In the days of ritalin and ADD, I don’t feel like I am missing out on much. The question is who do you feel the most sorry for – parent or child? I am going for the child. They did not ask to be brought into this world. You thought they were what the world needed and maybe you are right.

I am no professional but if you yourself lack the maturity and discipline in your own life how can you pour what you don’t have into someone else’s? I am sure there are at least ten good benefits to one bad benefit of being a mommy. But honestly, I don’t think I want to find out. I have actually been told and I quote “it is not natural not to want to have your own children”. I have enough issues of taking care of myself let alone another human being. Kids today have it too easy. Everything I wanted as a child, little adults today have by their 4th birthday. I mean come on, eight year olds and cell phones? Shouldn’t eight year olds be learning how to operate the washing machine and take out the garbage? And if they are really lucky they are learning how to load the dishwasher and not be the dishwasher. I do understand that technology today is farther advanced than when I was a kid but the magic of completing the Mini Page in Saturday’s paper with your grandmother or lying in the backyard looking for shooting stars is much more a memory maker than watching Hannah Montana or having a MySpace page.

Don’t get me wrong now I don’t think children and parents should be quarantined to a remote island. But I do think that because you are letting them run around in a restaurant that I am about to drop $50 in, that I shouldn’t have to smile and say “awww” because you think they are cute or acknowledge and act concerned while they are pitching a total fit because chicken nuggets are not on the menu.

Maybe children are what my life is missing but until I have them, I won’t agree with that. I am not a parent today simply for the same reasons I am not a medical doctor – I am not qualified.