The Children are Our Future.

Originally Posted 6/30/2009.

No, I haven’t seen Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen yet. No, I don’t know when I’m going to. Get off my case.
Instead, I bring you news from another front. So, I’m adopted. It’s not really a big deal, just an interesting tidbit about myself.
Apparently there are people with children who harass childless people about not having children. These people are known as, “breeders.” This phenomenon has become so common that childless people have made “Breeder Bingo,” a bingo game based on the things “breeders” say to them in regards to children.

I start work tomorrow, work at a summer camp for kids ages 6 through 12. I figured posting this is mildly appropriate because, by the time camp is over, I will not want to see a child in that age range for months, and I will be grateful that their parents came to pick them up every day.

This is the “Breeder Bingo” board, and here are my ever-so-tactful answers to all of these questions.

1. “It’s different when it’s your own!”
No, it’s not. It’s the same. Except I can’t give it back.
2. “Your child could grow up to cure cancer!”
Based on the way things went for me, my motivation, and my work ethic, I highly doubt that.
3. “People like you SHOULD have kids!”
Yeah, and people like you really shouldn’t.
4. “You were a baby once, too!”
Okay…water is wet. The sky is blue. The Pope is Catholic. Oh, sorry, were we not having a state-the-obvious competition?
5. “What about the family name?”
Yeah, it’s pretty sweet, isn’t it?
6. “Who will take care of you when you’re old?”
Well, for one, I don’t expect to need to be ‘taken care of.’ And if I do, there will be very well-paid nurses for that.
7. “What if your parents didn’t have kids?”
I’m adopted. They didn’t ‘have kids’ the way you’re implying anyway. Suck it. I’m special.
8. “The only reason to get married is to have children!”
Two words: Shotgun. Wedding.
9. “It’s all worth it.”
Weren’t those Ted Bundy’s last words?
10. “The biological clock is ticking!”
So is the atomic clock.
11. “You’ll change your mind.”
You a psychic or something?
12. “If everyone didn’t have kids, the human race would die out!”
You see that as a bad thing? We’re a virus with nice shoes.
13. “But the Bible said, ‘go forth and multiply!’”
The Bible says a lot of things. I believe one of them was, “Jesus wept.”
14. “You forget the pain of labor and birth!”
What?
15. “People who don’t want kids are selfish!”
And…there’s something wrong with that?
16. “You aren’t a real adult until you have kids!”
Legally, that’s not true. I was an adult at 18.
17. “Children are a woman’s greatest achievement!”
No they’re not. Now go in the kitchen and make me a sandwich. That will be your greatest achievement.
18. “Don’t you want to give your parents grandchildren?”
We never really discussed it. It seems a little presumptuous to say that they want them without asking, doesn’t it?
19. “It’s the most important job in the world!”
I don’t know, there are some pretty important jobs out there. Like whoever makes alarm clocks.
20. “What’s the matter, don’t you LIKE kids?”
Yeah, if I can give them back later.
21. “The children are our future!”
Well…that sucks.
22. “Don’t you want genetic immortality?”
Yes! And that’s exactly why I’m having myself cryogenically frozen so that I can be revived when we figure out this whole “how to live forever” deal.
23. “Nothing is better than that “new baby” smell.”
Yeah. Nothing smells better than fresh loads of feces every 10 minutes. Believe me. Nothing.
24. “Aren’t you curious to see what they would look like?”
Not really, no.