fish counter encounter

I saw her at the fish counter at Sh.aw's--long dark hair, jeans, a little on the heavy side. Her man was behind her, an arm around her waist, his mouth muffled in her hair as they discussed the scallops. This is what caught my eye as I emerged from the produce section. A man lovin' up on his woman at the fish counter? I am not squeamish about PDA, but for some reason this little scene made me want to roll my eyes.

Then she turned sideways, and I understood. She looked about seven months along. His draped arm was protective. The nuzzles in the hair were "you're having my baby" nuzzles.

Deep breath. I was there for cod. No problem. I would wait behind them in line. It would just be a minute. And then the roaring in my ears and the tightness in my chest. Nope, I couldn't wait.

Wasn't Frie.ndly's ice cream on sale? Two for $4, and it's 90 degrees outside. I spun on my heel towards ice cream aisle, found the freezer case, and tried to focus: ...if I get the black raspberry, Brian will like it but I won't be tempted by it, but bummer to get non-chocolate ice cream, maybe cookies and cream 'cause that's not my favorite either, but does Lilly like it, don't remember, definitely not mint chocolate chip, I'll want to eat it all.... Deep breaths.

This was just last night. I haven't reacted like that in the presence of pregnancy in a long time. If ever, in fact. I remember in the early days, the sight of expecting moms simply made me terrified. They'd be wandering slowly, ignorantly, ahead of me in the cereal aisle, and I would hustle by and psychically beam them a message, Hope your baby doesn't die! The little sleeping ones, too, in the car carriers swung from Daddy's arm or clamped on to grocery carts, prompted this message: Hope...! And honestly, they already looked dead to me. That's what it was like then. Any baby, any small child, so easy to imagine them dead.

But last night, this couple, they just... irritated me. Maybe it was the heat, or the fact that I had accidentally skipped lunch. But I didn't beam them a Hope! or a Good luck! Instead I sent them a grumble, ow, help, grrr, uh-oh bit of incoherence that they did't deserve. This catch of the breath, this whooshing in my ears, this wasn't the grief or the trauma or the low blood sugar. I was just jealous. Just jealous and mad and didn't want to face it at the fish counter where I was innocently seeking cod.

I don't worry for pregnant folks the way I used to. Because the odds are greatly in their favor that they will all be happy and healthy and take their babies home. Most of them. Almost all, in fact. It's just, you know, me. And some people I know. It's just us who are screwed. True, I do not know their back stories; if this couple has lost a child, if that couple has faced infertility. Unfortunately jealousy does not hang around to make these distinctions; it just roars something garbled in my brain and whisks me off towards the ice cream.

Five minutes later I was still staring immobilized into the freezer case, when out of the corner of my eye I saw them turn into my aisle. Breathe, don't look. They stopped right behind me.

*ching, ching ching*

"Oh look at this. I can't decide if it's creepy or cute."

"Yeah, it's cute."

"Do you think Matthew would like it?"

"Sure, let's get it. Or this one here..."

Wouldn't you know it? Behind me across the aisle was the baby section, and they had stopped to look at the toys. I wanted to be so mad at them. They were invading my space. Didn't they know I was trying to get away? (Um, no.) But I gave it up. I was in their aisle. I had picked a dumb escape route. I grabbed a box of mint chocolate chip, selected my cod fillets, and made my way to the checkout, where a tabloid cover hollered at me, "Kel.ly Pres.ton Pregnant at 47!" Super.

The weirdest element of this experience was realizing that missing Angel Mae was not the instigation of my fish counter reaction (although I do miss her). Rather it was the current absence of a current pregnancy. It was all about the "IF" word. And that was a first for me: my first public infertility freak out.

This is not a blog about infertility. Hell, I don't even know if I am infertile. But the 14 months since I gave birth are starting feel like an eternity. And while I'm not planning to blog my "TTC journey," this space is nothing if not a space of longing. So, you might hear about it now and then.

And for the record, if I know you, read you, love you, I do want to know about your pregnancy. Pregnancy is nothing to apologize for, and I'm in charge of my own boundaries about what I can hear, and when, and how to wrassle out my emotions without making them your problem. But I reserve the right to silently direct my ire to irritatingly happy, PDA-licious, total strangers in grocery stores. Everyone needs an easy target.