Living in NYC can be a wonderful and genuinely transformative interactive experience, where you meet and connect with people in unexpected and lovely ways. It can also drive you mad and make you want to kill someone. The hubby and I were absolutely ecstatic to find out we're having a girl - of course, stereotypically we would have been happy with boy or girl as long as the anatomy scan said all was well. Both families were happy and all has been going well. At least, until two encounters.
First, a long time friend sent a crazy-ass text declaring girls as being for loving daddy, and boys as being the ones to carry on the legacy of a father and fulfill his dreams and such. Koo-coo, Koo-coo said the clock to that pronouncement, and no response from us.
Second, WHO thinks its ok to comment on random people's pregnancy on the street?? EVERYONE that's who! I can deal with most of this stuff, after all, i've been tolerating random, unsolicited and unwelcome comments ever since puberty gave me breasts. However, ignoring suggestions about names, diet, size of belly for progress in pregnancy, etc is easier than what I encountered yesterday.
Usually it is Black men who feel most comfortable yelling random stuff at Black women, and this was no exception. I don't know where they were from - Caribbean? Africa? - but i'm walking the dog in the heat, waddling as I do now, and out of the blue one of these men speaks up:
Random Strange Man on Street: Hey, I hope that baby is a boy!
After a moment of incredulous silence, I could not help but respond to the casual misogyny:
Actually, its a girl. Which is Better.
They said nothing more and I kept walking. But Damn if that didn't throw a cloud over one of the few gorgeous, not-too-hot NYC days we've been enjoying as of late!
A Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia ice cream pop from a central park vendor smoothed the clouds away quite nicely.
Pregnancy (n): excuse for people to shout shit at you on the street.
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