What if?

I don’t read as much as you would expect of a librarian. Granted, I do enjoy it, but for the last 5 years I’ve become more easily distracted by the TV, a nap, or just about anything else that offers a break from parenting. If I gave you two numbers that represented how many books either my wife or I read this year, you would guess wrong.  She’s got some serious goals.

Nevertheless, I find time when I can. I recently read a novel in which the protagonist, disappointed about the unsuccessful and lonely state of her early adult life (in her opinion), found herself, after an attempt to end it, instead faced with the opportunity to try on other lives she could have led had she made one pivotal choice to move in a different direction. It wasn’t exactly a sci-fi approach of how things might change on a large scale, as in the parallel universes explored by, say, Star Trek or Marvel storytelling (see “Loki” on Disney+, for instance). No, this was more of a personal nature, as in “What if I had married so-and-so?”, “Should I have taken the opportunity to move over there?”, or “What if I had pursued that passion wholeheartedly?”

A form of this question came to my mind recently.  As I write, I’m here at home with our middle halfway through a 10-day stay, just the two of us. To be more specific, we’ll be here together, alone, for the duration of a standard COVID quarantine period. Sparing too many details, it took literally many miles and much frantic maneuvering by my wife and me over an initial and unexpected 24 hour period to figure out how and where each of the five us, already spread out across the state, would place ourselves for the duration once it was discovered she tested positive very early into summer camp and I had to book-it to get her out of there.

As I drove the first few hours of the change, the sudden diversion in plans brought the question to mind: “What would I be doing if I didn’t have kids?”

Before you feel inclined to judge, a few clarifications: I have kids, and I don’t wish that I didn’t. We’ve shared many times with one another that the choice, for us, was inevitable, one way or another. We both would always have regretted not choosing parenthood. Also, once you meet or conceive them, you love them and worry incessantly about their present and future, God’s admonitions not to worry notwithstanding. Rather, this question is better phrased, “If the choice to have kids had never been made in the first place, knowing nothing of them or about the future as it is, what would life look like right now?”

My wife and I had four years together to enjoy the DINK lifestyle. And enjoy it, we did. Coming home from work or waking up to the weekend, I had plenty of “me” time, as did she. Go for a run? Sure. Cook dinner and watch your favorite show quietly together on the couch ? Of course. Randomly go out for a nice dinner in the middle of the week with other DINK friends? What’s stopping you? 

Travel, namely, is one among many ways we seized the day. Never before or since have I been able to tell anyone, for example, that I would be joining my wife on her work trip for the weekend not across town or simply out of state, but in Belgium.  We didn’t even have to arrange a pet-sitter for such a spur-of-the-moment trip.

So, I imagine we’d be doing any number of things. We’d likely be living in a different house, maybe even abroad. I’d be further along in a full-time career. I’d be making much more time to take better care of myself and wouldn’t have the dad-belly I’ve been successfully nurturing the past five years. 

You don’t realize how much you take that time for granted until it’s gone. They aren’t “kidding” when they say kids change things. And once you’re in, no turning back. 

Sacrifice is the name of the game with kids. And it’s hard. Sure, there are still plenty of pleasures to be had; but school, homework, trips to the doctor, soccer practice, positive COVID tests forcing you all to change your plans, etc., now take precedence. Take ample time for yourself later. 

Not hard at all to imagine what you would be doing if it were only the two of you. Tempted to sigh longingly while pondering it over, I’m prodded into an even better question:

“Where would they be had you not chosen parenthood?”

Ouch. 

“It’s not about you.” That’s how a well-known minister many years ago opened his bestseller. And I’m afraid he’s right. 

Our three were adopted. Our kids weren’t always our kids. I have no way of knowing what life might have been for them had we not made this choice, but I understand it certainly may not have been idyllic or privileged. But that’s not a question they have to put to themselves. In fact, “What would I be doing if I didn’t have kids?” is a selfish question, I realize, and one which they wouldn’t want answered.

In the end, the protagonist of the story ended up almost right back in the life she left behind. There were other lives that were most certainly worth envying, but not one of them was perfect, and each had its drawbacks due to other choices not made.   With a changed perspective and attitude, she made the best of where she was, not dwelling on where she thought she should or could be.

So, maybe it isn’t the best use of time to wonder what could’ve or might’ve been in various alternate versions. It seems to me such over-speculation makes a god out of our ability to choose. If you believe, as I do, that there is a God ultimately writing the story, then there’s something to his instruction not to stress or worry about the day to day.

I see I could be doing a lot of things were it just the two of us, and we’d likely enjoy ourselves thoroughly.  I could choose a more comfortable life, a life more for myself.  A lot of us choose that, and many of us think that’s what we are supposed to pursue. But it would be a life vacant of the opportunities and benefits — the love — I could provide to others. 

Speculation aside, the reality is there are 3 kids who comfortably call us “mom” and “dad”, and I know for a fact they think it ridiculous that it could be any other way.  Why should I, then, spend time imagining it differently? How they’ve been changed for the better by this choice is far more important than the choice I could have made solely for me. 

God, give me rest from parenting when it’s needed, and help me to remember you’re writing the story. I need not worry about the choices I could have made nor remain in regret for those I have.  Amen.