My favourite mistake

What is the worst way to break bad news to your parents?
I’ve never really felt like having children. And I can rationalise it in very socially responsible and mature ways. When I said that in school, my friends reassured me I would feel differently when I grew up. (Having a child is what fulfils a woman, Carmen would say)
But I turn 27 in a few days, and I don’t any feel different.
So when a magazine wanted to do a story on couples who had closed the nursery door, my friend gave the journo my number.
Quote? Sure. Picture with dog? Great! How do your parents feel? Uh-oh.

This is going to break my mother’s heart (Part IV)
More than the time I told her I don’t want to be a professional dancer. More than the time I didn’t want to marry an NRI doctor. More than the time I told her I didn’t believe in marriage and lived with Tushar. Definitely more than the time I finally gave in, but refused to have a religious wedding ceremony (and thus hurting too many well-wishers who thought they weren’t invited to my wedding).
This one is going to take the cake. (Bring your own popcorn)

My brother said that me wanting to live with Tushar without matrimony was the outcome of too many episodes of Friends. He’s mature and understanding like that.
My father said my ideals would be acceptable, if lived in another land.
Problem is, these are not ideals, this is the way I feel. Chocolate ice cream? No thanks. Children? I’ll pass. Yes, I’ve had pre-marital sex with men other than Tushar. Does he know? Sure, where do you think the jokes come from?
With no offends to anybody, I can’t deal with middle-age ladies who start wearing pants after they visit their son in San Francisco. I can’t deal with ‘simple’ girls who accept a drink, because in the west, it’s acceptable. These may not be very accurate examples, but I hope you know what I mean. I thought belief is that which doesn’t change with geographical boundaries. It does with age, of course.
I live this way, because I don’t know any other. I’m not likely to get religious if I live abroad. I am not likely to wear a mangalsutra because I live here.

But I have been evading telling my parents that I don’t want children and that they should be bugging my brother to reproduce instead. If he didn’t get married before he did that, I would have the focus off me.
I wish I could have spoken to her, and Tushar has hinted enthusiastically that he would like to be present when that happens. But we are not a family that talks; We throw the bomb and run far away.

runs far far away