Take a step back. Remove yourself from the emotionally-invested view of your life. See the timeline of your life and think of it in the context of a movie script. Now hold it here and think about this: Can you partially, fully or even just somewhat see where you’re life is going next? Not necissarily limited to career goals…do you *feel* like you have an emotional grasp on what could come next? If you’re like me, you do. And you feel prepared for it.

Now the thing is, I was pondering how most of us are probably this way. I personally think that in 5-10 years i’ll still be in design, perhaps working on another degree, married and God-willing own my own house. At this moment in time, I can comfortably say that I can *feel-out* what the next few years will be like.

But what if you threw a child in there? Every comfortable notion I have of stability, everything that I know today would change. Drastically. Having a child rewrites your entire future. The second that you know you’re going to be a parent, you might as well kiss goodbye any idea of “knowing what the future will hold.” To me this is concurrently breathtaking and terrifying.

Now, rest assured that I’m not expecting any children soon (damn, let me work on the marriage part first, ok? sheesh.), but this concept is something i’ve never thought of before. I mean, I’ve always wanted children. In fact, the only sure thing i’ve ever had in my life is the knowledge that I want to be a father. I can’t wait to be a father. But thinking of it in this light scares the bejeebus out of me. The entire script of my personal movie would be rewritten, because the x-fact of a child rearranges so many other variables. What an incredible idea.

Call it trite, but reading Lionel Shriver’s book has me deep in thought…