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"Babies" Having Babies
Wow, Dahlia, thanks for sharing that story on "young" parents in the WaPo. I'm not quite sure I get the point of the article, but it leaves me with a million random thoughts. First off, it puts to rest the notion that only women write puff pieces. Are these just-about-thirtysomethings looking for sympathy (for forgoing all those wild nights out and exotic trips to the Galapagos) and plaudits for braving the uncharted waters of having a child ... in their late 20s? Give me a break. For how many years after college do you really need to be hitting the party scene every weekend, or hopping last-minute flights to Vegas, or taking that girls weekend at the spa? (Lest I sound too callous, I should add that I fit the profile of the couples mentioned. After five years of living together, my husband and I married in our late 20s and had our first child when I was 30. We were even among the first of our friends to have kids. Big whoop.)
I have no doubt it can be difficult to decide whether to have children before your career truly takes off or to wait until you're established. Alas, there's no one-size-fits-all solution to that dilemma. But the fact remains that, whether one is 28 or 33 or 38, if you are a college-educated, married professional, raising a child is a heck of a lot easier than it would be if you were 22 and single and struggling to make ends meet. I'm sure there are plenty of such TRULY young parents out there who are doing an admirable job—even if they are too busy to reflect that "parenthood is giving them a new level of ambition that is sophisticated and rejuvenating"—and I think their stories would be vastly more interesting than what was deemed worthy of front-page treatment in the Washington Post.
About Rachael Larimore
- Rachael Larimore is Slate's copy chief.
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