The $1,000 Birthday Party
When I was pregnant, I learned pretty quickly that there were two things I should avoid completely: Googling pregnancy “symptoms” and unborn baby fears, and reading any message boards on said subjects. The information (“information”) I dug up was always terrifying, confirming whatever fears I’d unwisely set out to investigate. Really, pregnant women should just talk to a couple of good friends who are moms, maybe get a book or two, and leave it at that.
I’ve taken my own advice, refraining from any of that after about the first trimester. But I seem to have forgotten myself now that we’re in NYC. I don’t read message boards about babies, health, etc.; but over the past few days I’ve been perusing a variety of “city baby” websites, clicking on random topics—how much household income do you need to live comfortably in NYC? Where should I send my child to school? Is it possible to have a child’s birthday party in NYC for less than $1,000?—and, subsequently, feeling a low simmer of panic deep in my gut.
Let it be said, first of all, that I don’t think you have to make $500K+ to live comfortably in NYC, as many of that message board’s posters claimed; however, I’m not yet facing private school tuition. And I definitely don’t think I could ever stomach a $1K birthday party; however, I’ve never faced the prospect of hosting twenty kids in a tiny apartment and realizing fairly quickly that just won’t work. So I’m appalled—but I’m also ignorant of how life works here once a baby becomes a kid. And so I can’t stop reading, even though I know that people who post to message boards are generally not the people whose advice I’d take on anything at all.
Our plan is to move out of the city by the time Lucia is school age, but if my birth plan was any indication, child-related plans of any sort are an eye-rolling idea. And so the tremor of doubt intensifies. What if this becomes us? People who struggle to make it work on a half million dollars, people who outsource birthday parties, people who pay for multi-thousand-dollar sleepaway camp? I have to remind myself that we are not those people. And I don’t think we will become them simply because we’re now big-city people once again.
I once woke up with a numb lip, Googled “numb lower lip left side,” and found out I had twenty-four hours to live. I should have just made a cup of coffee, read the paper, and let the pinched nerve or whatever it was work itself out. Now that I’m living the baby-in-the-city life, I need to just cease and desist with the urban-life message boards. Andrew and I have our ways; we make things work; we’re happy and don’t need a lot of things or money to be that way, never have, and don’t plan on raising a child who needs all that for happiness, either (with the exception now and then, of course, of a $20 chew toy). Being here doesn’t change who we are. And if the time comes when I realize there’s no way to celebrate Lucia’s birthday with a group of little friends for less than a month’s rent—well, then we’ll hear the message loud and clear that it’s time to go.
I’ve taken my own advice, refraining from any of that after about the first trimester. But I seem to have forgotten myself now that we’re in NYC. I don’t read message boards about babies, health, etc.; but over the past few days I’ve been perusing a variety of “city baby” websites, clicking on random topics—how much household income do you need to live comfortably in NYC? Where should I send my child to school? Is it possible to have a child’s birthday party in NYC for less than $1,000?—and, subsequently, feeling a low simmer of panic deep in my gut.
Let it be said, first of all, that I don’t think you have to make $500K+ to live comfortably in NYC, as many of that message board’s posters claimed; however, I’m not yet facing private school tuition. And I definitely don’t think I could ever stomach a $1K birthday party; however, I’ve never faced the prospect of hosting twenty kids in a tiny apartment and realizing fairly quickly that just won’t work. So I’m appalled—but I’m also ignorant of how life works here once a baby becomes a kid. And so I can’t stop reading, even though I know that people who post to message boards are generally not the people whose advice I’d take on anything at all.
Our plan is to move out of the city by the time Lucia is school age, but if my birth plan was any indication, child-related plans of any sort are an eye-rolling idea. And so the tremor of doubt intensifies. What if this becomes us? People who struggle to make it work on a half million dollars, people who outsource birthday parties, people who pay for multi-thousand-dollar sleepaway camp? I have to remind myself that we are not those people. And I don’t think we will become them simply because we’re now big-city people once again.
I once woke up with a numb lip, Googled “numb lower lip left side,” and found out I had twenty-four hours to live. I should have just made a cup of coffee, read the paper, and let the pinched nerve or whatever it was work itself out. Now that I’m living the baby-in-the-city life, I need to just cease and desist with the urban-life message boards. Andrew and I have our ways; we make things work; we’re happy and don’t need a lot of things or money to be that way, never have, and don’t plan on raising a child who needs all that for happiness, either (with the exception now and then, of course, of a $20 chew toy). Being here doesn’t change who we are. And if the time comes when I realize there’s no way to celebrate Lucia’s birthday with a group of little friends for less than a month’s rent—well, then we’ll hear the message loud and clear that it’s time to go.
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