The Problem with Naming Your Theoretical Children on a Drunken Friday Night

The problem with naming your theoretical children on a drunken Friday night isn't that they might not be pretty enough, or that you might not remember how to spell them right on their birth certificates when the time comes, or even that they might be in the Top 5 Most Common Baby Names in America. It's that now, you have full responsibility over those little named rascals, because before, they were just this idea, this possibility, and now, they're the real deal: all six of them. 

And now you both have to pick favorites, and sides, and decide the colors of their bedroom walls and who has to sleep in the same room as who. And who's going to get up at 3am tonight to feed them because you did it last night and he promised, but he's really tired from work and says he'll make up for it tomorrow night. And whether Phil is going to play football like his uncle or swim like his dad, and whether Becca is going to do ballet like she wants to or gymnastics like all the other girls at school. My loves, do what you love because nothing else will make you happier: not money, not fame, not anything at all.

And now you have to teach them how to share and say please and thank you, and that it's not okay to eat in church, but here's a bag of Cheerios Kate, sweetheart, just please stay quiet for the next hour or so, and Matt, please stop pulling on your sister's hair. And how you can only have cookies from the cookie jar after dinner, and even then you can only have one. And how 5 x 2 is 10 but 5 to the power of 2 is a whole 'nother thing, which is 25 by the way. But don't be too hard on yourself, because mistakes are okay and you are so much more than just a test grade.

And before you know it they'll be falling in love just like you two did on an elevator that first day of college way back when, and suddenly they'll be saying they don't need you anymore. And here come the dates and the curfews and the tears-- oh, the tears! And Addie swears she'll never find anyone ever again but honey you will, I promise you, you will, just give it some time.

And then before you know it they'll be getting  married and you'll be giving them away, and then it'll just be you two again. Because everyone has moved to other states to start lives of their own and you'll just be those old folks in some picture frames in their living rooms. And you'll be sitting on the back porch on a Sunday evening watching the sunset with a couple of drinks in hand, thinking to yourselves, "When did this all happen?"

And then you'll remember it was when you decided to name your theoretical children on a drunken Friday night, just the two of you alone in the dark, in your poster-filled dorm room. It was when you were wondering if you'd had too much to drink or if the warm feeling inside your chest was because of the way he was looking at you. It was when he said he loved you for the first time and you believed him, and oh sweetheart, it's okay that you did; I would have too. It was when you didn't know better because you're still learning, still growing, still hurting; but I promise you dear, it's why you're here.