X always equals infertility

I bet we've been together for a million years.
And I bet we'll be together for a million more.

Oh, it's like I started breathing on the night we kissed,
And I can't remember what I ever did before....

For some strange reason, I often recall a very random line from Family Ties - you know, Alex P. Keaton, Mallory, and gang... Well, Alex's visiting uncle tells him to not worry about his Algebra test; he advises him to just remember that, "x always equals 8."

Lately I've had a strange understanding that for me, x always equals infertility.

It's just always there. Most people don't get that about me. I don't think anyone does. How could they, unless they've walked this path? I can seem fine. I can seem happy. I can seem myself. Maybe I am all of those things. Even so, x is always lurking just barely below the surface. Just waiting.

It's not fair - and I don't mean to me. It's not fair to... well, my hubby, Ar.

See, Ar is a pretty single-focused guy. Not much for the multi-tasking... He is constantly amazed at how many windows I can have open on my computer - and just seamlessly jet back and forth between them, managing a dozen ideas and tasks at once. I think that's where he notices my amazing talent the most. But I'm one heck of a multi-tasker, in general. I used to cook and bake for a living - and talk about multi-tasking... It's second nature.

It's a blessing - and a curse.

If I may offer such a broad generalization, none of this is probably mind-blowing stuff for most women. My point is that pesky x is always there... no matter how happy I seem, how many fascinating things we're discussing, what I'm doing, or where I'm going. X is there. I'm more familiar with x, than I am my own shadow.

My Ar forgets how prevalent x is for me. He doesn't mean to; it's not that he doesn't care, because he very much does. It's just that he's not like me. If he's happy, he's just happy. If he's having a stimulating conversation, he only knows that conversation, if he's driving - oddly enough - he's just focused on the road. Such strange and foreign concepts to me.

I don't want to brag, but I can cover eleven distinct emotions in the span of three minutes - all while making a chocolate truffle cheesecake, coconut stewed chicken, balancing the checkbook, playing Scrabble, and checking my work e-mail.

And just because I seem happy this second doesn't mean that he isn't going to say something seemingly very innocuous that in a fraction of a second reminds me of something that reminds me of something that reminds me of something that makes me instantaneously feel every single ounce of my raging infertility.

It's a game-changer.

And it's not fair, especially not to Ar.

One minute he's with the sweet (ha!), loving (definitely), fun (frequently), weird (always), interesting (occasionally), beautiful (he thinks so) woman that he fell in love with and married; the next minute, I've gone completely stark raving infertile on him. And it's just not fair to him, but x often catches me by surprise, too.

Should he have to run every single word he says through some magical infertil-filter to check if somehow it will make me think of something that makes me think of something that makes me think of something that reminds me how incredibly infertile I am?

Even if one argued that he should have to - since such a magical device as an infertil-filter doesn't exist (note to self: invent infertil-filter) - would he even be capable of such telepathic analysis? Would anyone?

...what would we do baby, without Us?

Thank God, I don't have to find out what we'd do, baby, without Us... Ar loves me anyhow. And I'm grateful. Would that I were worthy.

Sha la la la...

Song of Solomon 8:6-7: Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot sweep it away. If one were to give all the wealth of one’s house for love, it would be utterly scorned.