at least I’ve got Paris. Five full days strolling the Seine and the Musée Picasso, five days of café crème, five days of croissants. And five days free of the relentless swarm of Alix’s emails asking for more research on the latest baby controversy du jour, treating me like I’m her secretary, and trapping me at the office well past midnight most nights.
Nope. What I’ve learned the hard way, postrecession “mediapocalypse,” as assistant ranks have been traded for tech solutions, is this: having a child is really the only excuse a woman can use to work regular work hours or leave early. Single women don’t have the same luxury, and therefore must take on the extra work, little cleanup projects and finishing up when the moms on staff have a hard stop. No baby—no excuse not to stay late.
“Everyone, everyone, shh! I’m going to make the call,” says Caitlyn above the growing din. She picks up the phone and fights to hold back a giggle. “Pippa, Cynthia needs to see you in the conference room—NOW.”
We’ve played this trick countless times at Paddy Cakes, or The Baby Magazine for Moms and All Their Little Neuroses as Jules, my work BFF and the only other mid-leveler on staff, and I call it. As we wait, I fiddle with my old cracked iPhone 4—the one corporate refuses to upgrade—and try to switch off the alerts for the FitBaby app our web editor is having me test out for a story. It’s the one that supposedly monitors vital signs for your pregnancy, tracking miles walked, nutrition, sleep and the pièce de résistance: an ominous meter that calculates the totals into “Baby Smiles” using a patented and secret—albeit slightly random—algorithm. For “millennial moms who are dissatisfied with the typical pregnancy conversation and are looking for a more fun—and fit—experience,” read the press release, which I’ve already thrown in the trash. It won’t stop alerting me with “Push :) Notifications” that I need to “push it harder” to bring up my Baby Smiles score for the story.
“To do list?” pokes Jules, sensing my Mach-10 distractibility.
“It’s getting there,” I flat out lie.
Jules winces. “Then I hate to tell you, but I heard Alix talking to Tamara. The Marigold Matthews cover has dropped out—due to ‘exhaustion.’”
“Diet pills and a botched mummy tuck, you mean.”
Jules rolls her eyes, yes.
“Great...” I tug my blousy top down over my dirty little secret—my pair of size eight maternity jeans pilfered from the office giveaway table. Thanks to my midnight feedings as of late: cereal, some hummus scooped from the container with my finger because I forgot to buy carrots again, followed by a new brand of vegan cashew-milk ice cream/numbing agent. Jules is too quick not to notice, eyeing me.
“Do not even try to maternity-jean shame me,” I tell her.
“Liz.” My overly practical office BFF from age twenty-two has only to say my name to trigger me.
“They’re just so...comfortable,” I say.
Arghhh! I wince as I see the time on my phone. It’s 2:27 p.m. I’ve got exactly three hours and thirty-three minutes to finish my work before rushing home to pick up my suitcase, then head to the airport for my 10 p.m. flight. But now with the threat of the cover dropping out, I start to sweat. More coffee needed sends a signal from my temple. And sugar. My ever-present fantasy arises again: quitting to freelance travel write, my secret back-of-the-mind dream for what feels like months now. Maybe I won’t get on the return flight.
I quickly check my account. I have $405 to make it through until next pay period. Phew. That should be enough while I’m in Paris on the press trip, and virtually all meals and activities will be covered. Then another alert. My credit card balance needs exactly $425 for the next payment due tomorrow. My throat begins to dry up...
“Shh! Everyone, shh! She’s coming!” Caitlyn hushes us all again giddily even though the walls of the conference rooms are all glass.
Everyone giggles as Pippa spots the balloons. She softens into a huge smile and rubs her large belly as her eyes light up at the sight of the $1,789 Bugaboo Madaleen stroller we all had to chip in for, raised up on the conference table like a biblical golden calf.
“Liz!” says Chloe, touching her eye where her false lash is askew. “So how are you and JR doing? Heading off to Paris, I hear!”
I look down. I guess Jules hasn’t said anything to our coworkers. “No, it’s a press trip for Bourjois-Jolie, actually. JR and I broke up.”
“Oh, Liz,” she says, offering me a sympathetic look. “Are you okay? What happened?”
“We just weren’t getting along,” I say, embarrassed.
“It’s okay, Liz. What are you, thirty? You’ve still got time.”
“Thirty-one. But it’s fine.”
Talia joins in. In her early forties and married with twin two-year-old girls, I can tell she can’t help herself. “You broke up with JR? After four years? Wasn’t he about to pop the question?”
“Um, sort of. But that’s okay,” I respond, another attempt at brightness.
“Well, don’t waste too much time. You don’t want to miss your window.”
“Uh, thanks.”
“It’s just so haarrrd out there right now to be single, isn’t it?” says Chloe, her own skating-rink-sized rock gleaming like a searchlight from her left hand.
“No, it’s fine.” What I really want to say is, “If by hard, you mean searching for the unicorn of Tinder while spending weekends under a duvet, ordering Seamless and watching endless rom-coms on Netflix, starting with The Back-up Plan and ending with Under the Tuscan Sun as a sort of ‘final option,’ than yes, maybe, a little.”
Chloe then turns to Talia. “So, how are the girls?”
“Oh, you know how it is, new motherhood...”
“I know, we’re sleep training now. Weissbluth.” She cocks a brow conspiratorially.
“We did Weissbluth, Sears and Ferber, and finally the girls are mostly getting through the night. But you know who ends up being the one to put them back to sleep when they wake up at 3 a.m.?” says Talia pointing at herself. “Moi!”
“Exactly,” responds Chloe.
The whole room joins in now, as they debate the merits of the latest types of sleep training as if their value as women depended on it. Ground zero for competitive parenting, we’ve battled our way through Mommy Wars, Tiger Parenting, French Parenting, Elephant Parenting, Amish Parenting, Leaning In, Opting Out, Attachment and Co-sleeping, Anti-Vaxx, Free Range, ’70s-style, Gluten-Free Gooping, Paleo Parenting, KonMari Parenting (only do things that spark joy!)...not to mention “She who shall not be named” (shh... Jenny McCarthy). The rise of the “mommy” culture has turned modern motherhood into a marketing concept—a business to run—and our magazine has led the charge. Your child is no longer merely your offspring, a conception born out of love and fate, but your product to be programmed and perfected.
With the consensus that the baby should be further along, Chloe adds nervously, “We’re thinking of trying the sleep consultant we featured in the January issue.”
“Before
