If it happens, it happens.

The Man and I bought groceries and went out to dinner tonight.

On our way home, I asked him, "So, now what?"

We are still waiting on an answer re: IVF. And for some reason, waiting around has given me some time to become- well, if not ambivalent, rather detached from the subject.

I still occasionally well up with tears when I see parents and children together. The thought that I may never have children of my own is still raw, and it just seems...well, wrong somehow. We are meant to have kids somehow, some way, I know that. Maybe now is just not the right time. Maybe our kids will be born to someone else, and find their way to us eventually.

It's hard to be philosophical about it, but there it is. It's hard to wrap my head around paying $15,000 for something that only has a 38.2% chance of working (at least, at our clinic). Especially when it's not our money.

Is it worth that? To see my big blue eyes and widow's peak and his wavy hair and generous mouth on someone new that my husband and I have created together? To be able to use the names we chose together? To be able to ooh and ahh over silly hand-knit hats and baby blankets and decorate the room in the rainforest theme that I decided I wanted- oh, back in 2001?

We planned to buy a camcorder and record for posterity the first wobbling steps, the first giggles and words, learning the alphabet, reading bedtime stories, the pictures with Santa and on the pony. The Christmas pageant, the Halloween costumes, the soccer team, the graduations. The big wedding, and the grandchildren.

Now that I have it down in print, it seems silly to wonder if it's worth it. All those things, are, like the Mastercard commercials like to point out, priceless.

But I am still left wondering, am I being selfish, to feel that I am being denied so much? If we decide not to go through with it, or are forced by circumstance to abandon it...when will the diaper bags and the baby slings stop tormenting me? How long will it take before I can see a little girl in the checkout line, happily eating an ice cream with her mom, and recognize those long lashes and dark ringlets and pink Converse sneakers as anything other than a personal failure on my part?

Tonight, my sister-in-law called me. Her marriage is falling apart. We had a long discussion about how she has done everything she can, that her husband (my husband's brother) has evidently turned into a vampire- happily sucking up all of the love, effort, and money, and giving nothing back in return. We talked a lot about what she should do.

In trying to describe my SIL to friends, I have said that she's kind of like Luna Lovegood. She doesn't look like her, and her mannerisms are totally different, she's got this absolute honesty that's airy-fairy and blunt at the same time. Uncomfortable truths come bubbling from her lips at inopportune moments, all the time, but it's not mean-spirited, just stream of consciousness. It just skewers you because you are totally not expecting it.

She basically told me how lucky I was, vis-a-vis The Man, and said, "You and The Man are going to be parents. You were meant to be a mom. A cool, San Francisco Mom. And I know it is going to happen for you." She paused, and then said, "I saw it. I saw you walking down the street."

I didn't realize what she had said until I had gotten off the phone. (I was trying to keep it together after the whole, "cool SF mom" thing. ) Is it me, or is the phrasing really kind of eerie and weird?

Maybe I am going crazy.