Fairytale Mixtape: Year 2 - 1992

It's 1992 and the boy and the girl are starting to think about starting a family. The song is Love No Limit by Mary J. Blige.

In 1992, the boy and the girl began to talk about starting a family.  When they were dating they talked about having at least three kids maybe four.  The boy came from a family of five and the girl only had one sibling, a sister.  The girl’s father was the only boy in a family of seven, and the poor man didn’t have any sons to carry on the family name. Because of this, the girl wanted to have a bunch of boys.  Tall strapping lads, at least 6 feet tall, that would walk on either side of her and behind her, down the aisle at church every Sunday to show her to her seat.  In her mind’s eye, when she sat down she would smile and turn her head and gently lift it as each of them took their turn kissing her on her cheek.

Since the girl was a teacher, they decided to try to plan it so that the baby would be born right after the school year was out so that the girl could have the entire summer to get accustomed to motherhood without having to take maternity leave.

They decided to shoot for June of the next year.  So when they did the math, October was the month that they needed to get pregnant. They agreed and now had a plan.  The boy was proud of the couple's declaration of planned parenthood.  He went around telling everyone that would listen that they were having a baby in June of the next year as if it were that easy.

He was so naive that he even told a woman at church about their fait accompli. Unbeknownst to the boy, but known to the girl,  the woman had been trying unsuccessfully for some time to conceive with her husband.

Trying to kindly disabuse the boy of his foolish notion, the woman smiled and said to him, “Baby, it don’t really work like that.”

The boy was unfazed by the woman’s lack of faith in his plans.  The girl didn't know what to say.  She didn't know whether to be upset with the boy for spreading their business on the street and in the pews or whether to sit him down and teach him a lesson about discretion and decorum.

She decided to just let the boy be.  He was excited and a little dumb, so she was going to let his excitement act as a pardon for his stupidity.

When October came around, the boy and the girl sat down to map out their exact plan of action.  Sounding like Olivia from the Cosby show, the girl looked at the boy and said,

“I know my body.”

“What does that mean,” asked the boy.

“I know when I ovulate.  I can actually feel it. It’s usually around the 21st or 22nd of the month.  So when I start to feel it then you need to be ready for game time.”

“Wait a minute,” said the boy.  “We can’t risk having our plans going awry by some feeling that you may or may not have.  I have another plan.  The playoffs start on October 1st. No nights off for the entire month until we bring the trophy home.”

“Really?” said the girl as she laughed.

“For real, he replied trying his best to hold back his grin.

“You know you’re just trying to be greedy,” she said.

“That’s not true. It’s Love No Limit with me.”

“Baby, I'm in need of your love

And you got that touch

That I need so much

And I am about to explode

Freely, completely, everything you want I'll be

Good love down to the last drop

And I'm not gonna stop”

“OK,” she said semi-sarcastically as she shook her head and shrugged her shoulders.

The games began that night, but by the second round of the playoffs, the boy couldn't hold up his end of the bargain.  He bit off more than he could chew. He was running out of gas. He was trying to figure out if he could negotiate a new deal.

To conserve energy and not have to play as many back to back games, right before bed time the boy would go downstairs and watch ESPN in the living room.  He had hoped that the girl would get the message and leave him on the bench.

She did for a couple of days, but when she felt herself ovulate, she had to put the team on her back.  She became Michael Jordan.  She had to pull the boy through the last few games, even if it killed him.

It worked. In early November, the boy was hoisting the pregnancy test stick over his head like it was the Larry O’B; like he was the MVP.  The girl just looked at him, shook her head and laughed as she had grown accustomed to doing in the first few years of their marriage.  It's something she would get used to.