Just a few seconds later, a grandmotherly woman rushed towards me with my cart. “Excuse me, honey, but you almost forgot your baby! You would’ve missed him, wouldn’t you?” She laughed as if that was the funniest joke she’d ever heard.
Shit. Now what?
“Thank you,” I said. I turned and continued walking towards the pharmacy.
I decided for some reason that my baby would be most likely to go unnoticed by the home blood pressure kits. This time, after I rolled him away, I walked towards the exit. I was done taking messing around, I wanted to get out of there. Then I heard the announcement.
“Paging patient Toomey, paging Patient Toomey. Your baby is ready and you can pick him up in the pharmacy.” I walked coolly back to the pharmacy, rolled my son out of the store, left him by the rack of shopping carts outside, and ran. Then I woke up.
This dream has stayed with me for fourteen years and I still worry about its meaning. Do I not want to be a mother? Am I afraid I’ll be a bad mother if I do have kids? Or am I just afraid of responsibility in general? I’m not sure what any of it means. But one thing’s for sure—I always keep my distance from babies in grocery store carts.
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