Can the Motherless Mother?

So I'm 34 and I have no children. I've been married for ten years to a man I'm pretty into and yet we have no offspring to speak of. I've been asked 'why' on many occasions and each time I just screw my face up in mock disgust and shake my head to shut that conversation down. I don't need to have an answer as to why I haven't procreated and the truth is I'm not really sure myself.

Growing up I wasn't overly excited by dolls that wet themselves and I rarely played House. I used to think I was just programmed differently and I still don't think I can be trusted not to kill something left in my care for a prolonged period of time. My poor orchids can attest to that. I keep watering them and one day they look incredible and the next...barren, dead, murdered. 

I wouldn't know how to mom. Being motherless myself, who the hell would I call if I accidentally set the baby on fire, or if I needed a break because I might set the baby on fire? Who would tell me anecdotes about myself as a baby while examining the Rorschac-like contents of my baby's diaper? Who would stand in the queue with me amongst all the other people's screaming children and keep me from snapping as we waited for the Easter Bunny?

Of course I have fantastic people in my life who I could count on to step up, and some of them are much closer to me than family. But I firmly believe that you can't visit your crazy on these special people too much because they are not bound to you by blood and can fuck off whenever they like. For me, it's important to have a mom to have a baby. 

I do wonder that if my mom had died earlier in my life or later if I'd feel differently. If losing the one woman who you have constant access to at the time when you need that access most is the reason I'm broken. Maybe if I'd been younger when my dad remarried I'd feel more comfortable squeezing out a few people? Whatever the reason, as my friends talk about the loud ticking of their biological clocks, I'm shaking mine to see if it works.

Maybe I'll be like Sophie B. Hawkins and get pregnant at 50 and be so happy I waited, but then Steve would be nearly 60 and that's just gross. Or maybe it never happens, and at 50 I'm so mad at myself for not taking a chance earlier. But taking a chance when you're talking about someone else's life is what's selfish, not abstaining from having kids altogether. A friend of mine who has kids, once asked me in extreme earnestness if I wanted to die alone. I mean what a stupid question. We all die alone and that is pretty much the worst reason to have a child I've ever heard of.

But that's just it, people have babies for lots of reasons, some of them completely insane, and maybe I just haven't found my reason yet. I can think of so many reasons not to; I'm too poor, it might die, I might die, it might hate me, I don't know what I'm doing, etc. that maybe the cons just outweigh the pros at this stage. I've never ruled children out altogether, but I still can't see myself celebrating a Mother's Day anytime soon.