What am I, a piece of meat?

Before I was a dad, I commuted to work as I do now, by bus and subway. I probably spoke to one person per year, mostly when some grim unpleasantry occurred and we shared a moment’s whaddaya-gonna-do commiseration. People ignore each other in New York not out of rudeness but out of a differing definition of politeness, a subject I once addressed here.

But a baby changes everything. Make a similar commute with an infant, as I do each morning on the daycare drop-off run, and everyone smiles, waves, or otherwise engages him, and then proceeds to chat with me. It happens at least twice a week, and frequently more often than that. Some of them are nice enough, but more than a few are mighty peculiar people. Some, in fact, are desperate to talk, and just rattle on about nothing. Babies are an invitation to broach one’s personal boundaries.

Not long ago, it hit me that this is what being an attractive woman must be like: constantly being chatted up and dealing with attention–some of it pleasant, some of it awkward, some of it genuinely off-putting. Seeing something akin to that attention from the other side is a little unnerving. It usually comes with compliments, which ought to be pleasureable, but sometimes come from people I’d rather not spend much time talking with, which definitely isn’t.

The irony, of course, is that the people who chat me up are mostly women, and at least a few of them can do so because flirting has been taken out of the equation. I mean, I’m wearing a wedding ring and strapped into a Baby Bjørn. I’m as neutered and safe a male as can be. It must be a relief.