Non breeders

I occasionally take long weekends away with a gaggle of women. We were in our thirties when we started. Now 40s might be more honest although two have yet to achieve that giddy height. Tongue in cheek we call ourselves the non breeders. We found ourselves having a drift in commonality with our motherly friends. Some who envied us our untied nature and others who couldn't comprehend life without kids and some who wistfully wanted both worlds. Circumstances had led us this way. Two may yet breed. One decided quite definitively it was not for her. Two, perhaps with some sadness have accepted a child free fate. The fourth it's a subject too sore too raw to talk about even ten years on. I fall into the acceptance bracket.

I am in a cottage with three generations of my family. Three siblings over 40. One child. Sadly our genes are not well represented.

They seem good genes. My dad before multiple sclerosis was a county level hockey player. My mother along with her three brothers passed mensa level tests. She was a Rambert school of ballet graduate. We are intellectually and physically blessed.

I look at us as three siblings in our 40s and we may not have bred but we're still kind of good. My sister now a hockey player at masters international level. My brother fighting fit, a focused dad. Me, the disappointment in a sporting sense. Well I don't do so bad.

It feels like a waste of genes though. Funny eh?