Attention Received with a Pregnant Belly

Did I mention that at my most recent pre-natal exam, my ob/gyn exclaimed I am like a 20-year old?! I think he meant the comment in regards to my pregnancy and results of my tests. But I am taking it all the way to mean that I look like a pregnant 20-year old. Is that why, as I walk around Brooklyn, I get stares and comments? I must just look so young. Simmer down, M.A...it’s wishful thinking. Imagine if I had the maturity of a 46-year old on the body of a 20-year old?  Now that would be something.  I must get back to the reality that I really do look my age. Maybe I can get away with five years, but that’s it. I sometimes say I am 40. It’s sort of true. I do have a “40” in my age. Back to the stares and comments.  I think I stick out like a sore thumb whenever I am walking around. I ambled ever so slowly to a nearby park to read today in the 85 degree weather marking the last official day of summer. I got seven “Are you having a boy or a girl?”  questions. One woman, as I crossed the street, said she knew the sex of my baby but wasn’t going to tell me.  A group of men congratulated me. I got five “God Bless You”’s. And the mailman imitated my belly-protruding walk as he approached me, asking, of course, after the gender of the baby.  Several children asked me if I had a “baby in there”.  These types of interactions with perfect strangers transpire on a daily basis, the minute I step outside my apartment.  The stares, at least in my opinion (I can feel their eyes on me), are omnipresent.  Doesn’t anyone see a walking pregnant person anymore? You’d think with our population there’d be pregnant women all over the place. Either the birthrate isn’t as high as I think or pregnant women just don’t go out as much.  So, am I an anomaly? I do see the occasional pregnant woman. We sort of greet each other without speaking, like a sisterhood. So why the stares? Maybe it's just an uplifting sight to see a pregnant belly. I admit, even when I see a pregnant woman, I more than glance.  Maybe we are all trying to envision that there is a human life growing in there, and it is hard for us all to believe.