MAN OVERBOARD/Kevin Courtney: Do we men also have a biological clock which is ticking away towards fatherhood, and are we ignoring it in our vain pursuit of childish pleasure?
'My biological clock is ticking!" Guys, how many of us have heard that statement, emanating from the lovely lips of Marisa Tomei, in her Academy Award-winning role as Joe Pesci's impatient girlfriend in My Cousin Vinny? It's one of cinema's great scenes - Pesci is sitting in a chair with his head buried in a legal tome, while Tomei paces up and down the porch in her high-heels, regaling her co-star for his unwillingness to commit. When she can't get his attention, she stamps her foot petulantly on the porch, and utters the immortal line: "My biological clock is ticking!"
Some of us have even heard that admonishment in real life, from our girlfriends and fiancées, and, in homage to Joe Pesci, have buried our heads in the latest issue of Loaded and tried to ignore the shrill voice coming from those impeccably-glossed lips. Far from heeding the implicit cry for commitment, we search for an emotional escape hatch, anything that will help us avoid this impending clash of the hormones. She wants us to stop messing around, start acting like a mature adult, and get with the married-with-kids programme. We just want her to stop stamping her bloody stiletto on the parquet floor and let us finish this article about how to date a supermodel. We want to reach out to that loudly-ringing biological clock, but just to hit the snooze button, and go back to our sleepy, uneventful lives. If the ground could somehow open up right now and swallow our little sweetheart - and the way she's stamping I don't doubt the floor will give - then we'd probably sigh with relief and accept it as a sign from God that this relationship wasn't meant to be.
Lately, though, it's not just us guys who are studiously ignoring the incessant tick-tock of the female biological timepiece.
According to a new book by girlie guru Sylvia Ann Hewlett, career-minded women are too caught up in the Sturm und Drang of corporate life to notice the soft ticking inside their souls. In their relentless efforts to compete in the workplace, women in high-flying jobs are shutting off the inner alarm which tells them it's time to start having babies. Before they know it, their biological clock has wound down, and it's too late to turn back time. The argument put forward by the book, Baby Hunger, is simple: when many women feel the pangs, instead of heading straight down to the lifestyle supermarket and choosing a husband and baby, they put it off, figuring they'll get something at the convenience store later on. So, they get stuck back into their work, climbing the corporate ladder, grabbing the top executive jobs and beating men at their own game, confident that all the baby stuff will keep for awhile more.
Eventually, though, the pangs get too much, so they nip down to that 7-11 of the soul, only to find that the damn store is out of stock. Frantic, panicking, and feeling somewhat stressed, they rush home in the desperate hope of rustling up something at the last minute, but guess what? The fridge is empty. Nothing left to do but make yourself a hot cup of regret, put on your spinster's nightdress, and curl up in your single bed, alone and childless.
The book is reportedly scaring the bejasus out of women who read it, as if it's some sequel to Rosemary's Baby or Damien Omen II. The most frightening passages, apparently, are those which state that nearly 50 per cent of middle-aged, high-achieving women have missed the baby boat, and are treading water when they really should be changing wet nappies. Sylvia Ann Hewlett's advice to young, ambitious women is, plan your babies in tandem with your career, and try to factor a family into your long-term business plan. While looking around for that top job and excellent remuneration package, throw the eye around for a husband too. You'll probably find one hiding under the porch.
Reading about Baby Hunger, I felt a certain pang of male guilt, feeling that, perhaps, our gender was partly to blame for this barren state of affairs. And yes, Ms Hewlett does indeed implicate us bastards in the great baby starvation conspiracy.
She claims we tend to shy away from challenging women (by which I think she means "women who challenge", like our friend Ms Tomei) because we want to be the dominant partner in the relationship. In other words, we prefer women who shut up and let us make all the big decisions, such as choosing power tools, selecting the size of the wide-screen TV, and deciding exactly when the time is right for having a sprog. We'd also prefer to leave everything on the long finger and put off till tomorrow what she wants done today. And we definitely, definitely don't want to get tied town with a baby right now, not with all those single supermodels still looking for dates.
Sadly, many women learn, long after it's too late, that you should never entrust your man with the big decisions, and you should never, ever let him do things in his own time. Men, you see, live at a completely different rate of acceleration to women: recent scientific studies show that one year in male-time is about equal to one month in female-time. We are content to plod along through life like a tortoise, letting nothing speed up our ponderous progress, while women are anxious to hare along and avoid anything that will slow them down. We can happily fritter away a year of our lives and get nothing done, while women can achieve a year of worthwhile things in 30 days. An entire decade can pass without our lives changing significantly, while women can go through three marriages, six career changes, 12 torrid affairs and 24 blackbirds baked in a pie in the same time-frame.
Looking around at my friends and colleagues, I see varying degrees of baby hunger, and varying degrees of (dis)satisfaction. The women who have taken control of their lives (and their men) have managed to satisfy it in style, balancing career and family with enviable grace. Others, however, have let their men make all the running, and are still pacing up and down on the porch, waiting in vain while the biological clock ticks off the seconds towards childless middle-age.
I know one couple who have been together for the best part of a decade, but seem no closer to having a child. In fact, you'd need Mr Spock to calculate the astronomical odds of them ever reaching the baby stage. Maybe they don't want kids, or maybe she doesn't want to push the issue, but it looks to me as if he's content to keep the status quo, while she's afraid to rock to boat. Mr Spock's recommendation? Flee this unfeathered nest, girl, because if you stick with Mr Molasses, you'll be ready for your first child sometime after you collect your bus-pass.
Of course, I'm one to talk. As a middle-aged male who still acts like a spoilt twentysomething, the last thing I want is a little Kev to spoil the never-ending singles party. I want to remain the perpetual New Lad, and banish all thoughts of becoming an Old Dad. I want to have my cheesecake, eat it, and not have to bother picking up the crumbs. It suits guys like me fine when women put off the baby stuff, because it buys us more time to continue being a big baby.
But do we men also have a biological clock which is ticking away towards fatherhood, and are we ignoring it in our vain pursuit of childish pleasure? Well, yes, I believe we do have a biological clock, except it's still a bit of a mystery, like the male g-spot. We've been denying its existence for so long, it's become buried deep inside us, and probably needs a good dig with a stiletto heel to bring it back to the surface. But, as many fathers will tell you, the imperative to start a family can be just as strong in men as in women. It just sometimes needs a woman to kick-start it. One friend told me: a) that his wife ballyragged him into having kids; b) that he'd never have got around to it otherwise; and c) that it's the best thing that ever happened to him. (Interestingly, he left out the bit where he could carry on doing his job during late pregnancy and early motherhood while the wife had to put her career on hold).
When men express a wish to have kids soon, people usually tell them, oh, it's OK for you, you can have a kid at 50, even 60, so you can afford to take your time. That's not strictly true, however, because men's fertility - not to mention their virility - declines as they get past 35. So maybe ours is a biological cuckoo clock - we have to make sure that cuckoo keeps poking its head out at regular intervals. Besides, I don't want to wait till I'm too old to play football with my kid, or too deaf to hear his first Number One single. And I don't want to wait till all my hair falls out, my beer belly goes ballistic, and my prostate gland starts giving me - ahem - gyp.
Many women, having been scared silly by Sylvia Ann Hewlett's book, are perhaps redoubling their efforts to get us guys to grow up and get down to the serious business of having a baby. I hope they are, because my biological clock is ticking too, and I don't want to be left sitting on the porch with my head buried in my hands when it's too late.