Scenes From The Sperm Bank
So far, we've seen the most interesting people at the Sperm Bank. I had expected the clientele to mostly be dykes, hadn't given much thought to the makeup of those dykes. By and large, they've turned out to be Corporate Dykes, dressed in kinda frumpy/almost trendy (but really, not quite) corporate drag (this is the weekday group), super trendy dykes who appear to have it together and arrive sporting expensive-looking clothes that don't seem all that comfortable to me or scrawny athletic types who have probably never spent a moment of their lives worrying about their weight.
And then there's us, our chubby bad selves in our shorts and somewhat clever t-shirts. I feel more prepared for the grubbiness that having a child is bound to bring than the other types we see there, but really, that's probably more from my own sudden re-awareness that a trendy dyke or a skinny dyke, I am not.
So one weekday, we were there with Corporate Dykes (with really bad shoes) who seemed to have the most Mundane Life Ever. Their ENTIRE CONVERSATION was about a cheese sandwich one of them had eaten for lunch. I mean, cheese is cool, but wow.
One crowded Saturday, we had the earthy single lady with the Very High Stress Level. She was crammed into a corner (the waiting room is ridiculously small) and happened to notice that another woman was flipping through the book of donor profiles. She asked if she could see the book and before the other woman had a chance to react, she reached over, across another woman and flipped through the book to see whatever she needed to see while the reader sat there, stunned. After she'd seen whatever she needed to see, she told the reader to relax, then told the entire room to relax, since this wasn't going to work if we didn't relax.
On a different crowded Saturday, we pulled up to the Sperm Building just in time to see a group of 2 women, 1 man and a small girl getting out of a car. The man and one of the women were smoking and I thought, there is NO WAY this group would be going to the Sperm Bank, not when they've got a live sperm-producer with them who is SMOKING. People do not generally smoke before entering the hallowed halls of semen distribution, since most of us have been planning these trips for some time and are well aware that smoking will make this already challenging endeavor even more difficult. The man and one of the women are blind, the blind woman has a seeing eye dog and the man has a cane.
So we walk towards the side door, where you have to give a password (Hello, Baby!) to the security guard and are stunned to hear Mr. Smoker giving the password. My mind races, trying to figure out who belongs with whom and why this group has found themselves at the insemination palace on a Saturday morning.
We take the stairs, because I don't want to share an elevator with 2 smokers. And because I really want to get to the insemination palace ahead of these people to stake my claim on one of the 5 available chairs in the tiny waiting room.
When we arrive, we are not disappointed. First the large Russian receptionist who we've never seen barks at everyone to state their names, speaking loudly and blowing any illusions of privacy (isn't there some new set of legislation about that??) for all of us. The last group arrives around 11:20, 20 minutes past the scheduled arrival time of 11 that we've all been given. She says 'veve been vaiting for hyou' shaming them for following Queer Standard Time.
I'm hiding in my chair and the blind woman of the foursome sits down next to me on a bench. Apparently, she thought she was in a chair with arms so she gropes the arm of my chair, then my arm. I say 'hi' to this and she says hi back, but leaves her arm there, on top of mine. At this point, the seeing eye dog is sitting on my foot.
The group starts talking and the sighted woman's daughter starts hitting her. The woman, who has no teeth, hits the girl back, then explains how she'll spank her other daughter's bottom later. Later, she tells us that she doesn't blame ANY of her babies daddies for their personalities, not any of the 4 daddies for the 4 babies.
It finally becomes clear that they're here to inseminate the blind woman, that it's a day they've waited for a long time. For that, I'm happy for them and I hope it works. Hell, I hope it works for all of us, execpt maybe for Ms. You Need To Relax.
At one point, the blind woman says that she needs to go to the bathroom and here I pipe up with the Assvice. I tell her that if she waits, it makes the procedure less painful. This, I learned the hard way. ALWAYS take 2-3 advil an hour before and do not pee for a while before an IUI. Hopefully one day this system will work for us.
My Don't Pee Declaration causes some conversation and I nod like a seasoned insemination veteran. The toothless woman says 'but if you go afterwards, won't it all fall out?'
Um. You have 4 kids and you don't know that your bladder is different than your cervix? That's what I'm thinking and that's what the blind man (who is her brother, it turns out) says to her. To which I cannot control my reply, I say 'maybe that's part of the problem.' This makes the man laugh hysterically.
Finally, we were called in. I had to retrieve Andrea from the hallway since she'd long bailed on the cramped waiting room. If I didn't have a tailbone injury that has never healed properly, my ass would have been out there on the hard floor, too. But then I would have missed Ms. Toothless and her babies' daddies.
