BRIANNA LUZ
I met up with my coworker Brianna Luz in Central Park on a chilly November evening. The interview happened in-person on the same day, sitting by the Gapstow Bridge.
[TAPE CLICKS ON]
DVW: Do you want to have children? Why or why not?
BRIANNA LUZ: I definitely want to have children. I’ve always wanted to have kids. When I was in day care, I would beg the caregivers to let me change the other babies diapers. I had my own baby in day care. I’d show up and be like, “Where’s my baby?”
[MUTUAL LAUGHTER]
DVW: Do you know how many kids you want to have?
BRIANNA LUZ: I would love to have between two and four. This is, of course, if my financial situation could support that many kids. But I definitely want more than one, just so the kid has another kid. So they’re not alone.
DVW: Where would you want to raise them? Here in New York City? Another city? The suburbs?
BRIANNA LUZ: That's so hard. I want them to have access to a city because I feel like it gives you certain skills… street smarts. But I also want to be somewhere where it's quiet, so they don't get “lost in the sauce.” Because I do have a bit of a fear about that. So on the outskirts of a major city would be nice. Yeah, balance.
DVW: Well, you know, it's much harder for this generation to afford a home than previous generations. Is that something you worry about?
BRIANNA LUZ: I do, it enters my mind. But I try not to stress out about it too much. I feel like a lot of my life has sort of just worked out, the same with my friends. You just have to go with the groove, the flow of it.
DVW: That’s a good way to look at it. It’s kind of refreshing. I've personally really struggled with the idea of having children, because of climate change predictions. And it sucks, because I was an only child, which was really lonely for me personally. So growing up I always thought, “I'm gonna have a huge family. I'm gonna have my first kid at 25, and I'm gonna have like six of them.” But now it feels… ethically questionable, to me, personally. Is climate change something you factor into whether or not you have children?
BRIANNA LUZ: I always circle back to the fact that life is suffering no matter what generation you're in. In every generation, there's always been something that makes people feel existential dread, makes people think that life isn't worth it. But life is such a gift. What if I’m just overthinking things? And who am I to say that I shouldn't give another being that chance at life just because I feel like my life, personally, has been too stressful.
Born 1998 / Arts Administrator, Gallery Client Relations
DVW: That’s so funny, because I was talking to my mom about this, and she said the exact same thing.
BRIANNA LUZ: Really?
DVW: Yeah. A while ago, we were talking about this very issue, having kids and climate change. And she said, “You know, when I was thinking about having you, in 1999, everyone thought the world was gonna end in 2000. But it didn’t. And if I had let that stop me, you wouldn’t be here.”
BRIANNA LUZ: I know a handful of women who have already decided, granted it could change, but have already decided that they won't be having kids because of climate change and all the other impending dooms. But I feel like that's just one of the burdens we have to bear as conscious beings. It's only us stopping ourselves because we can think. Other animals, they don’t know whats going on, they don’t stop reproducing. Only because we can think do we think ourselves into these black holes where it feels like there's no hope and we don't want to persevere. But we're alive, you and I, because of perseverance. Just continue it, man. I feel kinda bad about it, but if in two generations the world blows up, what are you going to do about it? It's going to happen anyway. You can't live your life around that.
DVW: Around “maybes” and “what ifs.” I suppose that’s true. There’s a classic response to questions posed like this one, that goes, “Well, what if your child invents the solution to the problem?” I have thought about that a bit.
BRIANNA LUZ: That too. That's what I mean. Who are we to stop the progression of the human race just because we think that they won't enjoy their time here? You never know what's going to be born through you.
DVW: We also don't really know how technology will progress, especially now with AI. I don't think people like 50 years ago, 100 years ago, before then ever thought robots would be real, in the form of siri, cell phones. No one could have even conceived of the internet. Maybe somewhere down the line something will be invented that can reverse climate change. You know?
DVW: Did your upbringing, you think, have anything to do with your desire to have children? Were family values and having a family emphasized in your upbringing?
BRIANNA LUZ: I'm gonna say no, not at all. I mean, even now, like I talked to my mom about wanting to have kids and she's like, “Girl, you need to really chill. There's more for you in life.” That's always what they say. But I think there's more where you look for more. I'm naturally oriented towards motherhood and family, and I feel like that's where I’m gonna find that [fulfillment] in life that everyone's telling me to look outside of motherhood for. I grew up with my great grandma, and there really is no better feeling than being four generations deep in the kitchen. You can't replace that. And I really want my kids to have that too.
DVW: With this generation, I feel like waiting [to have children] is so emphasized, whether or not you think that's a good thing. It’s interesting because the person that I have the strongest relationship with is my grandmother, who’s only still around to have that bond with me because she had kids really young. I still don’t plan on having children anytime soon, but that notion has definitely made me take a second look at my life plan, my life’s timeline.
BRIANNA LUZ: I feel like a lot of people push not having kids early because their generation, the previous generations, had kids early, and they were sort of forced, or pressured into marriage. That's my grandma. My grandma had my mom at 18. But I love it because they're besties, they’re doing things, aging together. As someone who has an older mom, I sometimes wish I could’ve experienced that bond younger moms have with their children. I think about whether that's important or not, having that with my kids, too.
[TAPE CUT]