They’d come to every doctor appointment and had even gone so far as to help me choose my donor, though I was technically having a baby alone—I would be a single mom by choice. Starving already, I was off to enjoy a triumphant falafel. The first thing every guy wanted to know about was my relationship with the baby daddy. I found myself endlessly explaining my choices to guys I didn’t even want to go out with anymore. He called me sneaky for not disclosing my pregnancy right away. Hands trembling, I called my parents and sister, who cried with joy. I decided that after a couple of minutes of banter, I’d tell them I was expecting. This is where I learned something crucial about life: rejection is best served with ice cream.

I wanted to date for the pleasure of it, not because I was a 37-year-old woman hunting for a husband or a baby daddy before the clock ran out. I never hesitated in telling the truth about my story—to anyone. I’d been dying to have a baby before it was too late, and though I’d come close with a couple of exes, I still wasn’t sure what I was looking for in a man.(Though Shelasky never names Chef in the book, some light googling will lead you to Spike Mendelsohn, the Top Chef season-four bad boy who came in fifth on the show but still attracts a cool crowd—including the Obamas—to his Capitol Hill restaurant, Good Stuff Eatery.) Lonely, bored, and determined to impress her new man, Shelasky taught herself to cook a few simple dishes.Of her first attempt, she writes, "I collect [a pile of recipes], close my eyes, and pull just one. It's truffle and cognac cream macaroni and cheese, a photocopy from...oh, fuck my life...Despite my family’s wedding sentiment, there were still decisions to be made. Rachel and her fiancé, Adam, dealt with City Hall logistics, while I Citi Biked around New York looking for a post-City Hall venue.Because I’m older (36 to Rachel’s 34), a control freak and a food writer — and, just like when we were little, she counts on me and thinks I’m cool — Rachel asked me to handle almost everything. It would just be our immediate family, so all I needed was a big table at a great place. I ended my yogi interview with as much Zen as possible, which was not much, then ran into the street, screaming. I didn’t add “pregnant” to my profile, because taken out of context it does raise a lot of questions (even I can admit that), and I didn’t want a guy creating the wrong narrative for me. After one sperm donor, two intrauterine inseminations and thousands of dollars paid to the NYU Fertility Center, I was pregnant. Maybe I’d meet a single father or a modern romantic like me. One night I logged on to Tinder, not for the first time (British Marcus had come and gone—he was cute but little else).