If this were the beginning of a film, the scene would arrange aunts with exaggerated make-up and cousins with their shirts open down their chests around an extravagantly laid table. It would be one of the former, between a forkful of pasta and a sip of wine, who asks the inevitable question–”When will you have children?”–to be followed by an awkward silence only broken by the scraping of forks.

Sure, it happens like this sometimes, but, more often than not, it’s more subtle. It’s your mother who expects to spend her old age surrounded by grandchildren, it’s the relatives who are waiting for you to “get your act together”, it’s the employer who looks at you doubtfully, trying to figure out when you’ll ask for maternity leave.