“The thing that will always stay with me,” former California Rep. Katie Porter said of her harrowing experience hiding with then-colleague Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez during the January 6 attack on the Capitol. “I was saying: ‘Well, don’t worry, I’m a mom, I’m calm, I’ve got everything here we need. We could live for like a month in this office.’ And [Ocasio-Cortez] said, ‘I just hope I get to be a mom. I hope I don’t die today.'”

At the time, the remarks reflected the fear felt by two female lawmakers, as rabid men on the hunt for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi roamed the halls of Congress screaming, “Where is she? Where is she?” But when I first heard about this exchange, nearly one month after the Capitol attack, I recall being struck by how much Ocasio-Cortez’s comment echoed my own thoughts as a woman of a similar demographic: mid-30s, working, and hopeful for motherhood but unsure how it would unfold. Would it ever happen? If so, when? Have my choices hurt or helped that one outsized desire? Such questions tend to hum anxiously in the background for a woman of a certain age, in both mundane and extraordinary moments, as the one Ocasio-Cortez shared with Porter.

“I think it’s important for us as leaders to have these conversations and share these processes, especially for working women across the country, and normalize them.”

I thought of this anecdote again this weekend after the New York congresswoman posted a........

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