I think that's a reasonable point - before I had my daughter, I felt that friends who were parents were treating me with pity becuase I didn't have kids: what they didn't appreciate is that at that point in my life I had no desire to have kids, and was enjoying pleasing myself. I now have an eleventh month old daughter, who I love very much, but because I am conscious that parents can appear to be smug, I try to be, and hope I am succeeding, in being the exact opposite.
Whilst we are on the subject of kids, why do other parents automatically think I want to talk about our kids? Despite being a parent, and this may sound a little odd, I don't actually like other peoples kids - and I most certainly don't want to talk about their kids: I couldn't give a tinker's cuss that their little darling has taken their first steps.
I have a girl at work who has a girl the same age as mine, and it is her sole topic of conversation: prior to having a baby she was the life and soul of the party, now, dare I say it, she is boring.
Oh, and another thing, just becuase I don't mind the noise of my daughter screaming, I am very very conscious that it would get on other peoples nerves, and therefore remove her from those situations - shops etc... I do this because when I hear this noise from other peoples kids, and they do nothing about it, it drives me up the wall.