Today is Nate’s birthday; Margaret and I have been parents for eighteen years now (cumulatively, each of us has put in 43 parent-years). Margaret alluded this morning to this being the time that “Nate was being born,” but that over-simplifies an arduous and epic labor. One result (apart from Nate) is a degree of doubt over whether Nate actually was born on the eighth or the ninth; the obstetrician promised Margaret at about nine o’clock in the evening that Nate would actually be born that day, but I suspected at the pivotal moments that one of the second team of interns was holding the second hand back. It got to be quarter after twelve very quickly after Nate made his appearance.
Jeanne (Margaret’s sister) was there, and I was there, and two shifts worth of obstetricians, obstetric nurses, and observing interns were there (Yale-New Haven being a teaching hospital and all), and the birth was. . . an intense spectacle, but everything turned out all right, and we’re joyous and proud. Happy Birthday, Nate!
Posted by AKMA at April 8, 2003 12:08 PM | TrackBackYes I was there. Nate was busy forming his identity, which in adult or genius terms could be called intense, passionate, sensitive and serenely willful. But in infant-leaving-the-womb terms it was called agonizingly painful, terrifying, more drugs now, have we died yet, and of course beautiful. At one point I think I was told to take AKMA out to get something to eat. Apparently it was clear this would be another day's worth of work. But neither of us could eat much or say anything useful. In the end, there were so many nurses and doctors in the room that I, just the aunt-to-be, was moved out to a waiting room across the hall. There were other hand-wringers there but I knew none of them had been at it as long as I had. With just curtains for doors, I experienced Nate's long dramatic entry into this world by sound, and, not to take away from Margaret and AKMA's memories of this devastatingly divine experience, I was an utter wreck.
But Nate was just Nate. A perfect human miracle with an entire life before him. Since that moment, he has embraced each day of that life proudly and completely, and that's another perfect miracle that rewards all of us. Thanks, Nate, Margaret, AKMA, and God.
Oh, Jeanne, thanks so much! I didn’t know you were there. (I mean, I knew you were there at the hospital, but I didn’t know you were reading these pages.)
Thank you for sharing those memories, and for being there at a time we needed you in every way.
Posted by: AKMA at April 9, 2003 08:47 AM