Mother Time

I remember almost everything about the day. Waking early to oddly rhythmic pains, wondering, in spite of all I knew, what they could be. I sat on the edge of the bed, a legal pad on my lap and a pen in my hand, thinking about nothing but timing. Watching the pot boil -- never a good idea.

My husband went to work. He returned about two hours later. I was still sitting on the edge of the bed, a legal pad still on my lap, a pen still in my hand. The intervals between contractions had not changed, unless you count minor fluctuations. Four minutes fifty-two seconds, give or take a few. It was a beautiful day, so we took a walk. I vaguely remember them telling us in Lamaze class that walking would speed things up. Walking, and Chinese food. Chinese food had been my pickles and ice cream for at least seven months. Still, I was well past my due date. I expected very little from the walk, other than sunshine and a little distraction.

As it turns out the distraction was good. It was a beautiful day, and we walked the five or six blocks to the book store on Wells Street. My husband loves book stores -- at least he did, back then, when they existed -- but even he couldn't seem to settle down among the shelves. We walked back, enjoying the sunshine, doing anything we could to avoid comprehending how our lives were about to change.

The walk was as unproductive as the months of Chinese food. Contractionally speaking, anyway. Four minutes, fifty-two seconds, give or take a few. I was growing impatient; we had things to do. Like return some overdue movies to Blockbuster.

That race to the hospital in a taxi cab, the barely remembered suitcase that had been packed for weeks, the puddle of water on the floor at the most inopportune time -- well, that's all the stuff of television and movies and I suppose all the other women coming in to the hospital that day and popping out babies while I lay hooked up to a fetal monitor for an eternity, making inane conversation with a radiologist. Three shifts of nurses. Three different doctors on call, none of whom appeared to be mine.

It was Passover, and my extended family in New York was enjoying a Seder, as if the world were not about to be turned on its head. They called, mouths full of matzoh balls, while I was in the midst of a particularly inane conversation with the radiologist.

"My baby's heartbeat looks awfully low," I told him. Another thing I had learned in Lamaze, other than the Chinese food and walking thing: how to read a fetal monitor. I ignored the part about breathing -- that's why they make narcotics.

"It's fine."

Pause. An uncomfortably pregnant pause.

"I really think it's a little low. And Happy Passover to you too Aunt Sylvia."

"It's not low. It fluctuates."

"@#%$&!" I pushed the nurse call button.

"What?" That was my mom. The radiologist was doing his best to ignore me.

Well, thank goodness these were the days before Skype and FaceTime because the last thing your entire family needs to see while they're enjoying a ritual holiday meal is a grotesquely pregnant me flipped over onto all fours while a team of medical personnel scream calmly at each other and fiddle with all sorts of instruments on a crash cart. One of the nurses grabbed the phone from me. "She'll call you back. Have a fifth glass of wine." She shot the anesthesiologist a withering look.

Anyway, while this was all going on my husband, returning from his seventeenth coffee run, walked in to the horrifying rear view of me on all fours (no, this was not a good thing at that particular moment) with my huge hanging belly being slapped silly by a bunch of nurses. Enough to put you off your feed, as he would have said. Amazingly, we still managed to have two more children after that and didn't even break up until many years later.

As surprised as I had been about the contractions in the morning, five full days after my due date, I was even more surprised when my first child was born. "She's beautiful," the doctor said, holding her up.

"It's a girl?" I asked. I had already told him it was a girl. I had already told him her name. Motherhood makes you lose a few brain cells, and I think a lot of mine seeped out with the placenta.

I don't miss the brain cells. I get nostalgic sometimes -- about that beautiful day in April, before I knew much of anything, certainly nowhere near what I know now, in spite of my diminished capacity.  I sat on the edge of my bed this morning, thinking not about timing but about time.  I wonder how it has all passed this quickly, and I still marvel at the miracle who changed my world forever on that beautiful day in April.