It is our Moira's birthday today and two decades later the hours that led up to her birth are still vivid in my memory. We were living in base housing in San Antonio. It was our third home for that assignment and not the best of them. In fact the house was on the list to be condemned. We would be the last residents. We had two bathrooms but only one working due to crumbling clay pipes under the house. Large roaches occasionally migrated up through those drains so we tried to keep them covered.
We had good neighbors there. Friends who had been with us at our first duty station were nearby. We had homeschool friends. We loved Texas despite the housing. There were any number of people who could come hang out with the children until Miss Jen could drive over from the base on the other side of town. It was the ideal scenario for a military couple not living near family and a much better situation than when we had the previous baby soon after arriving in town.
This had not been an easy pregnancy. I struggled with irritable uterus and early labor with most of my babies. This time was no different in that regard other than that this baby had remained posterior for a good long time forming a letter B contoured belly versus a letter C curve. I remember we picked up some new things for this baby. Her Daddy had purchased a Jenny Lind cradle which we filled with a set of vintage style Winnie the Pooh linens.
Shortly after dinner on the 18th the telltale cramping began. It was sometime after six and sporadic. Who knows? It could be the real deal or could be a false alarm. We went back and forth with that speculation for a few hours until odds became increasingly in favor of real deal. Which got me thinking we ought to give a heads up to friends. Just in case.
We called the first set. No answer. Over and over. Then we tried the closest neighbor. No luck. The other neighbor also out. Remember this was a LONG time ago. Before cell phones. Before cell phones, you could leave a message on a cassette recorder answering machine but your party would not actually know about your message until they returned to their home. At nine o'clock that evening none of them had.
The other fun development was congestion. And a cough. And a bit of chills.
We waited. I took a shower. (remember the roaches – no bathtub option) We called Jen and apologized profusely but asked her to please head over. Quickly. Like, Godspeed please woman, because it was an up to 40 minutes drive depending on traffic. I'm not sure how many traffic rules she violated that night but there she was at the door in record time.
It wasn't cold when my husband dropped me off at the entrance doors. It was a mild January night and the brisk air was welcome in my congested and flustered state. He rushed to park and I began to make my way inside. The hallway was quiet and empty. Labor and Delivery was on the second floor. I have an extreme ridiculous lifelong aversion to elevators and it didn't seem like one flight of stairs would be THAT bad. It was slow going though. And part way there I met an acquaintance who stopped to chat. Trying to appear calm and normal was even more difficult than scaling the stairs.
When we got to the unit it was close to 11pm and I was in transition. That explained the trial with the steps and the chatting. We began the whole ordeal of paperwork and history and settling into rooms and yada, yada. It was a struggle to stay on top of the pain because my breathing was increasingly impeded. I was getting the flu bug going around. Right then. Did I want some decongestants in my IV? I specifically recall the young doctor explaining it would feel like the equivalent of "a one beer buzz." It's weird what you remember. A one beer buzz for a normal person was more like passing out for me. I needed all my wits about me, or whatever I had left, so I declined.
By midnight they had insisted upon oxygen mask which falls close behind elevator on my list of hateful things. Husband campaigned for alternatives but they wouldn't budge. My water broke during this debate. Intensity racketed up several points. At 12:15 I had had enough. I sat up in bed, swung my legs over the edge and took off my mask. The nurse looked with alarm from me to my husband and back again. "Ma'am? What are you doing?"
I believe what came out of my mouth at that moment was something like, "I've got to get out of here." That did not reassure her. My husband wasn't too concerned though and, while he stalled me, he suggested that someone check my status. Sure enough, it was show time. Fifteen minutes later a startlingly beautiful baby entered the world, our fifth child, our second daughter.
It was not a romantic story thereafter. I developed a full-on flu and fever set in which made for a complicated recovery. I wore a mask for some time after we came home because I was so fearful of infecting the baby. She was, and is, made of tough stuff however. She thrived. I healed.
She has done everything in life with gusto and determination. She became our farm girl, riding a naughty pony through the fields bareback and milking goats by my side. Later she traveled through Europe dancing her heart out and playing soccer. She has had incredible stamina as a distance runner, competing with her dad in the Bolder Boulder road race in grade school. Right now, she is several states away ending her work week and celebrating her birthday with her handsome husband, whom we have every confidence will spoil her to the best of his ability.
Snow is falling here meantime and I am thumbing through old pictures and marveling. We are so very proud of the hard working, faithful and grounded woman she has become. She has not ever pulled the easy ticket but has pushed and striven and shone brightly through every challenge. As the years have gone on a magical thing has happened. We have gradually stepped back from the teaching and directing role and just learn all we can from these incredible people our children have become. They are my treasure and it has been a gift to walk through life alongside of them.
Starry Sky Journal 