A Road Less Travelled

On this day twenty-one years ago I was brought into the world. On this day for many of the years between then and now I would climb into bed with my mother and she would tell me my birth story. I can’t climb into bed with her anymore, but I remember my story and I thought I’d share highlights with y’all.

My birth story actually begins before I was born. Mom liked to tell me about the time when she was pregnant with me that she got stuck in the middle of the highway during a horrendous storm. There was a hurricane going on somewhere in the world and this storm was one of the results. She had moved to the passenger side because whenever a car would pass her it would throw so much water onto the car that it was starting to come in around the door. There wasn’t much she could do so she was just sitting there, in the middle of a highway, crocheting my baby blanket. A man in a blue pick-up stopped and asked if she needed any help. He pushed her off the road and went to a phone to call Dad. For reasons that I just realized were never very clear Mom was convinced this man was an angel so she always said that angels drove blue pick-up trucks.

I was supposed to be born before Christmas. I had a stocking and presents and everything. But I was a shy child and I didn’t want to be involved in all the hubbub so I waited to make my big entrance. Or maybe I wanted a spotlight all to myself and didn’t want to share importance with another celebration.

When they got to the hospital most of the people assumed my parents kinda knew what they were doing by then, this being their fifth child and all, so they mostly left them alone. My dad was working on a sermon and my mom was reading a book. She was reading either Lord of the Rings or The Chronicles of Narnia. The doctor who was supposed to be there wasn’t, but my parents knew the resident on call and liked him. I remember lying next to my mom, smelling her Mom-just-woke-up scent, which is a combination of coffee and Mom-just-woke-up, and listening as she told me about the little Spanish girl who was in labor across the hall. Mom said that this girl was so scared she was yelling at the top of her lungs and that if my mom had known a little bit more Spanish she could have learned some fascinating curse words that night.

A time came when my dad finished his sermon and my mom finished her book and they looked at each other and decided I could come now. I was born at 5:10 in the evening and there is a noise my mom would make to describe how I came out. I won’t try to reproduce that noise here, but it is one of my favorite parts of the story. The noise is very similar to that of a matress rolling down a hill, but that is a tale for another time.

After I was born my mom couldn’t sleep so she asked for me from the nursery and held me while she drank cold de-caf coffee and watched a snow storm over the lake. When they brought me home it was Saturday so they decided to have the people who were watching my siblings just bring them to church on Sunday. So my very first night home as the youngest of five was spent with just my dad and mom. I loved to hear Mom tell about that night. Me all wrapped up in my special blanket, sitting by the Christmas tree with my Mom and Dad. I can picture it so clearly. It looks so peaceful.

So there are some highlights from my birth story. My mom isn’t here to tell it to me anymore so I tell it to myself and remember. There’s something very special about knowing your own story. This is a tradition I want to carry on with my own kids, though I know my Mom-just-woke-up smell will be different than hers.