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 view optionsfont: A A size: - 12 +book reviewspeoplemystic fiction health identity music/moviesjazzgrrlsmovies rantrrrampage
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There are two monumental things that everybody does and nobody talks about—being born and dying. These elemental, transformative journeys must have a tremendous impact on us, body and soul, even if we don’t remember the first and avoid the last for as long as possible. I found myself thinking about this just after my son was born. I suppose I was trying to imagine the experience he had recently undergone, the sudden violent shifting of his world, from being inside to out. When I was pregnant one idea quite frightened me: eventually my baby was going to have to come out of my body. I couldn’t think of any way that this might happen that didn’t worry me. In hindsight, I regret that I didn’t face these fears directly. Instead I made jokes and braced myself against the inevitable. I let my fears distance me, from myself and my son-to-be, throughout my pregnancy. Now I feel like I kept a golden opportunity at bay. I wrote this a while ago. For several years after my son Nemo was born, I beat myself up about this last bit—the part where I distanced myself from my feelings, and probably my wee forming baby in the process. Then I got pregnant again and I wrote this: Reflections on Learning that I am Pregnant So where were warm and cosy feelings 1 thru 6? This was my big chance to commune with my zygote, to correct my wrongs of the past. But I felt too sick and too angry at being so dominated by the whole thing. I envy women who can do pregnancy part-time: "Oh yeah, I forgot, I’m pregnant! What fun! Now back to my career, my fitness program and my fufilling family life." In one a short week I was at a complete standstill: "Oh god, I’m pregnant, Now I can’t remove the marijuana plantation from the upstairs apartment, fix it up and look for a tenant with fewer entrepeneurial tendencies. Now I can’t re-write my book. Now I’m being booted out of my yoga class for being pregnant. Now the only thing I can do is wake up, get Nemo off to school, and go lie down. And this is only the beginning: I’m looking at two years of complete baby dominion." Luckily, we sucky pregnant women have friends and family that help us get psyched up about this fabulous, miraculous event. First of all, they get really excited for us. Part of this is because they won’t have to do the work. The other part is that they know every child is a gift. Several friends talked about the fun of watching the relationship between their children grow; that’s impossible to witness until you’ve had at least one other. I got an email from a friend welcoming me to the club of "surviving mothers of two"; I cautioned her about celebrating my survival too soon. But pretty soon I was getting into the swing of it. As my morning-sickness dispelled, I liked the idea more and more. I began to feel like those women I envy: "Oh yes, I’m pregnant, and yet I still attend your Christmas party and keep my head out of your toilet for the duration. (But dinner’s late, and where are the SNACKS?! Must I eat my own hand?)" I was touched by my son’s reaction to the news. I was touched that my husband has mellowed enough to allow for this to happen to us again. I realized I was beginning to enter the magical mother zone, that place where you know what’s important. Your eyes are open to it and you have the tenderness to feel it. It’s probably the most human place I’ve ever been. It means the loss of a bunch of other stuff. It means not spending that layover in Paris dashing from the Louvre Museum to the Pompidou Centre. It means the dread of any layover, or any flight for that matter. It means serving someone else in a way that no one could pay you enough to do, under normal circumstances. It means feeling tired, overworked, underappreciated and ungroomed much of the time. And I can never decide whether it makes me feel better or worse that it is no more than countless millions of other people are doing right now. And it’s all emphatically--gratefully--worth it; as anyone with kids will say. My favourite part in Sofia Coppola’s movie "Lost in Translation" was when Bill Murray’s character tries to explain being a parent to Scarlett Johansson’s character. He says that your babies are born and you’ll never work harder in your life, and that gradually they become your most favourite people in the world. So yes, I was sad when I lost my wee zygote. At the hospital, I wasn’t sure if I was crying for the baby, or because of all the blood I was losing. But after the d&c, all fixed up, I still cried a bit. Even while I promised myself to never to go through that morning-sick feeling again, I welled up when I read the word "children" in a novel. Even while I celebrated being able to finish my own book, I missed the bigger adventure that had been with me for a few weeks. I hit the January sales and bought myself a bunch of new clothes. I know they’ll fit me for the whole season. And next season—who knows? I still have that feeling that the universe is conspiring to give me what I want.
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