A friend of mine in high school was born with a strong maternal instinct. She said to me once, "the happiest day of my life will be the day my babies are born". I don't know why, but it struck me and I never forgot it. For nine months, we looked forward to this day. We prepared, we rehearsed, I layed awake for hours wondering what it would be like, how long it would take, how I would handle it and knowing that in the end, nothing that happened before the moment of her birth would matter as much.
Well, the day after Easter Sunday when I made dinner for our friends and family, I awoke with contractions lightly pulsing inside me, pulling like the tide. Only a few frantic hours passed before they took her out of me in a rush of gloved hands, a sea of green scrubs, under a window overlooking the hills of San Francisco. As they wheeled me into the ER, I saw that the sun was shining and the sky was blue- the first sunny day in what felt like months of rain and gloom. I knew she had been waiting for a sunny day to emerge. And there she was. A whole new life- for everyone.
