yesterday at this time...24 hours ago

you would think that a woman living as long as I have

and having so many little nieces and nephews...and now having a grand niece and nephew...
would have somewhere along the line experienced a labour or delivery!?!?!

but the only labour and delivery experience I have is my own
and going thru labour four times is one thing...well...four?!??!

but observing one
even from afar

for it was just the two of  them...
...the three of them...

is something totally different than experiencing your own


we woke yesterday with the beauty and warmth of the morning sun
but soon a great scare caused the day to vere along another course


they had to travel routes alone that neither of them would have ever chosen to go
he had to be called away from work....and had to ride his bike to the car...
which was left at the birthing center
and then to meet her, at St. Elisabeth Klinik...where she had to be taken in taxi

the view from their labour room

but their short, freightening, separate journeys brought them together again
to momentarily gaze upon their mountains' highs...
they wouldn't be able to use their mid-wives as planned
BUT the baby would finally be born!

and then began the long night of walking the halls


and after 12 hours of hard, non-productive, labour
he was finally born
with urgency and immediacy! 
and again for the second time this week we were all awake before the crack of dawn
the first time to get me
this time to get BABY yet~to~be~named...


photo by Johnny Razin 
who sat with me, and Judith... thru the night until we decided it was best to go home...
and then they drove me all the way home...
and he came at dawn to drive me back to the hospital this morning...
arriving JUST so we could see 'the moment' that Dom was presented with his son!
 
bouquet by judith. johnny's fiance

I think they're waiting for the grogginess of the drugs to fade away...
to look that little guy clear in the face till he reveals his name...