Born again

Nov. 27, 2023: 8:50 p.m. Full moon Monday in New York City

My daughter yells from her bedroom as her husband drills-in screws to hold up a curtain rod for the new beachy curtains she recently purchased to soften the paint-chipped 1960s windows in her living room, “MY WATER BROKE!”

Buzz  Buzz BUZZ BUZZ 

“Jason,” I yell, walking into the beehive-construction-zone living room. “Her water broke!” He tosses the power drill on the well-loved black leather couch and freezes deer-in-the-headlights still. 

It’s happening. 

My Baby Three is about to have her Baby No. 3, a little boy who decided he just had to be part of these formerly California/Hong Kong-residents’ lives. An unexpected—unplanned—wee lad with a mind of his own. Daughter Three was in training for her second NYC Marathon when a routine doctor’s appointment in the Spring revealed she was “with child”—SURPRISE!

I didn’t find out about the pregnancy until Jack and Grandma’s July trip to New York when she stood sideways, stroked her “with child” belly, and revealed the news. While shocked, and a little worried about the stress raising three children under the age of three could take on the sanest of souls, I knew that if anyone could handle the challenge of mentoring a bustling preschool brood it was Katie, my beloved fourth-grade teacher-daughter-mother-wife-sister-cousin-friend of my 3-year-old granddaughter and 2-year-old. 

While now somewhat of a pregnancy expert, Pregnancy Three poised a few worries; the baby had an irregular heartbeat, which remedied itself, and the umbilical cord lassoed twice around Baby Boy’s neck, which days before Game Day also blessedly remedied itself. And then there was that upsetting work-related tumble which caused a scare, but other than a few bruises, caused no harm to mommy or baby. 

Scary stuff, but they got through it and now it was Game Day, The Fourth Quarter and, as we know, all kinds of unknowns and drama can happen during labor and delivery.  

Nov. 23 Tuesday 3:20 a.m.

We’re in a worn black Kia sedan that smells like cigarettes, on our way to Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan, about a 40-minute drive from the apartment. The driver talks and talks incessantly about the health problems his son had when he was born eleven years ago. Not exactly the gruesome details an in-labor mom wants to hear. 

Fortunately, traffic is blessedly light, and we weave in and out of New York City like an eel slithering across a moon-lit pond. Katie opens her eyes in between contractions and remembers running the same streets during last year’s New York City Marathon. She vows to run the 26.2 miles next November, 2024. A crazy goal to me, but if anyone can do it, it’s this powerhouse of a woman.

I’m in the backseat next to her, remembering our partnership 33 years ago when she came into my life. We were a team then, and now. As I watch her silent strength breathing in and out through each contraction, I’m overwhelmed with love and admiration for the woman she’s become. “They’re manageable,” she assures me, noticing my wincing face, a mirror of hers.  

Ambulances line 77^th Street leaving a welcome gap for laboring moms to enter Lenox Hill, the very same hospital featured in a Netflix documentary.  

Security guards check us in, then wish my daughter, “Good luck.”’ We take the elevator up to the Sixth Floor where Katie is gowned, triaged, and assessed. When she’s transferred to the birthing room, she’s three centimeters dilated. The medical consensus is, “It will be a long day. Rest while you can.”

My prediction: “The baby will be here before 11, more likely 9 a.m.”

4:26 a.m.

My daughter’s resting next to her resident doctor husband, who is also trying to sleep. Me and my project-stuffed backpack head to the waiting room to give them privacy. 

After about 30 minutes, I text her, “Do you need your back or feet rubbed?” I’m sitting in the lobby watching HGTV. “No, not yet.” 

I think about my new grandson, what he’ll look like, be like, the love and challenges his expanding family will inevitably face. I wonder how the little guy’s brother and sister will adjust to their new roommate and if his four-legged siblings will go-with-the-flow or be jealous. 

It’s going to be hard and wonderful and amazing and a full-on-confetti-rain fiesta, a joyous, chaotic, Big Love circle of life celebration. Our family is about to grow by one. The most amazing gift on the Planet. I’ll be a grandma to five grandchildren. Four grandsons and one granddaughter. My eyes fill with tears.

God has blessed me beyond anything I could imagine. Grandmother. The most beloved title in the world. Better than President or CEO or a mega-earning rock star. To my Littles and older Littles, I AM a kooky astronaut rock star who they know loves them to the moon and back.

I close my eyes, tune-out cable TV’s news cycle, and pray for a safe delivery: “Dear God, thank you for taking care of them, protecting them and keeping them safe, healthy, and out of harm’s way.”

As he is born, so will my daughter, and her mother, and our expanding family.

Born again.