Stephanie and Somebody

So we are 30 weeks along now in the pregnancy, and the baby is beginning to really kick and move around. The other day we were about to get out of the car, and the top quadrant of Steph's belly ("Big Belly, Big Belly!!" as I now always refer to it) was pulsing up and down. Yeah, all Alien-like. But according to all the ultrasounds, we are not in fact having a chest burster for a daughter.

And her legs have caught up to the rest of her body. We were quite concerned that she would have short legs like her dad, but no. Other ultrasound revelations have not been so comforting.

One disconcerting moment occurred a couple of months ago when we got a good look at her face. I made a comment, perhaps a sentimental tidbit or perhaps a witty retort--who can be sure? Right afterward the little girl yawned. Bored of me already, eh?

So there are 10 weeks left until the due date. The other day out of nowhere I blurted out, "Steph, we're going to have a baby." It was matter of fact. It was informative. It was absurd. Steph assured me that she had already checked out all the appropriate books on the subject, and many of the salient passages had already been marked. It was as if she knew that my Oprah moment was coming, that great cosmic "Aha!" in which we come into contact with pure experience, the ground of being, the source of all, and suddenly the obvious becomes as obvious as it really is.

I have heard that the Aztecs did not see the Conquistador ships even as they grew larger and larger on the horizon. They had no way of conceiving of something like those ships; no analog to connect what their senses told them with what they knew to be possible. But suddenly someone entirely new and foreign set foot on shore and their world was forever changed.

Just to be clear, I don't think our daughter is going to take over my land, infect me with strange diseases, and steal my wife. That might be considered over-extending the metaphor.