Labor

As I write this, my sister is in labor. Her baby girl will likely arrive within the hour. And I sit here in my yoga pants and glasses, my kids chirping about me, waiting for the good news.

I am really excited. Excited for her to have her second babe. Excited for her to have a girl. I am biased, yes, totally, but I think there is something about girls, about mothering girls, that should not be missed. Apologies to those who don't or won't have little girls, but this is how I feel. I also acknowledge that I have no idea what it means, or feels like, to have a boy. I'm sure it's pretty amazing as well.

So. She's in labor. At the hospital where I delivered my baby one year ago, almost to the day. My littlest girl was born a year ago Tuesday. And I remember that day with keen clarity, that day she was born. I was so tired as I had been up all night weathering contractions, waiting. And when she arrived, and I held her, I felt it again and anew. Profound, abiding, love. Also profound, abiding anxiety.

These two things - love and anxiety - are at the very heart of motherhood.

I continue to wait for my phone to do its little jig. To learn that our newest family member has made her debut. I continue to wait to see how I will feel, really feel, when this happens. Because my laboring days are over, a fact that both relieves me and makes me impossibly sad.

For now, I will scoop up my own baby, my baby who is just shy of her first, and wipe the stickiness from her beautiful cheeks and take her to her crib for her morning nap. And then I will wait some more.