Abstract

Last week, I discovered, with no small amount of horror, that I never wrote down Teyla's birth story.

She turned five last Wednesday, my sweet little warrior princess with the impish grin. She was a born on a cold January day, with snow ghosts skittering across the pavement and the sun shining bravely in an arctic blue sky. Which is ironic, really, because everything about her birth was as warm and comforting as a blanket fresh from the dryer. I blogged the basics that night, but I apparently never went back and recorded the details, like I did with the other kids. (Natalie's birth story is eight pages, single-spaced, Lord have mercy.)

At first, I mourned the details lost. I love a good birth story, and the details make it come to life. (I realize that's not always a good thing.)

But if there was ever a birth story to paint in abstract instead of realism, it is Teyla's.

The nurses and my OB were kindness personified, knowing my first two births had been dramatic and I had lost a baby just 11 months prior. They wanted me to enjoy bringing this little girl into the world, instead of giving birth to a child in a haze of pain and terror. They ordered my epidural early, they checked on my constantly and brought me warm blankets. They even let me eat during labor; chicken broth had never tasted so good. Their thoughtfulness was rewarded with a baby girl born by mid-afternoon. I laughed at how easy it was; I had never relished giving birth before.



In my heart, that day is painted in the palest pink, the pearliest white. Broad paint strokes of chunky red sweep through, raucous life-giving joy. It was tender and holy and healing.

To paint such beauty with the right angles of visible reality hardly does it justice. It was so much more.

So is she.