Sixteen Up...

...Just after midnight sixteen years ago E was born.

And what a time we had of it. A late birth, after days of fruitless induction sudden signs of foetal distress and straight into theatre for an emergency Ceasarean. Fortunate therefore that neither H nor I had been heavy on the whole 'birth plan' thing.

Not for us Tibetan birthing rugs woven from virgin yak's wool, with scented Aztec candles and soothing music culled from Polynesian folklore. (Never quite understood why Western minds have to graze so far afield in search of spiritual nourishment. Perhaps whatever we have had to contribute to the world's store of 'soul food' has been buried too long under mountains of cultural junk. It is there, but we can't see it or search for it.)

That we even managed to get as far as unplanned surgery (no ideal way to begin motherhood) was not in slight part owing to yours truly. Not the most assertive of personages, nonetheless the sight of a hapless midwife struggling to plug in a monitor or using her fingers to try and calculate the time on a twenty-four hour clock was enough, in these most urgent of circumstances, to shoot oneself straight to the doctor's station and demand the wretched woman be removed from duty and some properly qualified and competent personage to attend pronto.

Just as frigging well I did, for once said q & c doctor did attend to take some proper readings it transpired that E was in deep distress and possibly on the verge of something catastrophic. The Ceasarean did finally confirm this: silly baby - not her fault of course - had managed to wrap the umbilical cord round her neck.

Now 'E' is not her proper name - due discretion keeps that from the prying noses of cyberworld. The true birthname that she bears had, funnily enough, been chosen even before her conception. Odd possibly, but H and I had fallen on names for 'baby' whether boy or girl whilst one day walking in the hills of the Peak District. On that day there was merely the hoped for intention of becoming parents in some not far distant time. There would be RML for a girl and SJB for a boy.

Well E (or let us call her R) is a Hebrew name meaning 'knotted cord'. So appropriate of course as it turned out to the circumstances of her birth. Clever child it would seem to be so in touch with her destiny.

This 'baby' is suddenly now of an age when she could lawfully learn to fly a glider (nope!), buy a winning lottery ticket (yes per-lease!), join the Armed Forces (not likely) or even get married with parental consent (no frigging chance!!)

Where did the years go? Happy Sixteenth darling daughter.