Yves' wonderful sisters, Coco and Gigi, and his great good friend Charlie came for New Year's eve yesterday. Lucy made perfect mashed potatoes by hand and she cooked the biggest, sweetest fresh carrots in buckets of butter with thyme. I was charged with roasting the stuffed lamb shoulder, which should have taken less than an hour. However, I was made to understand that there is no way of cooking meat for the Congolese short of very well done. Well done it was—to the point that I found it virtually inedible, a heartbreak of a delicacy. But everyone else was charmed, so I made up in red wine for what small disappoint of protein I suffered. The cake Yves brought from the bakery that had made their wedding cake would have dissipated the memory of a meal of tinned sardines!
We celebrated New Years with the French on TV at 11:00. At midnight, the immediate neighborhood erupted with live fireworks that exploded under our very windows and boomed from all directions. In most other African countries, we would likely have ducked for cover, but in laid-back Senegal we could trust people were having fun, as they do to the drumming, the bells, and other rhythmic poundings I hear throughout the day, caused by nothing more, apparently, than being awake and alive.
By 1:00 I had withdrawn to bed, leaving the youngsters. I was fast asleep when Lucy awoke me at 2:15, wondering if her water had broken?. Well, it didn't take long to answer that, and to establish that the big moment had come. Yves flew out the door into the street where taxis were happily in abundance because of the New Year's tumult. My adrenaline-jolted body worked at one speed while my sleep-soaked brains worked at another: I stumbled quickly to the taxi , but without my purse, having promised to pay for any surprise expenses…
The roads were clogged with pedestrian revelers celebrating in the four-lane highway, with bumper-to-bumper taxis, with cars broken down and sitting athwart two lanes—the impediments to traffic were bizarre and numerous and each trouble magnified a hundred times the urgency felt and the distance it seemed we had to go. To Lucy's original question of when to leave for the hospital, her doctor had said, "When contractions are 5 minutes apart." I was glad that Lucy had pressed the point that my labors had lasted only 2-1/2 and 2 hours; her fraternal aunt's had been similarly expeditious. He had revised his instructions. "May you should leave at 10."
With several congested, traffic-circled miles to go, Lucy was contracting every 2 minutes. When we got to the Clinic, she wouldn't wait for a wheel chair and trundled in her pajamas straight through the doors.
And that was it. In the neat little clinic with two delivery rooms, a sympathetic team of Lebanese nurses and a doctor delivered the reluctant baby with forceps at 5:50 in the morning, after only 2-1/2 hours.
Lucy had Yves with her in the salle d'accouchement, but she asked for me after only a few minutes. I felt very privileged that she wanted my help and reassurance, to be with my daughter as woman to woman. I was filled with joy and pride by her effort and determination. Every woman who delivers a baby is brave and durable and beautiful—but especially my own daughter.
There was no doubt how much it helped both Lucy and me to be together for those minutes, some of the most rapturous of my life. I will never forget them. So why did I find myself, after stepping back for a moment to rest against the wall, tangled on the floor amidst the feet of an IV stand with Yves and two nurses scooping me up like warm Jello dripped from an overfull platter? I had no awareness of having fainted; I hadn't felt bad in the least. So it was a big disappointment to be banished from the further proceedings for my idiocy in having fallen over, unannounced even to myself.
Why did I do this stupid, stupid thing? Certainly not squeamishness to blood or pain: I'm a trooper. Perhaps the emotion and champagne, the bubbles in my brain and the giddiness in my heart were too much to bear. Today I am hobbling around on a knee that is much worse for the wear as the result of that episode. Perhaps it was all to remind me of my age and to conduct myself with some mincing show of grandmotherly dignity.
He's a beautiful baby, nearly 7 pounds and sleepy, but learning to nurse. She's a radiant mother, and while understanding of his need to proceed at his own baby pace, still most encouraging in the nursing department. Yves, I think, from my observations of a good man who keeps his counsel and does his heavy duty of politeness to all, could not have been happier when everyone just went away so he could have his family in his lap with no need for further words.
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| Happy New Year, Happy Birthday! |
We celebrated New Years with the French on TV at 11:00. At midnight, the immediate neighborhood erupted with live fireworks that exploded under our very windows and boomed from all directions. In most other African countries, we would likely have ducked for cover, but in laid-back Senegal we could trust people were having fun, as they do to the drumming, the bells, and other rhythmic poundings I hear throughout the day, caused by nothing more, apparently, than being awake and alive.
By 1:00 I had withdrawn to bed, leaving the youngsters. I was fast asleep when Lucy awoke me at 2:15, wondering if her water had broken?. Well, it didn't take long to answer that, and to establish that the big moment had come. Yves flew out the door into the street where taxis were happily in abundance because of the New Year's tumult. My adrenaline-jolted body worked at one speed while my sleep-soaked brains worked at another: I stumbled quickly to the taxi , but without my purse, having promised to pay for any surprise expenses…
The roads were clogged with pedestrian revelers celebrating in the four-lane highway, with bumper-to-bumper taxis, with cars broken down and sitting athwart two lanes—the impediments to traffic were bizarre and numerous and each trouble magnified a hundred times the urgency felt and the distance it seemed we had to go. To Lucy's original question of when to leave for the hospital, her doctor had said, "When contractions are 5 minutes apart." I was glad that Lucy had pressed the point that my labors had lasted only 2-1/2 and 2 hours; her fraternal aunt's had been similarly expeditious. He had revised his instructions. "May you should leave at 10."
With several congested, traffic-circled miles to go, Lucy was contracting every 2 minutes. When we got to the Clinic, she wouldn't wait for a wheel chair and trundled in her pajamas straight through the doors.
And that was it. In the neat little clinic with two delivery rooms, a sympathetic team of Lebanese nurses and a doctor delivered the reluctant baby with forceps at 5:50 in the morning, after only 2-1/2 hours.
Lucy had Yves with her in the salle d'accouchement, but she asked for me after only a few minutes. I felt very privileged that she wanted my help and reassurance, to be with my daughter as woman to woman. I was filled with joy and pride by her effort and determination. Every woman who delivers a baby is brave and durable and beautiful—but especially my own daughter.
There was no doubt how much it helped both Lucy and me to be together for those minutes, some of the most rapturous of my life. I will never forget them. So why did I find myself, after stepping back for a moment to rest against the wall, tangled on the floor amidst the feet of an IV stand with Yves and two nurses scooping me up like warm Jello dripped from an overfull platter? I had no awareness of having fainted; I hadn't felt bad in the least. So it was a big disappointment to be banished from the further proceedings for my idiocy in having fallen over, unannounced even to myself.
Why did I do this stupid, stupid thing? Certainly not squeamishness to blood or pain: I'm a trooper. Perhaps the emotion and champagne, the bubbles in my brain and the giddiness in my heart were too much to bear. Today I am hobbling around on a knee that is much worse for the wear as the result of that episode. Perhaps it was all to remind me of my age and to conduct myself with some mincing show of grandmotherly dignity.
He's a beautiful baby, nearly 7 pounds and sleepy, but learning to nurse. She's a radiant mother, and while understanding of his need to proceed at his own baby pace, still most encouraging in the nursing department. Yves, I think, from my observations of a good man who keeps his counsel and does his heavy duty of politeness to all, could not have been happier when everyone just went away so he could have his family in his lap with no need for further words.
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