The way it was

SILVER BABY

 

Skinny, 18 ½ years old, married for a whole year, I had gradually left my broomstick days. The 42 pounds I had gained were soon going to come off. I was almost happy to be standing on the corner of Smallwood and Pulaski with my husband while he tried to hail a cab. I was so young, so naive, I had almost no idea of what was going to happen to me, how long it would be before I could have a double chocolate ice cream soda again and I could look human, wear a dress that I didn't have to borrow. What I knew  was I was going to have a baby to take care of forever.

 

At the free library I had looked over a few 'Mother's World' magazines, bought some essentials like a huge gray pot with a lid that covered both of the burners on our small range. That was to be for sterilizing the baby's bottles every single day. I loved going in to Brager's Dept. Store to buy receiving blankets (four pink striped ones and two yellow)  just in case the girl I knew was on its way turned out be a boy. My 'she' was going home with us wearing a cute little pink knit hat, booties, a soft white sweater. Lots of diapers and a diaper pail that had a good, tight lid were already making our small bathroom smaller. My mother had bought a bathinette for baby that I had to keep folded in the bathtub. We were going to be as ready as we could for every emergency. Ha ha!

 

Although it was early Sept., a fall wind whipped around my belly, almost knocked me over. My husband was just watching cars go past, none of them a yellow cab. I felt my teeth clenching, pains turning my face into a green witch. Joseph finally snagged one but the driver was reluctant to take a chance on having to deliver my baby in his cab. Joseph waved a ten dollar bill at him and we were accepted. I needed the help of both of them just to get to the hospital door.

 

A white capped nurse had a wheel chair waiting for me, pushed Joseph toward an open door where I saw two men pacing the floor. I got a hug and a brief kiss from  my nerve-wracked husband. Spinning, my head was spinning as walls rushed past me. My arms were pulled into what looked like an XL convict's striped cotton gown that opened in the front. Being  subjected to a thorough, embarrassing physical going over by what felt like a hundred new med students didn't phase me. I thought I was drunk, looped out of my mind.

 

Thankfully my next stop was the delivery room and peaceful oblivion. Somewhere, far away, over a mountain, I was being told to 'push', 'push again! Someone was screaming bloody murder. When I shut my mouth that someone stopped screaming. From the dimness around me, I made out a fat lady dressed in white. She had a tiny bundle of something squawking. The white capped lady walked over to a table, put 'the thing' down on a white sheet and said to no one in particular, 'silver nitrate.'
Total confusion twisted my brain and my eye sight. The 'thing' was my baby and the damn white capped lady had turned her into a solid silver wailing oddity. My eyes closed and I didn't care if they never opened.

 

Once I got a taste of rationality, looked at my baby in a bassinette, she still looked silver. To this day, 50 years later, she has remained frozen in my mind, a treasure that can't become more dear, more valuable than she is.

 

Oh, how I love her !