SECOND TRY: OUR GRANDCHILD

This is the second time I’ve tried to write about the new grandbaby we’re expecting in December. The first time I wrote about it (never published) turned into a maudlin, sentimental piece that was embarrassingly sappy. It sounded a little like we were the first people on the face of the earth to have a grandchild since Adam and Eve beamed proudly over Enos. (I think Enos was their grandson by Seth, as Abel was dead and Cain was in jail). But it honestly was the way I felt—unique, sentimental, sappy and very, very happy.

I’ve spent the last two months keeping a piece of fruit in the refrigerator to remind me of how big our grandbaby is. At six weeks or so, the baby was about the size of a raspberry with a spinal cord. It is now about the size of a really big, Grade A California grapefruit (roughly the size of its mother’s hand when held in a traffic-stopping position). It has fingers, toes—and even ears.

So here I was, feeling sentimental, sappy, and happy—and choking up every time I saw that piece of fruit in the refrigerator. But for some reason, it seemed almost disrespectful to write about the baby too soon—I didn’t want to jinx it.

BUT--all that has changed! Now I can write about a real baby because on Sunday night on the telephone, I heard its heartbeat. My daughter-in-law’s aunt loaned her a baby heart monitor, and last night, we heard the lub-DUB, lub-DUB, lub-DUB of the baby’s heart just as clear as day. Tom thought it sounded like a boy (he’s been convinced from the beginning it’s a boy). I was just relieved it didn’t sound anything like the heartbeat of a raspberry or a kiwi or a cumquat or a grapefruit.

It sounded like an incredibly healthy baby with the heart of a fighter pilot.