Celia the Rutabaga

My in utero-daughter and I have a little game we play. Whenever Jenn says, "Wow, she's really moving around," or "She's kicking up a storm," I put my hand on Jenn's belly and little Celia (this week's name) stops moving. 

"Yeah, right," I say.

"You don't feel that?" Jenn grabs my hand and places it on her lower belly.

"Nope," I say, and roll over to read my sports book.

With all peaceful and quiet on the western womb, Jenn falls quickly asleep.

At first I found it frustrating, and oddly or no, took it just the slightest bit personally. How come Celia stops moving every time I try to feel her? Maybe she's surly because I don't talk to her more or sing lullabies to Jenn's belly. What a concept--to sing to Jenn's pregnancy bump with the knowledge that on the other side of it is a floating head of cauliflower snapping her tiny, fetal fingers to my off-key crooning.

The observant reader may have caught a recent and subtle allusion to my daughter's size. Why, as recently as two sentences ago -- in this very blog as a matter of fact! -- I compared her to (and I quote) "a head of cauliflower." I do this because, apparently, it is common practice to compare the size of a baby's progressive stages of growth to various types of grains and produce.

Early on in the pregnancy, Jenn informed me with genuine excitement that Celia was "half the size of a small grain of rice."

My internal reaction to this news (read with affected enthusiasm): Big Whoop.

From there, our daughter sprouted to half the size of a lentil (evoking much the same response) before graduating to the size of an entire lentil. The latter garnered a mild raise of the eyebrow from the author and a semi-feigned "Wow!" I offered this, of course, to demonstrate to Jenn that I would indeed be an involved father.

A month or so later, the handful of congregated cells in Jenn's uterus had grown to the size of a pea, which is when I informed Jenn that it was hard for me to get excited about this. I asked her to let me know when Celia/Zinnia had reached the size of a grapefruit--the produce of choice for many comparisons in life. However, I got on board with the food comparisons sooner than expected. Jenn's mother, a nurse and very happy future-grandmother, started giving us semi-regular, produce-based updates. She called one day to inform us that Celia was now half the size of a small banana. I felt a little twinge of excitement with this one. I paused to evoke the image. Half a banana. Hmmmm ...
I visualized a banana, cut it in half, then replaced its spotted yellow peel with pink, glowing baby skin and placed it in Jenn's womb.

"Cool," I said at last. And I meant it, by G-d.

From there, and somewhat predictably, Celia grew to the size of an entire small banana (albeit a really grotesque banana with squiggly arms and legs). Then one day two weeks ago, she graduated to zucchini status. I nearly burst my buttons with pride and mused aloud what it would be like for Jenn to give birth to a bouncing baby summer squash.  Jenn, of course, refused to play along, and frankly, I don't blame her.

Yesterday, Jenn's mom informed us that our child was now the size of a cauliflower. Not, presumably, one of those monster heads one sees on sale at the tail end of cauliflower season for $3.50, but more a smaller, organic cauliflower with nice, crisp florets and tender, spade-shaped leaves encasing the head in a green crown. Now that's produce I could wrap my brain around!

I asked Jenn to tell her mom to let us know when her grandchild-to-be had reached the size of a watermelon.

"No," Jenn said, slamming the door on that fantasy in the bud. "I will not be passing a watermelon through my body."

I whined. "But I like watermelo--"

"No."

Jenn's mom, M., can not wait to be a grandmother to our child. She has knit countless booties and made a number of hooded sweaters to protect little Celia from the harsh southwest sun. Due to M.'s medical background (as well has having brought into the world six kids of her own), she has offered various suggestions as to what Jenn should expect and what could help her during her pregnancy. Ironic or no from a woman who had three home births herself, she seems neutral-to-slightly-disapproving of our decision to have our child at home. This sometimes manifests as a sore of smiling, measured neutrality. But what I know about M. is, she wants what we all want--a healthy, happy baby following a smooth, uncomplicated birthing process.

Regarding the birth itself: I have long held a scene in my head from a movie. (I think it was, "Little Big Man.") A Native American woman is about to give birth to her baby even while her people are being attacked and killed by marauding band of Calvary soldiers. The woman is in a squat behind some bushes, biting down on a dirty strip of cloth to stifle her cries as beads of sweat pour from her forehead. The image was unspeakably poignant, so naturally I suggested that Jenn, too, could bite down on a rolled up bit of cloth, and I even offered to roll it up for her. She must have been having one of those days (wink, wink) because she nixed the idea out of hand with little (if any) consideration to its merit.

However, lest the reader get the idea that my wife is some sort of female curmudgeon who walks around with her smile perpetually upside-down. it was Jenn's sense of humor that won me over early on and, in fact, was (and is) the very mortar of our relationship.

What I consider to be Jenn's crowning achievement occurred one day in our kitchen back in Oregon.  She was encouraging me to try some food or other that I held a decided antipathy towards.

"Come on," she said, "You might like it."

"Hey," I said trying out one of my favorite lines from Pulp Fiction, "sewer rat might taste like pumpkin pie, but ... " I paused, unsure how the rest of the line.

Jenn saw me struggling. "... but that doesn't mean I want to eat the motherfucker," she said as cool as can be.

It nearly brought a tear to my eye. I clapped my hands with delight and spread my arms. "I'm so proud of my baby," I said. "Come here so I can give you some sugar."