Our Good Fortune

Saturday evening, Quinn will be reunited with the woman to whom we owe all our health and sanity.

It all started with Jack's best friend Tom, who had the perspicacity (and sheer luck!) to marry Jill, an incredibly smart and good-natured woman.

Auspiciously, Jill is the friend I was cross-country skiing with in Utah when I went in premature labor. A former labor and delivery nurse, now a nurse anesthetist (the first cut in that profession is just being able to pronounce it!), Jill was writing down my twinges of discomfort when I was confident I wasn't in labor.

It is entirely to her credit that I made it to the hospital in time to deliver, rather than being my usual dumbass-self by heading to go the gym to "sweat out" whatever discomfort I was having.

Not only did Jill coax me to take a shuttle, if not ambulance, on the 20 minute drive to Salt Lake City, she had Tom (back in Kansas) on the phone emailing my blackberry directions to the hospital (and thank Baby Jesus she did because the driver didn't have a clue where she was going, but was thrilled by the idea that she might have a kid born in her van. . . to the extent I swear she was delaying things when I tried to pay her as we were running into the ER).

By the time it was confirmed my water breaking was no aberation, my heroine Jill had already changed her ticket back to Kansas, rented a car, talked to Jack's commander's wife to get word to him, and was ready to crash on a cot until the kid made her debut.

With all my joking, crying, and intensifying groans, there wasn't much sleep to be had by the time Quinn was born. Nonetheless, Jill sprung into action videotaping the whole thing for Jack (who appears to be too squeamish to watch it), cutting the umbilical cord, and then helping me get collected and moved to yet another room.

Within a couple of hours, Jill scurried back to Park City to pack up the rest of our things, check out of the hotel, bring our other friend Dar to the airport, and then returned to save my sanity as I started to come unglued from the shock of all that had unfolded.

What's really remarkable is that about four days before Quinn was born, I had a dream that I had given birth and someone who was a sister to me, but not my actual sister, stood next to me to lend her support. In the dream, the delivery was such a breeze it made it hard to fully comprehend what had just transpired.

The morning after that dream, I mentioned it to Jill and Dar over breakfast. That dream is still so clear in my mind, as was the thought I had afterward "Yeah, if only a delivery could be so fast and relatively painless! And that other woman's presence was so serene, the whole event was rather calm and peaceful. . . " And then, as if following a script, that's just how it went in reality.

Even after seven months of pregnancy, that was only the second dream I had about the baby. The first one was startling because in it I was unaware I had given birth, and instead of seeing a screaming, gooey, puffy-faced kid, I saw one clothed and bundled and lying on a bed away from me.

Obviously, after those two dreams I've just canceled my subscription to dreams all together. That's just too freaky. Although, having Jill come to my rescue -- in both a dream and reality -- lends me the fortitude to face the prospect of both my sleeping and waking reality.

Wishing you only the sweetest of dreams,

Mama Murphy & MQ