Telling the Story: Celine on Birthdays

I have never cared for my birthday. (Getting older lost its charm at age 8.) So I always thought it was quaint the way each year, on my birthday, my mother would detail the long day of my birth. The dinner they went out to, the meal she ordered. The long and bumpy ride into the city. The rather barbaric way they forced women to labor in bed only, with no water even to drink. The roommate that smoked! The rejoicing when I finally appeared. My grandmother bringing Thanksgiving dinner to the hospital afterwards. She would get a certain look in her eyes every time.

Then I had a baby. The birth of my first child mirrored my own in so many ways- back labor, 12 hours at the hospital, a noontime birth, no drugs. And then the immense and total gratitude of holding that tiny creature in my arms. I was immediately in awe of my mother, birthing naturally in 1971 with conditions far less appealing than my birthing tub and private room. It was a lightbulb, and I understood now this celebration of my birthday, that she had always savored far more than I. Now I look forward to her reminiscenses in a new way. I find myself starting to tell a similar story on Emmet’s big day.

This piece originally appeared as a comment on Happy Birthday Calder Mac: My Life’s Work.