sweet sixteen

Sixteen years ago today, I was in a hospital bed on Sunset Blvd. with a seven pound fourteen ounce lump lying next to me. It was a toss up as to which of us was more traumatized at that moment, and we were eying each other warily, clearly unsure of the other's intents. Visitor after visitor trooped in to take a peek, and, as wiped out as I was I was grateful for them, because as long as someone else was there I didn't have to feel responsible for anything. I vaguely remembered something to the effect that eventually this small person would actually leave the hospital in the care of his parents...whoever those people might be. I was a little fuzzy about the specifics, but I had the notion that I was implicated here somewhere.


We had rolled into the hospital at 5:30 the afternoon before, bags packed, birth plan in place, What to Expect When You're Expecting bookmarked in all the appropriate places. As is my usual pattern I had read everything I could get my hands on, so I felt confident that there would be no surprises, leaving nothing to challenge the sense of control that was so vitally important to me. I expected to deliver in about an hour, refuse all drugs and leave the hospital - smiling - in my skinny jeans.


You can stop laughing now.


From 5:30 pm until 1:01 am Pacific Standard Time, when Sasquatch finally made an unwilling appearance, I had plenty of time to fully comprehend that the word "control" was no longer relevant to my life and wouldn't be for years to come. (I'm still waiting. Can I get an ETA?) As I looked at the swaddled little body in the bed next to me, I marveled that something that small could wield so much power.


And on this, his sixteenth birthday, he's got at least three inches on me. He's capable of making me run the entire gamut of human emotions in a period of about three minutes. I'm starting to notice suspicious fuzz on his upper lip and the smell of his tennis shoes can kill small animals. This kid who changed the entire course of my life is sixteen years old. Sixteen. Years. Old.


But he'll always be my baby. Even if I'm still a little fuzzy about the specifics.