It's been a long, long time since I updated this Livejournal.  I'm not entirely sure anyone who reads this will still remember that they even had me on their friendslist, but what the heck.  If I'm remembering right, one of my last entries was along the line of how I didn't have anything to say, really, beyond 'I work all day at a job I don't much like' and 'Wow, my daughter is really awesome.'

Well, I have something to say today.

Kielle is coming up on her second birthday, as a matter of fact.  She's amazing.  How can I say all the ways this little girl is wonderful?  She's a beautiful little girl, with curly blonde hair and big brown eyes.  She's tall and skinny for her age, with really, really strong legs, because her favorite thing to do is bounce up and down.  Not just on our big backyard trampoline -- everywhere.  She sleeps like an angel, and usually (though not today, because she didn't get her nap on time) is a very mellow, happy baby.  She loves her veggies, although like her daddy she's not big on trying new things, and her favorite food is her mummy's coconut chicken and rice.  Her favorite color?  Orange.  Since the age of four months, she will pick the orange thing over any other thing.  Kid loves orange.

So did I, when I was a kid, so this is fine with me.

Anyway, today a thing happened and I need to write about it.  Today Sarah and I went out to a local shopping center.  We were going to buy some groceries and a new hat that I've had my eye on -- a Montreal Canadiens cap.  (Why the Canadiens?  Long story, probably one for another post.)  We were running a little behind, so instead of all of us setting out together, I took Kielle and her stroller and headed for the train station, and Sarah locked up and followed along behind us a few minutes later.

So I got up to the station and sat down on one of the benches in the shade.  Kielle was obviously tired and I'd been trying to lull her to sleep with a bottle of formula and some nice repetitive motion.  Usually a good long sleep on the train will do her good.

Well, there were these two kids a couple benches down -- I'd say about twelve or thirteen years old or thereabouts.  One of them was making this annoying noise over and over again; I think he was imitating the annoying birds in the trees of the field across the train tracks.  It was loud and irritating, and Kielle was getting restless and fussy.

"Hey, excuse me," I said, "would you mind cutting that out?  I'm trying to get my daughter to sleep."

This was an error on my part, as it turned out.

Basically, he started making the noise more and louder.  His friend joined in.  I asked them several times to knock it off, but they just kept intensifying the behavior.  Eventually I went over and stood in front of the kid I'd first spoken with.  I asked him to stop again.

He asked mockingly if I was going to hit him.  "No," I said, thinking 'You little idiot,' "I'm not going to hit you, I'm just asking you to be quiet so I can get my kid to sleep, please."  He thought that was terribly funny.

I went back and sat down.  They kept getting louder and making more and more annoying noises.  Sarah came up and asked what was going on, and I suggested taking Kielle down to the other end of the platform.  As we walked away, they continued making noises.  Later they got off at the same stop as us and kept yelling and making noises while I fumed and tried to ignore them.

Sarah and I talked about what happened a lot over the course of the day.  I was angry and shaken.  When I was the age those kids were, I was in middle school, getting beaten up on a daily basis and tormented in ways not unlike what those kids pulled today.  I didn't understand why they did what they did, why they would act that way.  I mean, I know not every kid is respectful and nice, but good grief -- that kind of deliberate jerkitude just flabbergasts me.

Anyway, they kept yelling at us for as long as they could see us.  We walked on to the shopping center; I bought my hat, we had lunch, we got some groceries.  Then we headed back to the train station.  On the way there, Kielle had *FINALLY* fallen asleep.  Poor little pudding!  She was so overtired by that time; she desperately needed the nap.

As we got to the station and found seats, I found my mind going back to those kids.  We talked about the motivations of kids like that, and how you ought to act in response to that kind of behavior.  I felt stressed and uncomfortable.

And then... what should happen but a train should pull up, and off hop the two idiots in the flesh -- and a friend.  I heard them cry out in delight when they saw us, and immediately they sat down on the bench behind ours and started making weird noises and yelling.  They got louder and louder.  "I have to do something," I whispered to Sarah.

She gave me a look, as if to say that would be a stupid thing to do -- reacting was, as she had said earlier, exactly what these little idiots wanted.  "If you want," she said.

They kept it up.  I subsided a little; they walked off for a second, then came back, just as loud.  This time they'd made up mocking nicknames for me -- 'Captain Cowboy America' was my favorite, although 'Captain Fats' was a contender also.  "If they wake her up," I whispered, "God.  I've got to do something."

Well, they got even louder and even more annoying, and finally I launched myself upright, walking over to the kid who'd started the whole thing this morning.  "What is your problem?"  I demanded.

And the kid looked... confused.  It was just for a split second, but unlike when I went over to him this morning, this time he didn't look challenging or cruel or stupid, just puzzled.  "What the hell is your problem?" I demanded.  "All I did this morning was ask you to keep quiet so I could get my daughter to sleep.  What is wrong with you?"

His response to this was to say something like 'nothing' -- I don't remember exactly what he said -- and call me fat.  Made me pretty mad, honestly.  "So," I said, "you're yelling at me because I'm fat?  What the hell is this?"

He said no, and kept backing off while still making his noises.  A young woman who was standing a bit further along the platform rolled her eyes at him.  "Let it go," she told him.  "It's not funny.  Just walk away."

He and his friends scuttled off a few feet at a time, I imagine to show that neither the girl nor I intimidated them.  The main kid kept yelling at me as he got further away -- the 'Captain Fats' and 'Captain America' nicknames and so forth.  "See you later, Captain America" and like that.  At least Kielle slept through the whole thing.

The thing that strikes me funny now, honestly... during that whole second confrontation, I was wearing a Montreal Canadiens hat.  I wish I'd had the presence of mind to claim to be Canadian.  That would have been funny.

I just feel so upset.  It mostly has to do with having been tormented so when I was a kid, but I just keep coming back to that stupid kid.  Those stupid kids, I guess I should say.  Why would a person act like that?  I could have been some dangerous lunatic, for God's sake; they didn't know me, they didn't know what I was capable of.  Someday, it seems to me, those kids are going to get their heads handed to them by someone who doesn't care that they're only kids.

Gah.  I don't know.  I just had to get that out.  I'm still shaking a little.  I do feel better than I did this morning, after the first encounter -- that moment when I asked Kid #1 what his problem was and he didn't understand what I was asking him made me feel better, for some reason.  I also feel better for actually doing something, and not just standing there letting them do their thing and trying not to react.

Anyway.. like I said before, I finally had something to say.  How the hell is everybody, anyway?

Here's the problem: babies are never as fascinating to all other human beings as they are to their parents.  And I get that, I do; I have no desire to bombard you guys (well, I have the desire, I'm just trying to ignore it) with a detailed description of every time Kielle coughs or sneezes or whatever.

...have you ever heard a baby sneeze?  Or hiccup?  She does that a lot, and it's much, much cuter than you'd think.

Anyway, the reason I haven't posted in a really long time is twofold: first, I'm not doing a lot besides working and taking care of Kielle when I'm home -- Dyce does a hell of a lot, and I still need to step it up to pull my full share -- which is... you know, kind of boring.  I could probably write the same post every day for a while.

"I went to work today.  It was okay, mostly, but there was a sizeable chunk of time where I stood there hating humanity and wanting to wander through the store with a flamethrower.  Then I was told I wasn't scanning fast enough, I ate some bad food, and I came home.

"Later, baby-related things happened.  My baby is awesome, as is my incredibly awesome wife."

I'm guessing the readership-level there would be low, at least after the first couple days.

The second reason I haven't posted recently is that people wanted to see photos of Kielle, which I totally said I would post.  And I haven't.

Because I've misplaced our brand-new, expensive digital camera.

At first I thought I'd just put it down somewhere and forgotten about it.  I do that a lot.  But now I'm beginning to think that on one of the unbelievably sleep-deprived trainrides between the house and the hospital in that first five days, it just fell out of my pocket and I was just too out of it to notice.

And I am ashamed.  Deeply, deeply ashamed.

At any rate, that's why I haven't posted lately.  I'm still trying to get better at this.  Hopefully, the next time I can think of something interesting, I'll think to post it!

Well, it happened.

At 8:15 PM in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, our daughter was born.  She's eight pounds and four ounces; she's absolutely perfect in every way -- of course I'd say that, I'm her father, but still, she is -- and while Dyce had a bit of a hard time've it (the induction didn't go as smoothly as it could've, and in the end they had to give her a Caesarian, but it all came out all right, no pun intended) it's ended beautifully.  Mother and baby are both resting at the moment.

We've known for months what her name had to be.  We met because of an extraordinary woman, someone who was a dear friend to us, who knew how to conquer adversity and was strong but was certainly kind too.  Knowing that this child exists because of her -- well, what else could her name be?

We've named her Kielle.  Kielle Rose Gratton, a little Aries born tonight, whose parents already love her very, *very* much.

We'd like to thank everyone for their support through the long and annoying pregnancy!  There will be further updates -- and pictures, very soon, but right now I've been up since four AM yesterday and I'm going to bed.  See you in the morning!

I'm kind of hoping that by posting this, it'll change everything, on account of when you post about something on the Internet, you so often suddenly become Entirely Wrong about it.  Like that time I was trying to impress smart people on a certain website with my copious knowledge about flags, and ended up being entirely wrong about all the Arab League's countries having at least some green in their flag.

Stupid Yemen.

Anyway.  Dyce and I are having a daughter, as you all probably know, but the thing is, the kid is refusing to exit.  Tomorrow's the official due-date, but we were kind of hoping labor could start today -- the bloody doctor's taking two days off, and we would prefer to avoid Dyce getting induced on Wednesday as has been scheduled.  (That's late in the day Tuesday to those of you in the States.)

I'm somehow reminded of the Mother's Curse, something Dyce and I have both been hit with.  You know the one: I hope someday you have a child who's just like you!  Then you'll know what it was like!

Yeah.  Thanks, Mom.  Thanks, Dyce's Mom.

I'm kind of sensible to the fact that I've only posted since my return about stressful or depressing things.

Life is actually okay right now, seen in the long view.  The stresses are relatively short-term things, having to do with money and outside forces, which believe me I'm going to get to in a minute.  But I'm doing my best to keep in mind that the awesome stuff in my life right now outweighs in ways too numerous to count the stressful annoying stuff.

I don't really have time to compose two separate posts at the moment. Suffice it to say that Dyce is getting bigger all the time, which we both think is awesome; that apart from the dodgy-kidney problem, the baby is in great shape and is bigger than average all around, is active, is strong... God, I'm proud of her!  She's doing all the baby-stuff you're supposed to do in utero, and I know it's kind of dumb to be proud of her for doing involuntary things, but I am, so there's that.

I'm proud of Dyce too.  She's handling all this stuff, which has to be stressful and freakout-inducing in its own right, with severe aplomb.  She's her usual cool, collected self, and I couldn't be prouder of the way she's tackling this.  She's going to be the world's best mom, guys, seriously.

Stressful things, though... yarg.

* The Housing Commission is going to inspect our house.  We live in public housing, so that happens a couple times a year.  There's nothing to really worry about, as we do keep the house in condition and do not abuse it.  Inspections are just stressful, because they remind me that we don't actually control our own living-space at all.  (There's an issue of some trees we were told to trim last time out and haven't yet, because neither of us knew who the hell you go to to professionally trim a tree, we don't have the equipment or the ability to do it ourselves, and I, at least, was damned reluctant to do it at all because I resented being told to trim trees I didn't want to see trimmed because some faceless entity was telling me I had to based on arbitrary rules.  I know they own the house; I know I was being stupid.  I just resented it.  I still do, for that matter.)

* Bills.  Oh holy fuck, bills.  We budgeted carefully back when Dyce first got pregnant, but that budget was based on the idea that the pregnancy would proceed in the normal way and wouldn't cost more than a little more than it was supposed to, max.  All the extra doctor's appointments so we can find out what's up with the baby's genetic structure (which is still happily normal) and her kidney issues (which is still adding up, because that's what unexpected bills do, right?) the old budget is inoperable.  We also expected for Dyce to be working until February or so -- not to have to quit in November because her stupid stressful job was giving her heart palpitations and possibly harming the baby.  Don't get me wrong -- I'm GLAD she quit, and if anything I wish she'd been able to leave the job sooner.  But the money that would have come in would've been awfully nice.  Still... we're still working it; we're still okay, it just involves a lot of scrambling and trying to figure out where to put the fingers that need to go into the dike.

I'm less than thrilled with the whole situation.  The thing that frustrates me most is that, while my parents have incredibly generously offered to cover a large percentage of the baby-related expenses, they can most conveniently do that in the form of paying via the emergency credit-card that I have that pays out of their account.  The problem is, I have to be there to *sign* that credit-card.  Well, given that I work all the time, practically, it's all but impossible for me to be there with Dyce during her doctor's appointments, for the most part.  While the people at my work have been more than reasonably helpful when I go to them and ask for schedule-shifting, it's not what they want to be doing and I'm a lowly cashier, so I've been praying I wouldn't have to go to them again.

Grr.  World, why aren't you perfectly convenient?

* I like having free time and uninterrupted sleep, but I would give those two things up NOW rather than a few months from now if it meant we could just deal with simple wants and needs like "the baby needs her feeding" and "the baby needs her poopy diaper changed" instead of "the baby may need an operation" and "the baby needs to be scanned with the imager again to see if there's YET ANOTHER PROBLEM."

It's scary, and it's annoying, and I AM READY FOR IT TO BE OVER.  I expect to be scared by and annoyed by parenthood.  It's a scary annoying thing.  I just do not like this part of it, and -- insert my John Cleese voice here -- I wish to register a complaint!!!

Just what it says on the tin, as Russell T. Davies once said about something in Dr Who.

*  I've been reading historical tidbits on the always-entirely-accurate Wikipedia lately.  I've been particularly interested in two things -- the entries on sandwiches, which I find fascinating (as a picky eater, I've never had most of these sandwiches, some of which sound horrifying and some of which make me want to NOM NOM NOM my monitor), and the entries on extinct political states.

Like, Corsica was briefly the Anglo-Corsican Kingdom, or it was if you asked the British and the Corsicans, but nobody else.  Republics that lasted a few years or a few decades.  Empires I never heard of.  That kind of thing.  When I was a small child, I had this sense of things always having been exactly like they were at the moment -- this may be a legacy of my early fascination with World War II and the Allied Powers, which was broad but very very shallow.  The older I get, the more I read, the more amused I grow at how profoundly wrong I was as a little kid.

(Among the many awesome things I recieved as a gift on the Summer Solstice was a biography of Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating.  I find the Aussie PMs extremely intruiging.  They're all so much larger than life, even the ones like Ben Chifley and John Curtain who were so determinedly ordinary men.  Of course, Chifley and Curtain are so interesting because they were extraordinary, but I digress.)

*  Reading through the comics wikis has made me interested in the comics for the first time in years.  I'd migrated to SF and SF tv, largely, but some of the stories were interesting and some were amazingly frustrating to me.

I miss comics.  A few years ago, I was reading the Identity Crisis miniseries and got to the infamous rape sequence, and I spent two days feeling sick to my stomach and angry.  At the series as a whole, and at that scene.  If I'd had Brad Metzler to hand, I might have given him a good solid whack with a newspaper.

I bought a lot of old comics after that; TPBs and reprints of my favorite characters and teams, but never the new stuff.  It stopped being fun. I'm trying to get back into comics again, but they're so much darker than they were.  Some of you have been subjected to my lengthy rants on how much darkness and violence ruin comics for me -- hi, Foe! -- but I'll spare everyone that here and basically say that I'm happier with the reprints.

On the other hand, every time I'm about to go on a long rant about the Marvel Civil War and Dark Fill In The Blank stuff along the lines of "But that's just there to generate angst!" or "But that doesn't make sense; they're BAD GUYS, who's gonna just blindly trust the obvious bad guys?!" or "Didn't Thunderbolts already do this way better?" I find myself thinking of the last ten years in America. Yes. Yes, people would trust the obvious bad guys blindly.

I remember a rather awesome post Dex did years ago about how he'd lost his political idealism.  I wish I remembered when it was written so I could track it down and link to it, but it was a beautifully-crafted piece of writing.  Anyway, I remember that at the time -- as so often happened with me back then -- I thought that that sort of thing could never happen to me, that I was a committed idealist and believed the best in the system and in people, and my God what a wanker I was back then.

The American political system beat the idealism out of me slowly but steadily from 2000 to 2008.  And oh, well.  I still have beliefs and I still believe those beliefs are worth fighting for.  I just don't have any illusions about....

This may seem like a digression, but it's not.  One of my favorite lines of Terry Pratchett's is in Night Watch.  Sam Vimes, back in time and pretending to be his old mentor Sergeant-at-Arms John Keel, is thinking about Reg Shoe, not yet a zombie and currently a sort of freelance revolutionary idealist.  I'm too lazy to go find my copy of Night Watch and write it out, but the essence is this: Vimes thinks to himself that the problem Reg is having at the moment is simple.  The problem Reg is having isn't that they have the wrong sort of government; that's obvious.  The problem is that they have the wrong sort of people.  Reg talks about The People a lot, but The People don't exist in reality the way they exist in Reg's head, and if Reg ever actually met The People, they'd give him a clip round the ear and tell him to stop being so stupid.

Anyway. Upwards and onwards, right?

UPDATE:   What the hell?  This entry wasn't one giant block of text when I wrote it.  Let's see if this fixes it.

I feel like I should have been saying a lot lately.

(Here's fair warning: I'm a bit depressed, and when I get melancholy, I tend to do what passes for introspection in me.  This post is likely to have at least a bit of wankerdom.  Therefore, if wankerdom is something you wish to avoid -- and who could blame you? -- please feel free to skip this post.  I'm hoping to have something else up later tonight anyway.)

My days are have the common ratio of tolerable annoyance and joy.  I go to work, I come home and spend time with Dyce -- and I keep thinking I should have something profound to say about it being Christmas; my last Christmas without having a kid, and in a way the last Christmas of my youth, because when you're a father, whatever your age, you pretty much have to stop thinking of yourself as being young per say.

Don't get me wrong.  I think my impending fatherhood is awesome -- pretty much the greatest thing ever.  I couldn't be happier -- certainly couldn't be prouder of Dyce.  This is great.

I wish I had a lot more to say beyond "This is great," because it sounds so inane to me, but whatever -- it <I>is</I> great.

(I do tend to get melancholy in the evenings and nights.  It's weird that I've always thought of myself as a night person.  I'm aware that it's a cliche, but does anybody else here get that pull of melancholy when it gets dark?  More than the usual, I'm thinking.  And while thinking of yourself as an evening/night person.)

Anyway, the point of this post is that I feel like I should have a lot of profound things to say, and wish I did, but don't.  Which is why there's been radio silence from me of late.  Sorry, guys!  I'll try harder.

Stay tuned for something a bit more interesting.

Actually I know perfectly well what National Novel-Writing Month is.  I've taken a shot at it four or five times, and while I've never come anywhere close to finishing, a couple of the books I started are, I think, pretty good ideas.  (One was an introduction to a series of fantasy-novels I'd like to write, more of a fictional reference book that would've geared me up for writing the real thing; the other was... well, it was a novel that I would have loved to read, though I suspect I'm the only one: an Australian immigrant to the U.S. goes back to Australasia in early 1860 and recruits a volunteer regiment of Australians and New Zealanders to fight in the U.S. Civil War.  The novel followed them up through the close of the war at Appomattox Courthouse, and featured among other things the Eighty-Eighth Pennsylvania -- that was the name I stole for them -- charging down Little Round Top with the Twentieth Maine in the decisive moment of the Battle of Gettysburg.

Yes, I know, I am a nerd of gigastic porportions.)

Anyway, this year I'm not taking part.  Don't get me wrong, NaNo is fun, but I've never taken it with the kind of seriousness that you need to take it if you want to actually win.  I've always enjoyed the peripheral bits more -- the gatherings, the plotting, and most of all getting to hear about or read Dyce's output.  (Hers is really good this year.  Pretty amazing for a first draft, so far -- I think this one's definitely worth revising for publication.)  So since I can do most of those things (I had to skip the first Brisbane meetup on account of having to work that day) without working on a novel, I've decided to be Support Staff this year.

So far I have it easy.  Support Staffing isn't so hard until the pressure starts coming on hardcore, usually around the third week.  That's when you really need someone to get you drinks without asking, rub your shoulders, offer to, you know, assist in various novel- and house-related ways.  Especially if you're pregnant.  (Dyce can't be the only pregnant novelist on Earth this year, although she's probably the only one among my favorite novelists who is... then again, if, say, John Scalzi or John Green got pregnant I for one would be extremely skeptical and extremely amused both at once.)

Anyway.  Who all is doing NaNo this year?  I know foenix is, I know Gavin of poxy_report and Kate of wyrdsmyth are, but that's pretty much all I know.  Is anyone else?  Do you want to, but just not have time or energy?  (Man, I feel that last one.)

At any rate -- posting time!

I hate my job.

This is not exactly an uncommon state of affairs.  Many people... I'd be willing to bet something closer than not to most people... hate their jobs.  My dear wife hates her job and can't wait to leave it to be a full-time mom, and I don't blame her a bit.  So I know this doesn't make me unique, and I have it better than a lot of people do -- I'm not quite arrogant enough to be unaware of those things.

That doesn't make me like my job any better.  Mind you, I'm extremely grateful to have a job.  In this economy, my God, I'm lucky to have anything, let alone a job that will, just barely, allow me to support a wife and child and a self on my own nickel.

I admit, when I was a kid, I was an arrogant little shit -- I was an arrogant little shit well into adulthood, actually; I was sure I was going to have a job where I was going to get to use my brain, my intellectual prowess (gimme a break, says Adult Me) and all that stuff.  Something in the law, or history, or... well, that was always my problem; I still don't know What I Want To Do When I Grow Up.  I want to be a father, have a family -- that's pretty much what I want from life, and the key to work is finding something that will allow me to do that.  Being happy at work is frosting.

I work for one of the two Gigantic Food Conglomerates in this country as a checkout operator.  I put down 'clerk' on my tax form this year; it's fashionable to refer to us as 'checkout chicks' -- isn't Australian sexism charming? -- which is only barely less dignified than the job title I came up with, 'cash-register monkey.'

I have to say, I feel more than a little pathetic.  Thirty-one years old and doing this job; my resume is beyond unimpressive and, as I have no university degree, I have very little in the way of prospects.  I'm kind of amused -- and rather annoyed -- at myself from a few years ago; I recall some of you, definitely IceWing, wondering why the hell I was messing around online and not studying or, for God's sake, going to class?

Yeah, I wonder that too, now.

This is a hole I dug for myself, and I don't blame anyone else for it.  Mind you, that doesn't mean I like it down here.  I've never had a lower opinion of humanity than I have now, after a year of working a cash-register and selling the public food.  I genuinely had no idea that this high a percentage of people were this thoughtless or just flat-out stupid.  Most of my customers are pleasant enough, and I'm good at staying cheerful all day, so it doesn't usually bother me until I walk away from the register, but good GRIEF.  I used to think that the Customers_Suck community was over the top.  I don't anymore.

It's weird to be, at precisely the same time, almost slavishly grateful to be employed (and that my amazing wife is happy to do the budgeting, so all I have to do is earn the money and she'll take care of the bills), and hate my job enough that if the store burned down tomorrow -- I mean, obviously that would suck in the long run, but I wouldn't be able to shake an intense feeling of relief.

Anyway.  I hope this doesn't sound too ungrateful or myopic.  I shall post something more cheery next, I think.

The saga is well and truly over, at least insofar as a pregnancy-related saga in the middle of a pregnancy can be, so I figure now's a good a time as any to commit these thoughts to pixels.

Dyce covered a lot of this stuff in her own LJ a couple weeks ago, a little bit, but I wanted to put this down, sort of as a public record, and because it was frustrating and annoying and it's good to get this stuff out.  (The next post will cover something similar.  If this is an annoying thought for you, you know, you have my official permission to skip it and not become annoyed.)

I have Attention Deficit Disorder, which is a pain in the ass, but I can work around it.  Knowing that it's almost certain that I'll be passing ADD along to my kid (she being a girl, ADD is the form she's most likely to get, rather than ADHD, which is more common in men) -- my great-grandfather had it, my aunt has it, I've got it, and it's more likely to be passed along to those whose mothers were highly stressed during pregnancy.  For some reason, none of which having to do with choices SHE's made, as I'll make clear below), Dyce has in fact been highly stressed during the early half of this pregnancy. --

Anyway, knowing that, I also find myself worrying about other problems that could crop up for her -- physical problems, mental ones.  I think it's probably common, extremely common, to worry about that, and want the list of problems your kid has to be as short as humanly possible.

All of which is to say... a couple months ago, we went in for the first ultrasound.  The tech did her job reasonably well -- she had some trouble getting the baby, who was not yet a girl as such, to come into focus, and she kept referring to the baby as "Baby," like it was a name, which I found supremely irritating.  I once knew a woman whose parents were unkind enough to name her Baby, and I didn't think to make any "don't put her in the corner" jokes.

So while I was irritated, everything was fine until the woman said that the baby's neck looked thick, and told us that she was going to put us down as having a one in sixteen chance of the baby having Downs Syndrome.  Oh, and Edwards Syndrome too, though I forget the odds on that -- they were a lot higher, which is good, because Edwards Syndrome is basically a death-sentence for newborns.

Dyce and I agonized over the next two weeks, which we had to wait through while the baby got big enough to test.  What would we do?  With Downs, while there was a struggle, mostly on my part, to get used to the idea (mainly because I had to wrap my head around the idea that I'd be hoping and praying the rest of my life, Please let my child die before me -- so that she, or he, wouldn't have to live in a world where I wasn't there to take care of him or her) we were all for letting things proceed.  Edwards.... well, while the odds were much smaller, we worried about that one too.  As badly as we both want a child, it seemed unforgivably cruel to bring a child into the world when you know there's a near-certainty that the child will have at most a few days of life before dying.

So we waited two weeks, and then poor Dyce went in and had an amniocentesis -- giant needle go in abdomen, collect fluid, come out.  Good God. -- and then we had to wait over the weekend for the results, as the test was on a Friday.

I've never been so relieved as the moment Dyce got off the phone with the doctor's office and told me that the baby was in the clear.  That SHE was in the clear for both Edwards and Downs, because as it turned out she's a she.

The full genetic workup came along a few days later.  She -- she hasn't got a name yet; we've narrowed the list to three possibilities and we're waiting to see what she looks like when she comes out -- is absolutely genetically normal, as far as tests can show, which is incredibly awesome.  Like I said before, it's all but certain she's going to have ADD, but while that's a major pain in the ass, it's one that can be treated with diet, meds, and other stuff.  I've been forced to go off my own ADD meds since coming to Australia, but that's a different post.

Of course, there's all sorts of things that she could still end up having.  That's life.  I think I understand better now that I have a child-in-potentia -- all those things I've read about being a parent.  You want to protect the kid from everything (even, I guess, their own genetic code), but ultimately you have to suck it up and do what you can to smooth the way, and hope that that's enough.

I love my wife.  I love my daughter.  Here's hoping I can smooth with the best of them.