For nine months he'd been rising like bread.

He'd been imaged

charted

and prepared for;

we had no idea what he'd be like.
He kicked a lot.
Would he look like a goat?

Towards the end, anticipation turned all consuming -

Labor began lightly

intensified

and stalled. Wendy refused drugs for 24 hours. Nancy, our doula, later said Wendy is the "toughest fucking woman" she'd ever seen in labor, (she's attended hundreds of labors). After nearly 30 hours, a c-section was ordered

I was supposed to stay behind a screen but I couldn't. I had to look. Finally, after a good deal of muscular activity, he was lifted out,

weighed (8 lbs 13 oz),

and introduced to his mom.

All that's changed is, the thing we wondered about

now looks back at us, wondering.