Chapter 16: Alex

I THOUGHT I was a pretty worldly guy. I thought I had things pretty well figured out in life. I had a business in Chicago and one in Ontario. I’d been traveling all over the world as part of my job with the State Department and had been in every country in the Western Hemisphere. I’d had a few different lovers. Of course, none of them compared to the three wonderful women who shared my home and my bed. We are a family.

Ronda and I have been together since February of 1967—six years! We had shared a girlfriend in high school, but when Chris graduated, she left us both. Ronda stayed with me and has never left my side. Oh, we’ve been apart, but Ronda is committed. She transferred from Boston University to the University of Chicago her sophomore year to live with me while she did her undergraduate work in International Relations. She probably could have gotten a much better job than being my coordinator at the State Department, but she wanted to stay with me. I love her to the moon and back. She’s a rock and has seen me through a ton of shit. She travels with me making the interminably long trips seem more bearable.

Anna was my very first girlfriend when I moved to Tenbrook in 1966. My mom had become the Methodist minister there and we moved out of South Chicago so she could serve the church there. Talk about culture shock. Tenbrook had about one percent the population South Chicago had. But the very first day of school, I sat next to this incredibly cute girl named Anna in speech class and asked her out on a date. We were together for a few months, but she got scared of how fast we were moving—we hadn’t even kissed yet—and broke up with me. We kept working together on the school yearbook, though. By summer, she had officially become my accountant and bookkeeper. And by the next summer, we were lovers. She has more business sense than anyone I’ve ever met. And she manages the family just as efficiently. I love her so much I can scarcely see straight.

Then there’s dear sweet Patricia. When I first met her in Tenbrook, she was riding the back of a motorcycle behind Tony, the leader of the local ‘biker gang.’ He had a tough reputation, but through one thing and another, we became best friends. One of those things was Patricia. She got me to take pictures of her pretending she was a Playboy bunny for her boyfriend. He loved them and kept sending her back for more pictures. When he was drafted into the Army, my mom married them. Patricia continued to come into my little studio every week to get new pictures to send to Tony. And sometimes to cry, because she was so lost without him.

After Tony was killed, she spent even more time with Ronda, Anna, Chris, and me. When she found out she was pregnant, she sought comfort in my arms and we became lovers. I would do anything to protect her and our little girl Toni. Toni has called me Daddy for years and that’s what I am to her. We always remind her that her father is buried in Tenbrook and was a very brave man who saved my brother-in-law’s life. But I’m still Daddy.

The important thing is that we are a family. I mean Patricia, Ronda, Anna, Toni, and me. We live together. We bought a house in Ontario, just in case I needed to run from being drafted. It included an antique store and my Canada studio. We bought a house in Antioch, Illinois as a base for our time with the State Department, and a place to raise our children.

Children.

Patricia was pregnant with our child. I’d been gone way too much during her pregnancy and was looking forward to three weeks of peace and quiet before they put Ronda and me back in the air. None of us had realized what 75% travel would actually mean. But there was nothing I could do about it.

The week after my graduation from college, I received my draft notice. In a final stab at me, the crooked draft board in Hunter County had changed my status from II-S to I-O. I’d applied to become a conscientious objector years before, and they decided to grant the request as soon as they had control over my status again. They claimed all conscientious objectors had to serve, though legally, they were treading on thin ice. Nonetheless, I’d already agreed to go to work for the State Department and they simply bought my contract from the selective service. That tied me to them for two years.

When Ronda and I got to Midway in Chicago Saturday morning, all I wanted was to hold my family in my arms and possibly sleep for the next few days.

“Anna! You’re here to meet us! I thought we’d have to take a limo home again,” I said as our wife rushed to meet Ronda and me. She kissed me deeply and turned the same attention on Ronda.

“There’s no one home,” she finally said. “Elise took Patricia to Lake Forest Hospital the same time I left to come and get you. She went into labor this morning.”

“Oh, my God! We’ve got to get there!” I cried.

“That’s why I’m here. Get your bags and let’s get loaded.”

“No rest for the wicked,” as Reverend Mother Superior would say. She easily included me in that statement.

“What about Toni?” I asked.

“We had arrangements made with Lisa Thompson to stay with Toni when Patricia went into labor. Toni isn’t allowed in the birthing room, and she loves her teacher,” Anna said. “And if it takes until Monday, she’ll just bundle up Toni and take her to school like always.”

“That’s good. Oh, man. Last time it was something like twenty-some hours after she started labor before the baby was born.”

“Yeah. I think Patricia conveniently forgot about that when she decided to get pregnant again,” Ronda laughed. “I’m glad Elise is with her until we get there.”

“So, in order for all of us to be with her, we had to get clearance from her obstetrician. Officially, Nate is the father. He has a right to be in the delivery room if Patricia approves it. And she has. We had to do a little manipulating to get you and me included. We are listed as birth coaches. If she hasn’t popped already by the time we get there, we can rotate in and out. They don’t want more than one coach at a time.”

“What do I know about coaching a birth?” Ronda asked, alarmed.

“You hold her hand and say ‘Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.’ And when the doctor says ‘now,’ you start chanting ‘Push. Push. Push.’ Word of advice: take off your jewelry before you hold her hand. She will crush it.”

“I’ll verify that. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to use my hand for a week after Toni was born,” I said.

“Oh boy,” Ronda said. “It’s a good thing I love that girl to the ends of the earth.”

“True for all of us,” Anna affirmed.

“Baby, we’re here,” I said as soon as I entered Patricia’s maternity room. “How are you doing, sweetheart?” I kissed her and she reached up to hug me.

“Aside from being tired and cranky, I’m fine,” she said. “Little Alex, on the other hand, is being a stubborn brat.”

“Hey! What’s that about?” I asked petting her tummy.

“When we got here, my contractions were about ten minutes apart and it looked like it would be a race to see if you got here before the baby did. Now contractions are twenty to thirty minutes apart and the doctor says I’m not dilated at all. They wanted to send me home until they realized how far we live.”

“They aren’t too busy this weekend, so the doctors kindly granted her a room for a night or two,” Elise said.

“Well, it will all pick up again and we’ll have a baby, right?” I asked.

“That’s the idea. The doctor wanted to call it false labor until he witnessed one of the contractions. I guess some women think they’ve gone into labor and then nothing happens for a week,” Patricia said. She reached for Ronda’s hand. “I’m so glad you got here, Mom Ronna.”

“I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout birthin’ no babies, Miss Scarlett,” Ronda said in a very fake southern accent. Patricia started laughing, then seized up in a cramp.

“Oh! Oh! Oh! Again!” Patricia said. She squeezed Ronda’s and my hands as she began panting.

“Breathe. Breathe. Breathe,” Ronda chanted while grimacing in pain. The contraction passed and Patricia lay there gasping to catch her breath.

“Apparently, you know how to make me laugh,” Patricia chuckled. “How long was that one, Mom?”

“Twenty-three minutes,” Elise said, jotting down a note and looking at her watch.

“Who’s been feeding you spinach, girl?” Ronda asked, flexing her fingers.

“Sorry, honey. When they hit, everything just kind of seizes up,” Patricia said. She motioned for a drink of water and I held the glass so she could sip through a straw.

Since it looked like the baby would be a long time getting there, Ronda and I ran home to put fresh clothes on and to assure Toni that baby Alex was still in Mommy’s tummy but would be out soon. We talked to Miss Thompson—Lisa—and she said she would be fine with Toni for the rest of the weekend. They were planning a big game of Chutes and Ladders. Toni was also teaching her to foxtrot and to waltz.

We had a late lunch with them, then Ronda and I headed back to the hospital to sit with Patricia and give Elise and Anna a break.

There wasn’t much change the rest of the afternoon. We all got dinner, though Patricia’s wasn’t solid food. Anna, Elise, and Ronda went home. I decided to spend the night and just be with Patricia. She was feeling pretty sticky and stinky from the day’s exertion. We checked with the nurse on duty and then I took Patricia to the shower.

I held her and bathed her. She said the warm water felt good. Of course, it wouldn’t have been a pregnancy if she hadn’t been hit by another cramp in the middle of our shower, but I held and supported her through it. I got her dry and back in bed before the next one hit.

I wrote down the times and duration in Elise’s log book, then Patricia settled down to get as much sleep as she could. I slept in a chair beside the bed and held her hand, being awakened by her grip every time she woke up with a cramp.

In the morning, the obstetric nurse came in and took all Patricia’s vitals, then looked at our ‘labor log.’ She scratched a couple of notes.

“Your labor pains are finally getting closer,” Nurse Abbie said. “You’re down to about fifteen minutes. The doctor will be here around nine and he’ll check to see if you are dilating. If so, I’d bet you’ll have a baby before dinner.”

“That’s good. I’m getting hungry,” Patricia said.

“You’re doing a good job,” Abbie said. “You look a little parched, though. Better have a sip of water or some ice chips. Do you need me to call in the anesthesiologist?”

“No. I think I can manage with Nate here.”

“You’re lucky to have him with you. Most women do this alone or with a woman to assist.”

“Mom and my wives will be here before long,” Patricia said, fading back to sleep. Nurse Abbie raised an eyebrow at me and I just smiled. She left.

“Progress is progress,” Dr. Randolph said when he’d examined Patricia. “Dilated to four centimeters. Heart rate is good. Not sure why it is taking so long. We’ll get this baby on the ground soon. If it’s not out by evening, we’ll give you a dose of Pitocin.”

He seemed to be a decent guy. I remembered what an ass the doctor was when Toni was born. The staff here seemed to be a lot more ... um ... empathetic, I guess. They cared about the people who were here.

I sat with Patricia and we played a little cribbage between her contractions. Ronda and Elise arrived and said Anna was staying with Toni and her teacher for a little and would be arriving shortly in the microbus.

“So, we’ll have two cars here?” I asked a little foggily. I hadn’t gotten much sleep. I guess no more than Patricia got. It had gotten to the point that as soon as a contraction died down, she just dropped off to sleep.

“What we’ll have is a car and a bed. When she gets here, you’ll go out and get some sleep. That way, none of us will be far away when the time comes. We can all rotate in and out and know we can be back in the room in ten minutes or less,” Ronda said.

“I need a cup of coffee,” I said, yielding my place by the bed to Elise. She looked at the list of cramp times and nodded.

“It’s just slow. It isn’t stopped.”

“I’m worried about how long Patricia can keep this up. Her last couple of contractions she didn’t grip as hard.”

“I think she should get the epidural now,” Elise said. “We’ll talk when she wakes up again and then call for the anesthesiologist. Even though it was really slow at first, she’s been in labor for twenty-eight hours already.”

Anna arrived and took me to the microbus. She settled in with me and I went off to sleep almost immediately. I was out for about three hours. I stopped for coffee on the way back to the room. When I got there, I found Patricia with more wires and a drip bag leading to her spine. She was asleep.

“Mr. Hart and Miss Marx,” Dr. Randolph said, following us into the room. “You are aware that you have medical power of attorney for Mrs. Kowalski?”

“Yes. Is there a problem?” I said.

“This has been going on for too long,” he answered. “She still isn’t fully dilated, even though the pains are now just a little over five minutes apart. We can’t have her start pushing and the baby is in distress.”

“What should we do?”

“I recommend an immediate C-Section. It may be the only way to save the baby.”

“And Patricia?”

“She’ll have a little scar on her tummy, but there shouldn’t be any other negative effects.”

I looked at Anna and then Ronda and Elise. They all nodded.

“Can I go with her into the operating room?” I asked.

“Can you stand the sight of blood?”

“Yeah. I don’t think I have a problem with that.”

“Scrub up. Nurse, he needs scrubs, hat, and mask.”

He stepped out into the hall and was immediately followed back in by two guys dressed in green. While Nurse Abbie was monitoring my hand washing and getting me into the same kind of green jumpsuit, the guys shifted Patricia onto a gurney and I followed her out of the room.

Our doctor was assisted by another surgeon, or vice versa, and a curtain was erected between Patricia’s baby bump and her boobs. I sat on a stool on her left, holding her hand, and a guy with the smoothest voice and tone I’d ever heard sat on the other side, explaining what was going on.

“Are we going to have a baby now?” Patricia asked me.

“Yes, honey. They say she’ll be out in a few minutes.”

“I still think it’s a boy,” she smiled.

“Now, Patricia, I want you to let me know if you feel any pain. I’m monitoring your epidural and we can adjust it if you are hurting. You’ll feel a little pressure now. It’s nothing to worry about.”

I stood up to look over the curtain and could see the doctors opening a slot in her tummy.

“If you are going to faint, please try to fall that way,” the guy beside Patricia said.

“Right,” I answered.

I sat back down, but continually was drawn to stand and look over the curtain. It was amazing. I really couldn’t understand what the doctors were mumbling, but before long, they were pulling and a head emerged from Patricia’s abdomen. It was really a task to get her out. It looked like they stretched her neck out a foot before the rest of the baby finally followed.

“Here’s your little ... girl,” said Dr. Randolph.

“And here’s her car keys,” the other doctor said.

“Oh my!” The nurse said, taking the baby to a receiving station where her nose was sucked clean and she was weighed and measured. Patricia gave me a little push and I walked over to see my little daughter.

“Black hair and blue eyes,” I said as she looked at me.

“Can you say American Express?” one of the nurses said. They put a knit cap on her head and wrapped her in a blanket.

“Here’s your baby,” the first nurse said. And then she just handed me my little tiny girl.

I’d never known the instant bonding, the complete and unconditional love, that overwhelmed me when the nurse put my own little girl in my arms for the first time. I cried as I held her and took her to her mother. Then we both cried.

I believe we have a soul. I never really found evidence of it in the Bible. And no sermon ever convinced me. No. I believe I have a soul because I felt it leave my body and wrap itself around my baby daughter that day. I was more firmly attached to her than to any human being on earth. Even when I was in a different room, I could close my eyes and feel my daughter in my arms. To protect. To nurture. To Love.

How was I ever going to travel and leave her?

I carried her to the bed where Patricia was being cleaned up and stitched up.

“Honey, here’s our little Alex,” I whispered as I brought the bundle to her mother and tucked her in.

“Oh, Alex. You are so beautiful,” Patricia said. “Have you already decided to become a professional boxer?”

“Everything turned out well,” Dr. Randolph said as he came around the curtain to look at little Alex. “But a ten-pound baby! Patricia you aren’t big enough to carry that big a child. And with her presenting sunny side up, having the cesarean was the right decision. We’re going to move you to the recovery room now and I know the rest of your family is eager to greet the two of you.”

“Thank you, Doctor,” I said.

“And thank you, Jim,” Patricia said to the guy who had talked her through the whole thing. He was disconnecting the bag to her epidural.

“Patricia and Nate, love that precious little girl for all you’re worth. Life is a wonderful gift and I’m always thrilled to help welcome a little one into the world.”

It worked out well that Ronda and I had just gotten home from a trip because we had the entire next week off. Then we’d still have two weeks working in the office before we had to fly someplace else. I didn’t even know what our next destination was.

I, being a little bullheaded, insisted on spending the remainder of the night with Patricia as our baby was brought to us for feeding on a regular basis. Elise, Ronda, and Anna finally went home and promised to be back in the morning.

When they returned Monday morning, we were feeling a little tired, but Patricia was sitting up holding Alex. Unfortunately, since she’d just had major abdominal surgery, she wasn’t going to get to go home as quickly as she had with Toni. And that had Toni worried. We decided that I’d go back to Antioch and pick Toni up after pre-school and bring her to visit Mommy and Baby Alex. Patricia and Alex would be allowed to come to the visitor’s lobby where Toni could meet her new little sister.

“Daddy, why Mommy still in hopsital?” she asked when we got in the car to go for our visit. I’d prepared a baloney sandwich and potato chips for her lunch in the car with a sippy cup of juice.

“Well, sweetie, Baby Alex had trouble coming out of Mommy’s tummy, so the doctor had to make a hole for her. That’s surgery and Mommy needs to rest for a couple of days before she can come home. You’ll see the bandage on her tummy when she comes home and she won’t be able to lift you up right away until she’s healed,” I explained.

Toni scowled as she ate her sandwich, then her face lit up.

“Like Daddy’s pendix!”

“Yes, honey. It’s just about like Daddy’s appendix. The doctor had to make a little hole in Mommy’s tummy for Baby Alex to get out.”

“Did they throw Baby Alex away? Like your pendix?” Toni was puckering up to cry.

“Oh, no! Baby Alex is just fine and we’re going to meet her in a few minutes.”

“Oh. Good,” she said and settled in to enjoy the rest of her meal.

When she was face-to-face with her sister, Toni suddenly became very shy.

“Sister?” she asked.

“Yes, honey. This is Baby Alex.”

“She’s little!”

Patricia had been wheeled out to the waiting room so she could hold Alex for Toni to meet. We thought we’d prepared Toni pretty well.