The Cycle

I am currently sitting on shpilkes, as they say, waiting for the birth of my 7^th grandchild, my son’s 4^th child. No doubt I am far more comfortable than my lovely daughter-in-law, but I’m on shpilkes none the less.

I will be leaving soon for the hospital as they have asked me to be present in the delivery room; I have been a sort of makeshift doula in the past and I guess I can be useful. And there really is no bigger deal than attending the birth of your grandchild, apart from attending the birth of your own child (and in my case, this is a lot less painful.).

But I can’t stop thinking about my parents and my brothers, all departed this world. Why am I thinking about Death when I am excited about Life? I believe it’s all part of a continuum; I’m not alone in this belief. Some compare dying to a form of birth of the soul into another world. I have a sense of the presence of departed souls at times of times of great emotional power, whether of celebration or mourning. Some would say that the human brain conjures up these sorts of ideas as a means of supporting itself through crises, but I really believe that there are other planes of existence and this world is one of them.

My mother passed away too soon, aged 65, 26 years ago, and not a day passes without my thinking of her. I wear her engagement ring and it summons memories. My father and brothers drift in and out of my consciousness and at the moment it’s feeing a bit crowded here with all the folks kind of jostling and murmuring around. Could be the adrenaline, maybe it’s my pulse I’m feeling.

Giving birth is really the ultimate act of faith. Faith that the mother will survive, the birth attendants will be competent, the baby, above all, will be well, the child will grow strong and healthy and become a decent person and a contributing member of society, that the world will go on, that there won’t be a nuclear conflagration, that G-d knows what He is doing, that G-d is there in the first place. It doesn’t really bear thinking about.

So back to the mundane realities of organizing the other kids and washing their faces and hands and getting their lunch and dinner together; back to the suspense, the waiting for the call, waiting for the amazing moment of seeing a new person enter the world, waiting to hold the damp, warm, pink miracle of a newborn, as full of potential as the stars, this crazy melding of the finite and the infinite, the mundane and the holy.

Shpilkes indeed.