Anakana Schofield

The cure for a headache today turned out to be a rivetting conversation. Thanks L.

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Today I woke to the thrill that a new baby was in the world and I was going to meet him. I put on my lipstick for I had to be at my best and headed out. I was even more thrilled to find his mother sleeping with a do-not disturb sign on her hospital door. I remembered the days following my son’s birth (which was equivilant of search and rescue of ship lost at sea) the exhaustion was unlike any other ever. It was like being run over by a semi-truck, standing up and running a twenty-six mile marathon and then discovering you’d now to attend a barn dance at the end, followed by some kind of farming inspection after the shindig ended and now off you go to the nightshift.

Your baby needs everything from you, you are his food and he may have a hard time adjusting to acquiring it and your body may not entirely co-operate either. You’ve grown this life, now you feed this life every hour, second hour, all night long.

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Last night in a strange incident I was caught in a robbing situation at a shop, which then boiled over onto the street and was very startling. There was a moment where I was suspended between this heightened situation and my son was beyond, unbeknownst, in the car. Between he and I were a bunch of unpleasant circumstances that briefly cut off my passage.  It was horrible. Today at the hospital I remembered that early fragility of life and recognized that it still continues in different shapes, despite his strapping height and searing intelligence and gentle jokes. I am glad to be reminded of this.

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