American in Spain

When I shared the final photo from this post a few days ago, it got much praise on the social networks. One of my friends told me that when she first saw it, she assumed – as is always possible with my photos – that it was a Photoshop fake. She said that it looked “too perfect”. I had also noticed the especially pleasing aesthetic to the photograph, but it took me a bit to put my finger on it. What is amazing about the original photograph is the perfectly spherical appearance of my wife’s belly.
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We are considerably less stressed/terrified about the impending birth of our son than we were about our daughter, four long years ago. For instance, for Nora, we had the crib bought and put together a full three months before its first use, and this time we haven’t even considered bringing it down from the attic yet. The baby car seat and stroller attachments are still stored in my in-laws’ attic as well. I don’t even think we’ve bought a single item of baby clothing yet.
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This morning we went to our appointment for the third sonogram of this pregnancy. While I was waiting on the curb for my wife to drive up and pick me up, one ambulance and four police cars sped by going towards where she was supposed to be coming from. She was five minutes late, and I started to get worried. Soon, though, she drove up and told me that she’d just driven by an accident and the motorcyclist was still lying on the ground with his helmet on. Yikes. I’m not sure if it’s good or bad that we beat him to the hospital.
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Nora has an announcement to make. Take it away, Nora…

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On June 2, 2011, we went into Santander to visit a private obstetrician, the same guy we visited with the first pregnancy. His professionalism and caring way of treating us impressed us both times we’ve seen him. About halfway through the sonogram, he said, “I’m afraid I don’t have good news for you.” He took the time to carefully explain all the developmental deformations the fetus had, listed the many possible causes, and described the sum of deformations with a phrase I will never forget: “incompatible with life”.
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