Emery and Arlo Thomas and Arlo
I knew long before she told me. I was visiting my sister in Massachusetts when I had the dream. The next morning over coffee, I told her that Emery was pregnant.
“Did she call you? I didn’t hear you talking on the phone.”
“No. I dreamt it.”
“Well, then you don’t really know she’s pregnant.”
“No, I do. I’m 100% sure.”
“Ok. Well, let me know when Emery tells you.”
The dream stayed with me long after I woke up. Emery and I were somewhere with a lot of people, maybe a party, and she pulled me aside and whispered in my ear, “I’m pregnant, Mom. Your baby is going to have a baby.”
I woke up knowing she was pregnant, but would have to wait for her to tell me.
When I returned to Kansas City, I went to dinner with a dear friend, and while seated on the patio of a tapas restaurant, she told me her daughter was pregnant. I told her Emery was also pregnant, and before any other details were shared, we clinked our glasses, hugged, and made the joyous screeches girls make when excited.
“When is she due?”
“I don’t know. She hasn’t told me.”
“When did she tell you she was pregnant?”
“Well, she hasn’t. But I know she is. I dreamt it.”
There was a long pregnant pause, pun intended.
“Well, then it’s kind of a ‘pretend pregnancy’…I mean, it was a dream…”
“It was real. I’ll let you know when I have a date.”
I knew it all sounded strange, my certainty coming from a dream, but I knew in my soul of souls that Emery was pregnant, and she wasn’t going to tell me until she could do it in person. The following week, she was flying into Kansas City for an event. She lived in Fort Collins, Colorado, and I was in Kansas City, so her trips home and the airport pickups were always special to me, this one even more so.
As soon as she came through the gate, Emery rushed over to me and said, “Mom….” The word Mom was said with two syllables and a rising intonation, her way of indicating she was about to say something important to me. Before she could go any further, I looked at her and said, “I know.” She shook her head, made an exaggerated exhale, and said, “I should have known. Of course, you already know.”
“But you can still tell me.” She smiled and said, “Mom, guess what? I’m pregnant!”
It was so much better hearing her tell me in person than in my dream.
“How did you know?”
“I dreamt it.”
“Of course you did. I never can have a secret with you.”
And that is how I learned of my daughter’s pregnancy with my first grandchild.
Arlo John Golson was born at 10:51 pm on April 30th, 2017. The first thing I said to Emery was how special it was that Arlo was born on his Uncle Thomas’s birthday. She looked at me and said, “Yes, but Mom…we both had our first babies on the same day, and they were boys.” Although we were both saying the same thing, the way she saw the date had much deeper meaning to me. My third child, my only girl, and I had our first babies on the same day… April 30, and they were both boys. It felt magical. All of it. From the way I found out about the pregnancy in a dream to the date we both shared as our first.
This year, on April 30th, Arlo will be 9, and Thomas will be 40. It will be another difficult date in the long line-up, and I’m learning that it doesn’t get easier because the year of firsts is over. This will be Arlo’s second year without his Mama. Emery won’t be with him to celebrate his birthday or her brother’s entrance into a new decade. Maybe she would have come to Portland for Thomas’s birthday, bringing Arlo with her, and the two would celebrate together. Maybe.
I pulled the following words from a Mother’s Day essay I wrote shortly after Arlo was born. I’ve rewritten these words often, and although I could rearrange them and write something new, nine years later, they still convey what I’m feeling today, so I’ll use them once again.
I can tell you a whole lot of things that will likely happen to you as a new mom, because they are somewhat universal, but you will come up with your own list. Tears will flow, for no reason, and you will have a tough time holding them in. That tear valve opens shortly after you give birth, and I’m sorry to say, sweetheart, but it will never close again. That’s OK, because in its opening, you can feel life and love more deeply than you ever imagined, and that is worth every tear. You will wake up more often than the baby during your first several days at home, and will check to make sure he is still breathing, and you will feel relief when you feel his warm, gentle breath on your hand. You will feel like a part of you is missing if he is not tucked securely in your arms, and that, my dear new mama/daughter, is exactly what being a mom feels like. Whether your baby is still nestled in your arms or 857 miles away, you will always remember the feeling of when you first held him, how whole and complete and absolutely perfect that moment was.
My son, Thomas, is 40 today. Emery’s son, Arlo, is 9 today. There will be a hole, a missing, a longing, in both of their celebrations.
Happy birthday, Thomas. Happy birthday, Arlo. I love you dearly.