Adessa Premiers...?

Baby Adessa is due on Saturday, June 9th. Today is Wednesday, the 6th, an auspicious day, full of good fortune and a perfectly good time for her to make her debut. I believed-- even convinced myself and others-- that she would come at least a week early, as all my mom's babys were early. Being so close to her due date is feeling late. I have moments of anxiousness, where I think of all the reasons it would have been nice to already have her...labor would be done, the great unknown of concentration and discomfort. Having her in my arms would be done, another great unknown, of intensity and discovery. She would have a jump on the summer! Her birthday would be during the school year so I could bring cupcakes to her class. Taking so many sick days off of workbefore she came would be validated, instead of me sitting around looking at baby stuff and crossing things-to-do off of to-do lists. The basement is organized, mailing labels are ready to send off for birth announcements, even her diaper bag is packed for a first outing, complete with extra clothes, socks, a hat... I am ready!

Wait. Is this waiting because I'm not ready? Do I need to make a new list? Bake something else? Wash something I've forgotten about? Write another thank-you card? Perhaps she is taking her time because she is brewing a bit longer, steeping in the warm familiarity of my belly. Do my hormones need to align at exactly the right time, I am waiting with the cosmos for a perfect degree of ripeness? Is waiting a way to make me eager for the deep shift that laboring a baby into the world is going to be in my life? Do I need more time to practice my breathing, to watch how-to videos on diaper changing and baby bathing? Maybe I need to gain a deeper understanding of the concept of patience.

I have a feeling--not such a great feeling for a semi-control freak-- that this waiting is a part of the big lesson of parenting. The life lesson I'm going to learn throughout this whole parenting process, that no matter how much I plan and prepare, I am not in control. Is that it? That with all my wishes and intentions to parent my very best, to pay close attention to my kids and be available to them while garnering their independence and sense of self, I cannot say what the final outcome will be? Okay. Then if I accept that fact, that I'm not in charge and have no control, if I quickly learn the lesson that I cannot will or wish things into being, then will she come?