[Updated to add: I HAVE A NIECE. And she's beautiful. Hello, little Mer. I can't wait to meet you.]
[Updated to add, as of 3:45pm on June 12th: Theresa is officially sans water and in the hospital for the duration of her delivery. Which means: Sometime tonight, or maybe tomorrow (but hopefully tonight!), Baby Barkley will officially be here. You have no idea how much self-discipline it's taking to refrain from using excessive ALL CAPS and endless exclamation points right now.]
I was sitting in a grassy courtyard earlier tonight chatting with Cayly (you’ll probably call her Hans, just like I do) about everything and nothing, about how amusing life is, and how tired our respective feet are after hiking thirteen miles yesterday, and how amazing it was to see a doe with her two fawns standing a mere ten feet away from us on the trail, looking at us curiously before taking yet another step closer, when your dad called to tell me your mom was experiencing contractions four minutes apart, and even now I don’t really know what that means, except that she’d been having contractions long and strong enough to know you weren’t joking this time. You were ready. You are coming tonight. Right now.
Right now I’m sitting at my desk writing you this note after having readied everything for tomorrow like it’s an ordinary day. Iggy is fed and walked. My lunch is made. The weather’s been checked and suitable work attire has been somewhat haphazardly set aside on a hanger on the inside of my closet door. My workout gear is eagerly anticipating me wearing it.
A 5:30am run has been cemented in my early morning plans because (the sun is set to rise right about then, yes, and) it’s 12:00am now and I can barely sit still, and if I thought I could run in the pitch dark and not break one of my ankles I would be outside right now, imagining I could send my sister bursts of my own strength with each stride so she’ll be sure to have plenty extra for the long night ahead, even though she probably won’t need it because your mom is one of the strongest people I’ve ever met.
But a 5:30am run it is, because I know after a night of waiting to see your face for the first time I won’t be able to keep my legs from sprinting as fast as they can, as if I’m running toward you, but that’s too far to run in one day and so I’ll just run as far as I can and pray your mom is still feeling strong, resting when she needs to rest, and pushing when she needs to push, and that you’re feeling strong too, healthy and not too scared about entering this world, because while you’ll soon enough learn this place isn’t always as beautiful as we’d all like it to be, for you, and for everyone, there is so much adventure to be had, so much to touch and taste and see and do, and there are so many people so excited to meet you. So many people who have loved you from the moment you existed. (Did you even know that was possible? I didn’t, until Theresa told me you did.)
You’re entering a big family, Baby. Maybe bigger than you’ll initially appreciate (big families have a way of suffocating you with sentiment sometimes), but our family is filled with people who’ll know exactly how to hold you, and how to make the best tea and the best pancakes (they’re huckleberry, by the way), and how to run a ridiculously fast mile and swim a perfect side-stroke, and how to steer a canoe and make the best stew and how to read to you so you love reading, too, and how to tickle you so you’re laughing so hard you won’t be able to breathe for a second, and oh how quickly you’ll come to see what a glorious gift laughter is, and how you’ll be doing copious amounts of it as part of our family. Someday I’ll tell you all my favorite jokes, including the joke that makes me laugh harder than any other, and I can’t wait to see the look on your face when you hear it for the first time, and you love it as much as I do, and we’ll both laugh at how I never learned to master a passable Irish accent even though the joke clearly requires it.
You see, what I’m really trying to say is: Today is anything but ordinary.
You’re a game-changer, little one, and even as at this very moment you’re forever changing Theresa and Will’s lives, you’re also forever changing mine.
Love and huckleberry pancakes,
Your aunt Kerri, who is looking ever so forward to meeting you soon and very soon.