Sunday, August 26, 2012

Plus One Equals Nine

Once upon a time there were two people out of a world of people who are very important to this story because they were absolutely meant for each other. Sometime between when those two people met and when they got married, they fell deeply in love, so much so that my father asked my mother to marry him. And they were married.
A while after they were married these two people had a baby and then about a year and some months after that baby they had another baby, and before too many years had gone by (ten from when that first was born) you could count six little heads in the Glasscock's pew on a Sunday morning, and those two people from the beginning of the story had six children. And then there came a time of much learning and teaching and loving each other for the six children and their wonderful parents.
Well, when the youngest of those six children was thirteen, and a little before the oldest had turned twenty-four, my mother and father told us children that there would be another baby to love, and hold, and dote upon. Words cannot express the way those children felt! The joy in their hearts over the upcoming entrance of their new little sibling (who turned out to be a brother) overflowed, and resulted (at least as far as the youngest set of girls is considered) in late night conversations and giggles about all the fun that they would have teaching the little brother to do this and that, sing songs, and make rhymes, and enjoy a good book.
And then, after a very long time of slow waiting and lots of prayer, the newest child arrived. Oh, the excitement there was! Family members running hither and thither, gathering up blankets, and onesies, and teddy bears, and even a set of "Dutch Blitz" cards to use later on. A lot of family was piled into the little sweetpea room, a lot of pictures were taken of the hugs that were given and the kisses that the baby received. And nobody even minded that the wee little one was screaming as loud as he could, except to worry that he was alright.
Of course, there was a little sadness in that the eldest sister (who was so very smart and thus attending Yale) could not be with them, but being a family of means, someone had thought to bring a way to skype with her, and so, although it took some figuring out, she, too, was able to partake of the joyful first moments of the baby's life.
He was a goodly sized baby, eight pounds even and twenty and three quarters inches long. He was born at nine o' nine pm, and in the sack (or caul) which, according to the midwife and several centuries past of myth and legend, is supposed to be good luck and means the the baby will be smart. And they all crowded around him until my mother was very tired and they all left to let her and the healthy little baby rest.
The moral of the story is this: If you add one to one, you get two. If you ad one and one to the original ones, you get four. If you ad another four ones to the other four ones, you'll end up with eight. Then, even if you wait a little while in-between, if you you and one more one to that eight you'll get nine. Trust me, I'm the third to last one of the ones, I ought to know.