Last summer my family and I were waiting for a new family member to arrive. I was in Boston with my daughter and son-in-law, hanging out. Making dinner. Watching movies. Writing. Teaching. Waiting, waiting, and hoping: for an uneventful birth, a quick recovery, a healthy baby.

In me as I waited were shadows, worry ghosts haunting me. Worry my daughter’s birth would be as hard as mine were, worry the baby would not be ready for the world, worry my daughter would suffer but keep it to herself. I tried to cope with these ghosts the way I cope with most things, by silently tripling down on determination.

It wasn’t until a few months after the baby was here that I understood the scared ghosts in me were remnants of my former self, that overwhelmed girl who never told anyone she couldn’t cope and just struggled through. And now here is this new presence, making us all laugh and smile, fixing us with those bright brown eyes. Sometimes, if we’re lucky, we get a chance to comfort our past selves.

Between Mother and Other

My heart is younger, higher than  
at any time since I held 
your beginning life against it. 
The mirror does not lie, 
I am as my mother was, 
as I, of course, would never be. 
On this day of days, time is gracious. 
It has, I think, a special fondness
for first-time grandmothers
and so leaves one thing unchanged –
I love your daughter as I loved
the daughter cradled in my
arms, that long ago yesterday when
I was you, and you were she. 

​*I have tried in vain to find the author of this poem. If anyone out there knows the poet, please tell me.
alisonmcghee.com
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