"I'm madly in love with you and it's not because of your brains or your personality." - Grandpa

I don’t plan to find out what gender this new baby is.
It’s not that I don’t want to know – I do. It would make some planning much easier – clothes and sleeping arrangements, among others.
And I will admit to some relief if it turns out to be another boy.
I know what to do with boys.
Most days.
But my theory all along, through three other pregnancies, has been, “SOMETHING has to get me through the pushing.”
And so I never found out the gender.

Because, let’s face it, the hardest part of labor is the time you spend pushing. It seems unfair that after your water breaking, hospital admittance, invasive exams, contractions, and in my case chills, fever, and vomiting, that you get nearly to the end and that’s when the hardest work is required.
And I needed a reward at the end and that reward was FINALLY finding out the sex of my baby. (No, sillies, the baby itself isn't enough!)
My husband doesn’t know this – he thinks it’s because I wasn’t in terribly good physical condition – but my third took as long as my first because I just couldn’t muster up enough energy to push really, really hard.
Confession: I am a childbirth slacker.

My first labor was fast – rushed along by Pitocin, I had nonstop contractions for about seven hours, pushed for about forty minutes, and there Primo was. Not easy-peasy but not bad for a first, especially once I accepted an epidural.

Seg was even easier, since I wasn’t induced. And I only pushed for fifteen minutes. Of course I had completed a sprint-distance triathlon while pregnant with Seg, so I really was in insanely good shape (for me).

Terzo – well, my water broke in the early morning. I dropped Seg at day care, drove to the hospital with Primo, checked with my doctor’s office, got myself admitted, and then called H to arrange for him to pick up Primo. I gave birth in the afternoon, and probably would have done so sooner but I was determined to wait for H to get back from dropping Primo at his mother’s house. I did push for forty minutes, but if I’d given it my all I probably could have cut that time by ten or fifteen minutes. But what’s the point? The baby came out anyway. And it was another boy which was not the huge shocker to me that it might have been to other people.

And just between you and me, my ‘nettie friends, I am betting this one is a boy too. It’s what I do best, gestating boys. I LIKE boys (Always have. Badum-bum.)

Boys are relatively simple folk. You feed them, clothe them, take them to the park. You can yell at them, and I have to admit I would have a much harder time swatting a little girl on the butt than I do my boys, when necessary. Boys don’t care if their hair is combed, or their pants match their shirts. They do care if they have a Pikachu Pokemon card, or if there are enough wiffle balls, and these are things I can remedy. They solve disputes with lots of noise, and, often, speed and, more often, physicality, and this is a process which I understand. In fact, I am fairly convinced that I was a boy in a former life.

I have one niece, and about eleventy million nephews (ok, only eight), and the one girl is a mystery to me, unfathomable and remote. Not that I don’t love her to bits, but I just don’t GET her. I don’t get why she loves cheerleading, complete with sexy, sequined little costumes and hair extensions and strutting, booty-shaking routines that make me very uneasy (I have NO IDEA how her father watches them without pulling her off the field and throwing her into a nice convent), and why she wears clothes that look like they were designed for Las Vegas strippers, and why her shorts have writing across the butt. (I don’t want ANYONE reading my daughter’s butt, lemme tell you.) I don’t understand why she wears lip gloss and eye shadow. I don’t understand why I have never seen her read a book, but she has attended several Backstreet Boys concerts and knows the words to every single N’Sync song. Did I mention she’s NINE?

In my defense, a dear friend has two little girls who I ‘get’ much better - but then E is fighting a hard, uphill battle against the formidable forces of contemporary fashion and culture. Her girls love horses and dogs, and they play sports, and E dresses them in cute but age-appropriate clothes (the sort from Hanna Anderson, although I swear E would have them in pinafores if she thought she could get away with it), and they read Harry Potter and LM Montgomery and Nancy Drew (and yes, Pony Pals), but I’ve never seen either of them with teenybopper magazines in their hands. I have never seen either of them shake their booty to a Britney Spears song (although I have seen them jump around to some Ralph’s World). They look and act the way I in my old fuddy-duddiness think six- and eight-year-old girls should look and act. (But then I am the throwback who refuses my six-year-old video games at home, and his own email account.)

H and I watched “Little Miss Sunshine” last night.
Terrific movie. Really enjoyed it, every minute of it.
Stellar cast – I think I am a tiny bit in love with Steve Carell.
I loved the teenaged son who has taken a vow of silence until he gets into the Air Force Academy, and Toni Collette was perfect as Greg Kinnear’s long-suffering and practical wife. Alan Arkin cracked us up, with his heroin-snorting, profanity-spewing Grandpa. But the best character was far and away that of Olive, the little girl who dreams of competing and winning the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. And I don’t want to ruin the movie, because I want you to go out and see it RIGHT NOW for yourself. But this quote is what stuck with me: when her brother and her father want Sheryl to pull Olive out of the pageant talent show, after watching little JonBenet Ramsay clones strut their stuff and fearing that dorky little pigeon-toed and bespectacled Olive will be laughed off the stage, Sheryl refuses. She says, "I know you want to protect her, I know, honey. But we've gotta let Olive be Olive." (Even if Olive does shock and surprise everyone with her (unpolished and innocent) dance routine, it is still weirdly more appropriate than the glitzy, polished dances the other contestants perform.)

I guess what I am saying is I’d rather be Sheryl than any of the other mothers.
I’d rather my daughter be true to herself, even if it means exposing herself to laughter and possible ridicule. I’d rather she be a little awkward but sincere, than polished and superficial.

I would rather navigate the minefield with her than give up without a fight.

But I guess what I really mean is, I think I’d rather just have another boy.