Born Again
Reportedly, I came into this world on Sunday, September 21. Depending on who you think you are, this is either an Ice Age ago or it is last week. While I myself don’t remember my debut, apparently others were there who do. Sources say that one minute I was not on Earth and the next I was. Poof.
Impossible, you may argue. Humans have notoriously untrustworthy memories. Circumstantial evidence, you say. Fine. But I am currently in possession of two souvenirs that prove the event occurred. The first is an official looking document called a Birth Certificate. This government–issued paper rectangle is stamped, signed, and processed by multiple people with multiple abbreviations tailing their names. The second memento, the main one I have, is Me.
Like most of us, I was born approximately nine months after I got started (and although this is a secret, eight months after my parents married). She is a concert pianist and he, an electrician. Even today, if you press her, Mama will look off into the distance and say that she always liked older men. That meant that during the moment of her own birth my father would be dreaming of a shiny new Buick for his Sweet Sixteen party. If you know anything about wartime 1942 you might notice the lie in that last bit, or at least the fantasy. Life can be hard. But even during World War II, with death in your head and in your face, there is more love in the world every second. Disbelief don’t change a thing.
Look at my parents’ wedding photos and you’ll quickly notice that the man half of the new couple is ecstatic and the woman half, startled. Behind the dichotomy is a handsome team at the start of a brave, heroic adventure. That’s me there, hidden in her middle behind the crisp white suit dress, on our honeymoon to Michigan's Upper Peninsula. I wish I could remember how I did it. The poofing into existence. But wishing doesn’t make for magic. Law of averages. Whether we believe a thing does not make it true. Or not. That’s why opinions change, why people change, and that’s where stories come from.
At least one thing did come along with my birth. The knowing that us people, all of us, got one another. Maybe that's the poof of real magic—when wishing or believing has no power to make things otherwise.
Impossible, you may argue. Humans have notoriously untrustworthy memories. Circumstantial evidence, you say. Fine. But I am currently in possession of two souvenirs that prove the event occurred. The first is an official looking document called a Birth Certificate. This government–issued paper rectangle is stamped, signed, and processed by multiple people with multiple abbreviations tailing their names. The second memento, the main one I have, is Me.
Like most of us, I was born approximately nine months after I got started (and although this is a secret, eight months after my parents married). She is a concert pianist and he, an electrician. Even today, if you press her, Mama will look off into the distance and say that she always liked older men. That meant that during the moment of her own birth my father would be dreaming of a shiny new Buick for his Sweet Sixteen party. If you know anything about wartime 1942 you might notice the lie in that last bit, or at least the fantasy. Life can be hard. But even during World War II, with death in your head and in your face, there is more love in the world every second. Disbelief don’t change a thing.
Look at my parents’ wedding photos and you’ll quickly notice that the man half of the new couple is ecstatic and the woman half, startled. Behind the dichotomy is a handsome team at the start of a brave, heroic adventure. That’s me there, hidden in her middle behind the crisp white suit dress, on our honeymoon to Michigan's Upper Peninsula. I wish I could remember how I did it. The poofing into existence. But wishing doesn’t make for magic. Law of averages. Whether we believe a thing does not make it true. Or not. That’s why opinions change, why people change, and that’s where stories come from.
At least one thing did come along with my birth. The knowing that us people, all of us, got one another. Maybe that's the poof of real magic—when wishing or believing has no power to make things otherwise.
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