Birth hospital

Yesterday, I took my son, who has had a raspy cough on and off for about a month, to the emergency room down here in Southern California. We took him to the same hospital where he had been born, over four years ago now. Every part of me remembered every part of that hospital, so comfortable, so familiar, even though the week we spent there, while my son was in NICU (neonatal intensive care), had been a harrowing week. Whatever animosity I had felt, whatever questions about this treatment or that treatment I had had, whatever stress over the uncertainty of that week, were all gone. Instead I was just so grateful to be at a hospital I knew very well, and had come to trust. It felt like I was taking my son to a new moment of origin.

Plus I got the exam and all the medications without paying a penny for any of it, which would not happen had he gotten sick in Iceland. So I considered it an afternoon very well spent. And now we know that Palmer is one of those kids who just wants to keep playing and running around and making jokes, even with an ear infection and a touch of pneumonia.