Christmas All in Pink

                                         
*This is based on a true event with all names and certain situations changed. But this angel is now 3 months old and very healthy. Miracles do happen.*







                                              Christmas All In Pink


Evelyn was a successful dance teacher and single woman of 35 wonderful years.  Her children were her students and she loved each and every one of them immensely.  She had given up any hope of having her own family because it just didn’t seem to be on the map of life’s journey. Her road, although fairly smooth, just hadn’t led her to “the one.” At least not till now.

Jim came into her life one day when she least expected it. Jim’s niece went to Evelyn’s dance school, and every once in a while he loved to stay and observe her progress.  Evelyn had seen him out of the corner of her eye each time he visited but never gave him much thought.  Until he rear-ended her car on that fateful day that romance took the form of an accident report.

The mild whiplash Evelyn suffered was never diagnosed as deriving from the accident or the quick movement of her head in the direction of the husky voice that shouted her name.  Jim’s soulful apology was like music coming from the songbirds in the surrounding trees.  Evelyn had never heard such sexy voice and fell head over heals that minute.

And the rest is as they say, is “history.”  But then why write this story.  History has a tale to tell and there is definitely a beautiful tale of Evelyn and Jim.

Evelyn and Jim continued to date for the next year and those were the most romantic months of Evelyn’s life.  She had it all: her students, a great career and a fantastic man. She was just too busy with her life to worry if he was “the one.”  She would just take it one day at a time. She knew not to mess with perfection.

Time flew like a bullet train, and sometimes Evelyn imagined herself as a gerbil going from one wheel to another.  She suddenly decided enough was enough. Time to take a break and go on a holiday.  One of the lovely things she did for her family of students was to arrange for them to go every few years to Disneyland to dance and take training from the studios in Beverley Hills.  It takes years of planning, auditioning and choreographing, but each trip, although thoroughly exhausting, was worth every painstaking minute.  Her dancers never let her down and they always delighted the audiences in Disneyland. So with Jim’s agreement they decided to stay on and head south to Mexico for a well deserved holiday after the performances.  Evelyn had very qualified and dependable assistants to hold down the fort while she basked under the Mexican sun for another week – or maybe two.

Getting ready for both trips was exhausting for Evelyn and her stamina was waning. While writing her daily “to do” list, Evelyn made a mental note to see her doctor for a quick physical before she ventured to distant lands. List in hand, off she trekked to complete it.

Five days before the big adventure south, Evelyn was summoned to her doctor’s office. Thinking nothing of this request, she arrived on time for her appointment.  Sitting in her car following her appointment, Evelyn thought she had been transported to a neighborhood galaxy with the punch she received from the news. She, Evelyn Tanner, 35 years old, never been married, never lived with anyone, never had any children of her own, was going to have her first baby and she had had absolutely no idea of its pending arrival.
“Wow! A mother…….Me, a mother to 36 dancers, and now a mother of my own future dancer.  And Oh! My God! Jim, a father. Oh! What was Jim going to say; how was he going to react.” Evelyn said out loud to herself.

She hadn’t even figured out what her feelings were yet let alone what her reaction should be.  The fog that had settled into her soul was thick and she needed time to digest the news. Evelyn continued to sit in her car and slowly placed her hands over her belly. She hadn’t noticed any changes in her body, just increasing fatigue. As if communicating through her hands to her unborn, warmth began to spread throughout Evelyn and she could feel the glow.  When Jim found her she had a very goofy grin on her face and he told her so.

Recognizing that deep husky voice shook her quickly out of her fog and brought back into the present,
“Jim!”
“Are you OK Evelyn?”
“Just fine, really, I was just daydreaming about our time in the land of sand and sun.”
It was the first thing that popped into her mouth.  This was not the time to be springing shocking news on her soul mate. Evelyn remained in her car for several minutes after Jim agreed to meet her at her place. She had to shake the rest of the mist from her cranium and gather her thoughts together because she had a mission to complete: tell Jim he was going to be a father in a few months time (that is once she’s convinced herself of the news of course).
“Well, here goes it,” and with new found strength she put the car in reverse and headed home. Evelyn never imagined that news of this magnitude could suddenly put her life in reverse also.

The next day, Evelyn made a frantic call to her doctor; her news did not go over as well as hoped.  Jim just wasn’t sure if he was ready to take on the responsibilities of parenthood.  He wanted them to live together first, then think about marriage, and THEN consider parenthood. Now what was she going to do? Calming her down from complete hysterics to near hysterics, Evelyn’s doctor reminded her of all the times she told him that she wanted to be a mother.  He reminded her that she was mature enough to raise the child on her own if Jim really did not warm up to the idea. She also was financially secure to provide this little gift with all the luxuries that she would want her bundle of joy to experience.
         
Once  he had her calmed down to the point where her life wasn’t over, the universe still existed and all planets were still aligned in the right order, he asked her to make an appointment for an ultrasound and once they knew the arrival date, Evelyn could then take time to organize the rest of her personal life.

Scared! That’s what all this was about.  Being scared. It was amazing to Evelyn how a tiny piece of matter floating in her tummy could cause such commotion and such unbelievable feelings of being SCARED. Jim agreed with her when he called her that night and did the old “we need to talk” line. She agreed and said that she had her ultrasound tomorrow and then she would have more news and they could better discuss things with facts in front of them – as if the fact that Evelyn was expecting Jim’s baby wasn’t enough to work with.  But Evelyn needed time to continue with the sorting of her thoughts, objectives, desires and goals, plus she was supposed to fly away in a few days and didn’t even know if that would be possible.

Diane, Evelyn’s confident since grade school, agreed to take time off work to attend the screening. Diane was an obstetrics nurse for a clinic in the next county.  Evelyn was relieved when her friend encouraged her with situation and lent support wherever needed. Hand holding right now seemed to be the first item on the support menu. Whatever other support was needed would be better determined after they found out the length of the pregnancy so far.

“Are you ready Evelyn? This exam is going to change the rest of your life,” as if Diane’s words of wisdom penetrated the thoughts whirling around inside Evelyn’s head. Evelyn could see the ultrasound screen but could not make out the impressionist painting of the inside of her uterus. Just as her untrained eye thought she could figure out an object the screen image on the screen, it melted into another unrecognizable form. Making her cross eyed, she decided to study her friend’s reaction instead.
“
So what do you see Diane, can you tell anything?” The color in Diane’s face drained out onto the floor and she now had the pallor of the object in the screen. Before Diane uttered a word, the technician announced with great certainty, “your due date is Christmas.”
“Oh alright,” replied Evelyn before letting this information sink in completely. Then as she continued to study Diane’s face it hit her, “My WHAT?”
“Your due date is Christmas; December 24th to be exact. Is there a problem with that?” asked the technician dressed in a color that could not soothe the most anxious nerves.
“You mean December of this year?” Evelyn stuttered.
“Yes, of course this year, you are not an elephant which has a longer gestation period,” She responded matter-of-factly.
“But that is in only 4 weeks.”
“That’s right, you are 36 weeks along but it looks to me like you mightl deliver in the next two weeks,” added the technician as she adjusted the screen and punched in some numbers on the keyboard. At that moment that is exactly what Evelyn felt like – punched.

“Diane, tell me I am off my rocker and I am not computing the information that is coming at me correctly.”
“No, it looks pretty clear to me hon, that you are about to be a mom in just under three weeks. Can you tell the sex of the baby?” Diane directed her question to the technician.
“Yes, by these images, the probability lies with this baby being a girl.
A girl; a little baby girl.  Evelyn couldn’t figure out how she could have slept through an entire pregnancy. Thirty six weeks she missed. That was an entire pregnancy book. There was so much to digest.  She needed a name, clothing, furniture, bottles, diapers, a crib and a car seat. 
“Birthing Classes – Oh God Help Me!” exclaimed an overwhelmed Evelyn and with this she collapsed in a puddle of tears.  Happy tears because she was going to be a mother in two weeks; the one wish  she never thought would come true is about to and she had so much to do.
         
Next was the family announcement, which Evelyn hope would fortify her for her tackle with Jim. Once the shocked and silent family members regained consciousness, their typical family actions of disarray commenced.  Through tears and screams of joy, everyone ran helter skelter trying to decide what each would do in the care of their precious mother-to-be and their soon to be new family addition. 

The whole picture resembled the antics of a family in organized (or unorganized depending on one’s point of view) chaos from a Robert Munsch book. They were running into each other, talking over one another, trying to out help each other.  Evelyn just stared at the scene with amazement.  This was her family and it was a family to be cherished. Instead of lectures and the “how could you’s”, they embraced the situation and took control.  This boosted Evelyn’s esteem greatly and at that moment she knew that she was going to be ok. She placed her hands on her tummy once again and talked in a quiet voice to the little person inside,
“Don’t worry little one you are in good hands and although I haven’t known of you for very long and we haven’t had long talks to date, you are very much loved and you have a wonderful family to come home to.”

With her army set, her “to-do” list divvied up and trenches cleaned, Evelyn set out to tackle her last job. Jim listened with awe, shock and disbelief and then sat silently looking down at the floor.  After professing her love for him, she told him that it was OK to be scared and that if he needed more time that was OK too.  She just prayed he wouldn’t walk out the door.

After an eternity, Jim slowly rose from the couch and walked to the front door. Tears started to well in Evelyn’s eyes as she knew the truth had finally arrived. As Jim opened the door Evelyn held her breath, but instead of leaving and shutting the door behind him, he returned with two things.  First the biggest bouquet of flowers that had ever been made and a baby’s car seat with a big yellow bow on it.  Evelyn just stared at everything with tears running down her cheeks.

“My new daughter can’t be safe enough as far as I’m concerned.  Sorry for the yellow bow, but I didn’t know we were going to have a girl.” Jim put the gifts down and opened his arms for Evelyn to jump into. Evelyn held on for dear life. She couldn’t believe he said “we”. That is the sweetest word in the dictionary as far as she was concerned. Everything really was going to be alright after all.

“Sorry it took me a while to come to my senses. I don’t think I’ve truly grasped what being a father is all about, in say six months let alone 2 weeks, but we’ll do it. I promise.”
“Oh Jim I love you and we will just take this all one day at a time.  Our trip, we can’t go, I can’t fly in this condition, but you can still go if you would like,” she said with trepidation as if his words of commitment and devotion were just a dream.
“Are you kidding, we have baby clothes to buy, a crib and diapers – we have so much to do.”
Evelyn burst into laughter at the familiar words that were just her thoughts a couple of hours ago.

Two weeks and four days exactly after the doctor’s diagnosis; just 10 days before the celebration of the birth of a Savior, a tiny angel arrived. A little girl just over 5lbs was born to a very loving and warm family. Swaddled all in pink she was the best present anyone could have imagined for Christmas.