Make Room for Baby

I was 4 years, 4 months, and 20 days old the day I met my brother for the first time.

Preface

I wasn’t sure I was going to get a new post written this week. I’m in Los Angeles visiting my brother. It’s my second time in a hospital with him, 60 years after the first. He was in an accident in June and sustained a traumatic brain injury. He’s as beautiful as ever, badly hurt, and almost as helpless as the day he was born.

I may write more about this in the coming weeks. And I may not. I need time to integrate the shock of seeing him so diminished. My boy has grit. He’s tenacious as fuck. A fighter. And smart as they come. I choose to trust that he’ll recover. I don’t think he’ll be the same as before, mostly because something this serious changes a person, but he’ll always be the little brother I love and the man I admire.

And I believe in miracles.

The first time I was in a hospital with my brother was the day of his bris, many decades ago. For those of you not in the know, a bris is the ritual circumcision of a Jewish boy on his eighth day of life. It’s a symbolic practice––and barbaric, in my opinion––that is demanded of Jewish baby-men at birth to seal that good ol’ covenant with god. Ouch.

Welcome to the world, little baby boy. Can I offer you a serving of PTSD to get you started? You’re eight days old, let the suffering commence!

My mom was “away” and all I knew was that when she came home, she’d bring a new brother for me to play with and love. It’s strange; I have no recollection of her being pregnant. I can’t visualize it at all and after searching through boxes of photos and slide carousels, there seem to be no photographs documenting her body as it changed, her belly growing larger as each month went by. There’s a photo of her pregnant with me, belly and all, but none with my brother.

The day he came home was the day the clock started.

The morning of the bris, I was home with my dad and my grandmother Meme. Meme took care of me the whole week Mom was away. After a quick breakfast, she helped me get dressed. First I took a bath, and then she zipped me into my beautiful creamy white dress with the fancy pink trim. Daddy designed and sewed it for me. My parents made a lot of my clothes. My father was a clothing designer, and my mom used to be, before they got married and I born. But since I showed up, her job was to be home with me every day.

Dad insisted I wear the pink Capezio slippers even though I hated those shoes; they hurt after wearing them for just a few minutes. But this was a special occasion, and he told me I wouldn’t be walking a lot. He convinced me to do it, “because they were perfect” with the dress. He packed my navy-blue sneakers in a bag, just in case I needed them. That made me feel a little better.

He hailed a Checker Cab and we went uptown to the hospital; Mt. Sinai on 5^th Avenue in New York City. I sat on one of the two fold-out jump seats that were only found in Checkers. Checker Cabs were my favorite, because they were curvy and big and had those special seats.

When we got to the hospital, I saw Nanny and Poppa on the sidewalk, waiting for us. They were dressed up and Poppa didn’t have a cigar in his mouth. We got out of the cab and Meme and Nanny hugged, which I thought was funny, because I thought Meme didn’t like Nanny. I heard her say it one day to my mom, when they didn’t know I was listening.

Poppa picked me up and zoomed me up over his head like I was flying. I loved when he did that with me, but he always stopped too soon.

Nanny and Poppa grabbed each of my hands and we walked toward the entrance. I begged them to swing me between them as we walked toward the big doors. Mommy and Daddy used to swing me too, but lately they’ve been telling me that I was getting too big for that. I wasn’t even four and half. But I guess I was a big girl, because now I had a little brother.

My aunts and uncles were there too, but not my cousins. I was the only kid.

We all got in a big elevator and went up and up and then got off. Everyone was standing together, talking and laughing.

They hugged and kissed me and each other. I had to keep wiping the lipstick off my cheeks. Some of the kisses were a little wet, and I hate that. It reminds me of when Mommy licks her thumb and cleans my face with her spit when I get dirty. Ewww. It was always a little smelly.

Then, this man with a white beard and a big black hat walked up to us, and shook hands with my father and my Poppa. I’d never seen him before. My other grandfather, Meme’s husband, wasn’t there, because he died before I was born. He died when Mommy was a little girl. His name started with an “N” too, just like mine. Mommy told me I was named after him.

The man in the black hat opened a door and everyone followed him in. My dad was the last one and as I walked toward the door, he stopped me, knelt to my level and said “Princess Pussycat, you have to stay here and wait for us. This part isn’t for little girls, just the grown-ups.”

I looked at him and said, “but Meme said now I’m a big girl.” Daddy smiled at me, and said “yes, I suppose you are, but you’re not big enough for this. I promise we’ll be back very soon, and then you’ll meet Steven.”

That made me feel better, and I started getting excited again. My little brother!

Dad pointed to a bench that was against the wall in the hallway, and said “sit there, sweetie. I’ll see you soon.”

And he disappeared into the room and I was all alone.

I sat, and I waited. As I waited, a very skinny woman with brown skin sat down on a bench just like mine, across the hallway from me. She was wearing a white nurse’s uniform, white stockings and shoes, with a little white cap on top of her black hair. She had pointy glasses, just like Meme’s.

I wondered why she was sitting there, and I smiled at her. She was looking at me, but she didn’t smile back. I wondered if she was mad. She had a very serious face.

Dad said he wouldn’t be gone long, but it felt long. It felt too long. Then, I heard a noise. It was people cheering and talking and laughing. The door opened, and all of them started coming back into the hallway and they did all the hugging again with each other. And then, Mommy walked out of the room with Daddy. She was carrying a small, wrapped bundle in her arms, and she was smiling a lot.

When she saw me, she handed the bundle to Daddy, squatted down, and gave me a big kiss and told me she missed me.

I still didn’t know where my brother was. “Where’s Steven?”

“He’s right here, honey. Daddy’s holding him. Wait until we’re in the cab, then we can introduce you. We have one more thing to do, and then we’ll go home. Daddy handed the bundle back to Mom, and walked over to a small table, where there was glass of wine and a challah on a big plate. He said some words I didn’t understand, and then everyone had a little cup of wine, and a chunk of bread. I had grape juice because wine isn’t for little girls. Even big, little girls.

It was time for us to go, and we walked to the elevators together. The brown lady in the white dress stood up from her bench and walked behind us and into the elevator when the doors chimed open.

Everyone said goodbye and we got into another Checker Cab. I thought Dad waited for one again, because he knew I liked them so much. But when I saw the brown lady was standing with my mom, and when Dad opened the door to the cab, and she got in with us, I thought maybe he got the big one because we needed more room. Mom and Dad sat on the regular seat, and me and the lady were on the jump seats. Why was she with us? She wasn’t in our family. She was a stranger.

I asked Mom, and she told me the lady was a baby nurse, and she was going to stay with us for a few days, to help Mom settle in. The brown lady talked for the first time and said there were things to know about little boys that were different than things about little girls.

Once we were in our seats, but before the cab started to go, Mom and Dad made a spot for me and invited me to sit in between them. I snuggled in and Mommy tilted the bundle that was supposed to be my brother toward me, so I could see his face. He was a little funny looking, but mostly I thought he was cute. His eyes were closed; I think he was sleeping. I wanted to hold him. Mommy told me I would hold him later, not in the taxi. I’d have to wait until we got home.

We pulled up in front of our apartment building, and walked into the lobby, and then took the elevator up to the 3^rd floor where our apartment was. We went right into my bedroom that wasn’t my bedroom anymore. It was mine…and Steven’s, now. I was excited to have company. There was a changing table against the wall, at the foot of my bed. Steven’s crib was on the other side of the room. It used to be my crib, but I didn’t remember sleeping in it.

The nurse was standing next to Mommy at the table, as Mom put Steven down on his back. I sat on my bed and watched.

I found out right away what the brown lady meant about the difference between boys and girls. Mommy unpinned the sides of his diaper, and as she was taking his dirty one off, the nurse said quickly, but not quickly enough, not to take the diaper off without keeping Steven’s “thing” covered. But Mom pulled the diaper off, and as she did, Steven made a sissy. It squirted straight up into the air, and right into Mommy’s face. She shook her head, and laughed, looked at me and laughed some more, used a clean diaper to wipe it off, and learned the right way to diaper a boy.

I paid close attention, because I wanted to do it one day, too.

The first day of my brother’s life.

I’m unable to record this piece properly today, but will as soon as I return to my DIY studio.

Here’s a link to a Note I posted about my trip to LA this week, if you’d like to read about a couple of major miracles I experienced while traveling.

I’m so grateful when readers decide to support my writing financially by becoming paid subscribers, so if you want to do that, thank you, thank you!

Here’s a thing you can do that doesn’t cost a penny. On the top or bottom of the story, you can click on the “♥️” to like my essay, click on the speech bubble (💬) and leave a comment, and/or click on the little spinny arrow thingy (♻️) and restack the post (“restack” means “share” in Substackese).

Those three actions will help me reach more readers.

And tips are always welcome and so appreciated.

One more thing. I’m offering my Substack 101 workshop again, in October, because the one I offered in May was a huge success. If you’ve been thinking about writing a newsletter on Substack, but don’t know where to start, Substack 101 is perfect for you!