The boy who named himself

For the first 6 months, Pidge and I were convinced LBP was a boy. When she first told her extended family in Mass about her pregnancy, her aunt Tracy stated knowingly, "it's a boy, I knew you were pregnant at Thanksgiving." So perhaps we had that seed planted in our heads, but for most of the pregnancy, we talked about "he" and "our little guy" in utero. About three months ago, we changed course in our thinking.

I remember being in Denver at a LightHawk board meeting and talking about Pidge's pregnancy with one of our board members and all around fabulous person, Merry. She said, "you're having a girl." Perhaps for me, that was what started a growing thought that LBP was a girl. Pidge also had several girl dreams about LBP and only one boy dream wherein she was second-guessing the nurse who told her she had a boy.

So it was perhaps no surprise how utterly surprised we were when our eyes feel upon the unmistakeable parts of a boy as the midwife held him moments after Pidge gave birth and just before he was placed on Pidge's chest. I remember saying, "I can't believe we have a boy" through tears of joy and amazement.

So on to the name and how a minutes-old LBP sealed that deal. Without too many medical details, when Pidge's waters released we knew that when he was born, if he wasn't "vigorously crying," the nurses would have to take him aside to suction out his lungs so nothing that didn't belong in his lungs ended up there. Our hope was that we'd have him placed on Pidge's chest skin-to-skin so bonding could begin and we could begin our favorite pastime - staring at LBP and cooing.

So, as we looked down on him after he made the transition from being a part of Pidge, to being an independent being in this world, we both silently implored him, "cry, cry!" Like a good little guy, he waiting a couple seconds, then let out a huge wailing cry. And be careful what you wish for: an intense desire to hear our child cry turned into a long (10 minute?) series of car alarm bursts, or roars from LBP. Once he felt we were satiated in hearing him cry, he settled down immediately and began eagerly taking in the world around him and putting faces to the voices he'd heard for 9 months. "Oh, you're 'Goodnight Moon' lady."

In our surprised of the sex of LBP, we had a stable of about 5 boy names galloping around vying for position, but nothing we had settled on for sure. The girl's name had been decided and settled upon almost at conception. As we refreshed our memories about the boy names we narrowed the field and began trying them on for size. A dark horse contender from the back of the pack was remembered and we thought, "Rory would be appropriate since he came into this world roaring." We laughed and continued looking at LBP saying, "are you an Angus?" "are you a Stewart?" "I guess you're not an August anymore, and you're probably not a September, huh?"

The more we sat with LBP, we thought about how he had chosen his own name in how he entered the world. Even now at one day, four hours and15 minutes later, if he's upset, he'll let out a big, full-throated roar rather than a subtle, building cry. It's only appropriate that we let him name himself since he was so willing to give us that big roar when we asked him to.