Welcome little one

When I hear about great feats of human achievement I will tell you about women in labour.

I was lucky to be part of this once before, and now again I am awe-struck with how you passed through those powerful gates. On this occasion you were submerged in a pool of warm water, which was all you needed to unbind yourself from this layer towards the next. You dived beyond the surface, on a lonesome crossing in the sea of intensity in search for your drifting cherub. You had to serve yourself up to the ocean so wide and deep, buoyed by the knowledge of mothers who had crossed before. I came to greet you between contractions – on the shore of consciousness – to make offerings of water and words. “You’re doing an incredible job, you’re almost there”, messages that felt like droplets tossed into the sea. You retreated as quickly as you’d appear – in waves – pulling back to a place beyond the horizon where words held no meaning. Sigur Ros played as the soundtrack to linear events. Your breathing sank to restorative and the pool water glistened with a gloss. It was time.

The midwives quietly arranged themselves in formation around you – a rosette of faith and wisdom. They were the unflappable guardians to corral your focus, to help you catch your sparkling angel. It was mostly silent aside from the ripple of water and the photographer’s shutter. You reached down to catch her – hauling her up from the well of devotion – during Sæglópur from Takk. A three kilo glimmering little being, swaddled in umbilicals and vernix. It was the second of the seventh, twenty twenty-one at the eleventh hour. For her hallmark of life, I had to look up the track’s title, it means “lost at sea”.For that she was until you found her. You brought to us Audrey Pearl Boudville.