dear baby.

you're halfway here. i can feel you moving every day. i know you're okay. i can't wait to meet you. it's march 1st. and i want to tell you something.

someday you will read about september 11, 2001 in history books. and you will ask your mom and dad where they were. and 10 years from now, we will be able to tell you. but our memories will have changed and our feelings long softened. and i'm not sure that i will be able to explain to you why you're here, so soon after such a horrible day, so soon after the world changed for us.

that day was terrifying. i had just been in the world trade center 15 minutes before, my thoughts consumed with buying pants for the fall. there was a new smell to the air that day - the smell you know from new york when summer turns to fall. the only thought in my mind that morning was getting some new pants. i stopped at the gap. and i wanted to buy your father some pants. the people who worked at that gap were very slow and not terribly helpful though and since i couldn't easily find your father's size, i just bought my pants and left. i considered buying some slick shoes to go with the pants but didn't have a watch on and worried i would be late for work. at 8:30, i ran down the stairs to the 1/9 train, caught one just as the doors were closing, and made my way the 2 or 3 stops to the houston street stop. i got out, got to the office, put my things down, and heard someone screaming.

we went to the window and saw tower one on fire.

i've journalled enough of the rest of the journey to not retell it now. you can always find that stuff when you need it. you can bring me to school if we're not in new york anymore. i'll be part of show and tell. like my grandpa was with world war two.

but what i thought about this morning, when i listened to a song someone wrote about that day, was how your father went in to work. downtown, right near the buildings. i didn't have time to think that day where i would have been if i had hit snooze one more time. but i did have time to know that your father was down there. and to worry that more planes were on their way.

i remember a paralyzing fear. not knowing if walking out the door would get me killed. or if your father had gotten caught in debris. or if his asthma acted up and he'd had an attack down there. not knowing if there was a plane headed for the brooklyn bridge and if he'd decided to walk home.

the phones were all jammed. i JUST TODAY realized how terrified your grandmothers and grandfather must have been. not knowing themselves that their children were safe. i called and called and had a terrible time getting through. but i was able to leave messages and let them know that at last check, after the second plane hit, we were both safe.

afterward, we just sat for weeks.

and then finally realized that we both came so close... pants, shoes, where to go have happy hour, whether or not we had enough money or the right room for a baby, all seemed so silly. wanting everything to be perfect. we almost lost it all.

people have asked me since if you were an accident - figuring that no one would intentionally bring a child into the world so soon after 9-11. like we should have waited a year. until the terrorists were all caught and we were all safe again.

that day may never come. before 9-11, no one ever thought someone would fly planes into buildings and kill thousands of people in one shot. now we know someone would and someone did.

and you have to keep living, continue to have hope. have babies, buy houses, hope that tomorrow will be a better day. and since you started growing, i've had that hope for myself and for your father and for you. i wanted you so badly. before the 11th and after the 11th. i wanted you even more after the 11th when i realized how silly we'd been to wait. how much i wanted to do this. and every day now, i am glad that things came together when they did. that you will be here in about 17 weeks. that i will get to meet this little person who likes the subway and cupcakes.

you are here because you are loved.

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