Redneck Simba

My mom was splayed across the bench seat in the front of the old pick-up truck. Her moans were squeezing out of the cracks in the windows. It was steaming hot inside the truck, sweat pouring down her face as she tried desperately to breathe and breathe and not push. Her fingers gripped the grimy dashboard, ”AAAUNNNNNGH!”

“I’m pushing! I’m puuuuusssshhhing! Please, God! Please!”

My aunt was there. Not one of my mom’s many sisters, but my Aunt Luann. She is my uncle Donnie’s wife. “Just hold on, Debbie, the Ambulance is comin’!” Aunt Luann tried to reassure my mom. Tried to calm her shaking body with a hand on her knee.

Only just an hour before, my mom had walked back from the Doctor’s office. She got a craving for some snacks and popped into the grocery store real quick on the way home. Mom was a stick figure back then and carried me right out front like a big watermelon. She must have looked ridiculous walking home that day swinging bags of groceries on either side of her big belly and stopping every few steps to rest. Mom couldn’t drive so she was no stranger to long walks, but by the time she got home, she was exhausted. She could feel the rhythmic tightening of her belly. Squeeze, Release. Squeeze, Release. Every time the squeeze would last a little longer and hold her in a tighter grip. The doctor had inserted a finger into her vagina and said, “Baby is still high! You are only at 1 centimeter dilated. Go home. Take it easy. You still have a ways to go.” I might have been high up when he checked, but I was definitely not high up after that walk home! Every time mom took another step, my big head pressed down harder and harder on her cervix. Every step up the hill that day, jostled me lower and lower in the birth canal.

Mom was raised to believe that she didn’t know nothin’ about nothin’. Her contractions were telling her it was go-time, but she told her body to quiet down! The doctor was the expert not her squeezing uterus. Also, this was mom’s first pregnancy so what did she know about what was happening in her body?
My father on the other hand had witnessed this process four times already with the births of his children with his wife. He took one look at my mom swaying back and forth, little guttural noises pushing through her clenched teeth, and he knew this was it. The baby was coming! I was coming!

My father climbed up beside her in the truck. It felt like there was a bowling ball in between her legs. That is exactly how she described that moment to me! She could not even sit up in the seat correctly. She laid back across the shifter and let out a growl. “THIS. BABY. IS. COMING. NOW!”

All of the blood rushed out of my father’s face. They were not going to make it to the hospital in time. There was no way. The hospital was half an hour away in the next town over. “Call an Ambulance! Go! Go! The baby is coming right now!”

No one seemed to be moving fast enough. My father walked with a cane that he carved himself. He wrapped his fingers over the coiled snake and heaved his body out of the truck. Dad walked with a limp from contracting Polio as a boy, but he had spent years turning that limp into a cool, tough guy strut. That day, there was no time for swagger. The landline was all the way across the yard and into the kitchen against the far wall. My dad was not a fast man, but that day, he put one foot in front of the other and got to that phone in record time.

Meanwhile, there was a small crowd gathering around the truck. Women who had already birthed came closer to offer support and encouragement. Men and children scattered through the alley and sprawled on the grass a buzz of excitement and also just the scandal of it all. The sounds coming out of that truck were enough to make the whole crowd blush, but no one turned away. Small town life means anytime there is any kind of drama, a crowd will gather for the show. I remember once when I was young, watching my neighbor’s house engulfed in flames. Mom had pulled me from the bathtub to go stand on the sidewalk and watch it burn, my still wet hair dripping down my back. Having heard the story of my birth a million times, I stood there while everyone else watched the flames, searching their eyes. They were of course horrified but there was also something else in their eyes. Excitement, because they had been bored at home and now there was something to see! And Relief because they were only witnessing this vulnerability, not participating in it.

My mom had really played up the role of the crowd in her telling of my birth story. Even though she was the lead, mom downplayed scenes involving her and focused on the parts that didn’t turn her cheeks red. The stars in mom’s telling of the story were me, of course, and the witnesses. She would poke fun at herself naked and spread eagle with everyone from the Sunday school teacher to the grocery bagger in attendance. I loved to hear this story almost as much as mom loved to tell it. I hope I am doing it justice right now. I imagine her smiling down on me from some heavenly realm and still blushing at the parts where I turn the lens to her.

Here we go, mom. Get ready for the good parts. A siren screamed in the distance competing with my mom. She pushed her pants down over her hips and pulled one leg out. She could feel the pressure so intense now. She was too scared to reach down and feel between her legs, but she didn’t need to reach down to feel the bulge of my head filling her vagina. I was already crowning. With every contraction, my head would push through and then slip back in with the pauses. Mom was not ready to let go like this. She did not plan for her baby to come into the world in an alley in front of the whole neighborhood, but babies do not care about birth plans and I was coming ready or not.

The paramedic wasted no time, snapping on a blue glove while climbing into the truck with mom. “I feel the head! Do you wanna feel?” to my mom and then, “We can’t transport until the baby is born! We can’t move her like this. Baby is coming now!” to the other crew members and to the crowd. I slipped into the medic’s hands within minutes of their arrival.

My mama reached down and allowed one finger to brush against the the curls slicked wet against my scalp. Love, Euphoria, Oxytocin, temporarily washed away her humiliation. Now, she felt something new. She felt proud. Brave. Important. The paramedic whisked me away and washed off the blood and goo from my new skin and checked me over from head to toe. Once all of my parts were noted and accounted for, the medic held me high up for the crowd. The air around the truck had been silent in these final moments but now every eye was wet and cheers erupted. My mom was still laying in the truck watching this scene through the open door. She says the sun shone down on my face and all around people were shouting and crying and clapping. Mom had picked out the name “Crystal Fawn” long ago. In fact her twin already named her first daughter “Crystal Dawn,” but in that moment, mom considered naming me “Sunshine.”

At some point in my childhood, Disney released the original animated Lion King. The first time we watched it, Mom turned to me and announced, “Oh my God, Crystal Fawn! That was you! That is exactly what that moment looked like.” I watched Rafiki lift Simba into the air and my mom was laughing so hard tears were rolling down her cheeks. “Oh my God. It really was just like that.” I decided right then at 7 years old that I liked this origin story. I was special like Simba. I was proud. I think my mom was too. Telling this story always makes me feel a little bit closer to her. I can only imagine what she would say if she knew that I had two of my babies at home on purpose.