It’s absolutely amazing how much attention and focus a new baby can cause. With so many serious things happening all around us, the recent arrival of Prince George of Cambridge got a whole lot of press time and I saw TV clips of crowds of people standing around all day outside both the palace and the hospital waiting for the birth announcement. Waiting all day? To me that’s absolutely incredible.
Then again, I am not a Brit or a Royalist, nor am I inclined to stand around all day for any reason, let alone to wait on the arrival of a baby, unless it was the arrival of my first grandchild which I am really looking forward to, but isn’t forthcoming any time soon.
People love babies! Me too. I see them in the street and I take notice. I recently saw a pushcart from a local childcare facility that had 10 babies, each in their individual seat, and the picture of those tiny tots brought me a great deal of joy. I found myself interacting with them and it was a great few minutes in my day.
I loved having a baby, most of the time. I didn’t love it in the middle of the night, when I was dealing with colic or such, and losing sleep and patience. Interrupted nights and sleep deprivation for months was difficult and like any other parent I longed for a nanny or such to turn to on occasion. How lucky in those moments the very rich or the aristocrats are. They always have someone to do that and are seldom responsible for the crabby times. I wonder if Kate and William will be?
Our baby on the cover last month brought a lot of “oohs” and “aahs,” and great mail came in commenting on how darling that photo was. Thank you for the feedback. It was fun to put together an issue that had so many articles focused on the natal experience. There’s another one in this issue, about the controversy around weight gain during pregnancy. I never really got a good look at her as she moved into the later stages of her pregnancy, but I would bet that Kate didn’t put on a lot of weight during her late trimesters. She’s pretty underweight to begin with.
Even for them, with all their help and all their rituals, I would bet there would be a “new normal” of a kind. It just happens when you become a new parent, even a very privileged one. I couldn’t help thinking of William’s mum Diana, and how pleased she would have been to be there too, and how proud she would be to become George’s Grannie. She always seemed to most of us to have been largely a good mum herself.
Enjoy the rest of the summer and as always, thanks for reading.
