29 Weeks: Horton Hears a Butternut Squash

Here in the Henig household, we’ve been getting into the Dr. Seuss canon. My favorite right now is Horton Hears a Who.

I won’t give a summary, because if you are not familiar with this one, you need to get yourself to a library or Amazon and read this gem, and I’m not going to let you off the hook with the abridged version. Then come back to my blog, because if you haven’t read about Horton, the rest of this post won’t make much sense.

I’m realizing this week that Keiki is kind of like the Whos of Whoville, and I’m kind of like Horton (yes, I went there and willingly compared myself to an elephant). The analogy ends with the rest of the world, because unlike the Kangaroo, and dozens of Wickersham brothers and Wickersham cousins, nobody doubts that I am pregnant.

Keiki started out as this little tiny speck of a poppy seed. As soon as I saw the positive test at 4 am in my bathroom, I protected that speck by cutting out Ritalin, coffee, wine, and sushi. I couldn’t see him/her, but “A person’s a person, no matter how small,” and that’s just what we Mamas do.

As Keiki grew, I was the only one who could communicate with him/her, mainly in the form of Keiki making me wildly ill and tired.

Those first few kicks felt like the chanting Whos:
We are here!
We are here!
We are here!
We are here!

Finally, Keiki’s kicks are big and thundering, movement stretching across my belly as he/she practices some fetal yoga. Much like the one final Yopp! from Jojo of Apartment 12J, Josh can feel what I’ve been for months. Unlike the doubting masses of the Jungle of Nool, Josh has always believed and been metaphorically shading Keiki with an umbrella all along. We hear you Keiki, and you are loved, no matter how small (or abstract).