Chapter three: Heartbeats and the second coming.

We originally thought that our baby was due around the end of November. Our slightly arrogant doctor had been ‘at least a hundred percent positive’ (implying that she could’ve been more) of this. Let it be known for the record that our doctors internal calendar shares its sense of direction with the Titanic along with the same sense of impending doom. We had our first scan in the hospital with the people who trade in facts and found that our doctor could not have been more wrong.

Firstly, the good news. A good strong heartbeat was found! Our doctor had tried to listen to the heartbeat using a travel hairdryer obviously failing so the collective sigh of relief must have been deafening. I like the people in the scan place. Well, I liked them initially but this was before the actual due date was revealed. Anyone who knows me will be aware of my feelings towards organised religion and if you have read the last chapter you will understand why I would think that it’s some kind of sick joke to be told that our baby’s due on Christmas Day. Yes! The supposed birthday of our supposed saviour. Of course I immediately began to make jokes about naming it Jesus or Judas which amused my girlfriend and I but did not go down as well with our scanners. We left the hospital in a state of shock which tends to be the common thread here. Shocked that we had seen our baby for the first time. Elated that it was so far healthy and bemused at the irony of the due date.

This does leave us with all sorts of moral dilemmas. How do we, as parents, approach the concept of Christmas until our child is old enough to realise that it’s all bullshit. This is a conclusion that our child will reach by itself let me assure you. It’s a tough one to negotiate. We don’t ’celebrate’ Christmas in the traditional sense but we do celebrate the holiday with our family and friends. Before any of you puritans jump on my back and call me a hypocrite let me be the first to tell you that it was the druids that held festivals at the times of year now reserved for Christmas and Easter and it wasn’t until the Christians landed in Britain did they become part of the Christian calendar. They ’borrowed’ them the same as the Romans borrowed their gods from the Greeks. Anyways, let me know your thoughts.

 Parenting, paranoia and me.