The Birth Journal

My Journal.

The Beginning.

I can write now, so I am going to start a journal and I promise to keep it for the rest of my life. I like it that I don’t just know how to print. Actually, I taught myself how to write a year ago, but children, especially girls, weren’t supposed to get ahead of their level, so I was told I had to wait. Now that I’ve waited a year, I can begin my story and I can use cursive. Oh how I love the way the letters can be made to run together, like a stream or a river or a snake. I hope I can remember some of the stuff I wanted to put down here, because it’s all very important. Let me see… where do I start? I know…

When I was a little girl, very little, I had some dolls. Their names were Irene, Dorothy, and Katrina. Those were my everyday dollies, and they were the size of babies I could rock to sleep just like they were my own babies, although of course they weren’t. There were two, no three, more dolls. Two were extra special and very expensive. They were made of china and their hair wasn’t painted on. It was like real human hair. Those two were Pamelia (dark, dark ringlets she had) and Marie (blond waves down her back). They were for pretend fancy parties and when they weren’t having pretend tea with me using my very own tea set, they had to sit properly on the highest shelf in my room, next to my bed. The last doll was a plain old thing made by my grandma Annie and she used some muslin left over from a dress pattern, plus some gingham from one of my dresses. She sewed a face on the doll, whose name was Diana, and the mouth came out a little crooked. Still, Diana was the one who cuddled next to me in bed and helped me sleep. I loved playing with Irene, Dorothy, and Katrina, but Diana was the one I hugged the most and I still hug her. I think she will always be my favorite baby, even when I have babies of my own some day. I think she’s stuffed with sheep’s wool or something like that.

A few months later.

My momma had a baby, so now I have a sister, but I can’t rock her and I can’t have her sleep in my bed because she’s got her own cradle and has to be close to momma. It was probably my cradle, but I don’t remember sleeping in it. I get to rock my baby sister a little, though. Her name is Grace. I love the name Grace. I don’t like my name much, though. When I have a baby, I will give her the most beautiful name in the world. Maybe Catherine. Or Corinne.

A year later, or maybe a year and a half.

Momma just had another baby. She cried a lot, but I couldn’t go to her and hold her hand like I wanted. Grace is walking and too big for the cradle, so now little Nathaniel is using it. Grace is going to come sleep in a teeny trundle bed in my room. If she’s good, I’ll let her hold Diana, but not to sleep with.

Two years later.

Momma keeps having babies. It seems like it’ll never be my turn. She has enough already. Another boy, and I don’t like boys that much, but he’s my brother. His name is Charles Allan, which is not a pretty name, but I guess Momma likes it. I’m going to ask her when I can start having babies.

18 mos. later.

Another sister! I think we’re going to have to start sharing beds, but I refuse to stop sleeping with my Diana because when the real babies are crying I cover my head with my pillow and have a conversation with her under the covers. Maybe the baby crib will be put away after this one. Oh, I almost forgot: her name is Alicia. I would have liked Lena, but nobody asked me.

Three years later.

Momma is ridiculous. For a while I thought things would get quiet and I could get my good dolls off the shelf for a tea party without worrying about younger kids breaking them or mussing heir hair. But I’m almost too big for those things now. Except for Diana. I’ll never be too big for her.

22 mos. later.

Well, this is the day he asked me to marry him, so I am getting married and I am glad. I guess you need a husband to start having babies and I’ve waited a long time. I practiced with my dolls and saw how momma did for the babies she had. I know how to rock them and change their diapers and even feed them. (Not real food, but I did practice a lot with plants and things I gathered in the garden.)

A few months later.

I am 18 today and my daughter was born today, on my birthday. I hope nobody noticed how soon after wedding she arrived (7 months), because I know momma for one would have disapproved. That’s why I didn’t tell her and I told my future husband we should hurry up a few weeks or so. Otherwise it would have been very obvious. At least now I have my own baby.

But I hurt, I’m exhausted, and the baby - my baby! - won’t let me sleep. I can barely write these words, but I wanted to say something because my dream has come true. I’ll think of a name for my little girl tomorrow.

4 mos. later

My daughter is 4 months old. I decided to name her Mary Elizabeth Catherine. She is a dear child, but I can’t get any rest. She eats and needs clean diapers constantly. I am losing weight because I never have a proper meal. Good thing momma helps out sometimes, even though she’s got her little ones to tend to, and, I suspect, a latecomer on the way again. Besides that, my husband hasn’t left me alone. Is that all men want? Why don’t they ever help with the babies?

2 wks. later.

I am that way again. I’m sure of it. Really sick. All the time. Food just won’t stay down. I thought you couldn’t get that way if you were nursing.

A year later.

My son was just born. 13 months after my daughter. It seems I do nothing but push food or a tit into little cupped mouths. They’re going to suck the life out of me. I need to be more careful, but who’s going to help me with that? Not my husband. He won’t hear of it. Such a handsome man, but so old-fashioned and happy to brag about a new birth. We’ll see about that.

3 yrs. later.

Another daughter. Three children and I am only 21. I’m starting to feel like my mother and am tired of rocking bawling babies until they fall asleep. I never get out of the house except to go to church. Grandma comes to stay with the little ones on Sundays, but now with this new baby I’ll have to give up church for a few months. Her name is Hannah Louise. The baby, I mean. She was born two days ago and seems less fretful than her older sister and brother. I pray to God she is.

2 yrs. later.

I will never let a baby tear me apart like this one just did. Eugene did not want to come out and he was far too large for me. It took two days and I wanted to give up more than once. Did momma ever have such a bad time with any of hers? Fortunately she seems like she won’t have any more after Earl. No more children for me, definitely. I am going to move out and live under another roof. 4 children are enough for any woman. Another baby would kill me. My lungs are not very strong and already my back hurts from lifting so many babies all the time. Babies and all the washing. Diana is coming with me, though.

***

Amalia found a packet of letters, many on pale green paper, folded and slipped in the latter pages of the journal. She slid the silk ribbon off and began to read. Nobody was around to stop her and she had no idea whose journal she’d been reading in the first place. The letters were very descriptive, almost making her blush. She hadn’t expected that type of correspondence from that era. The years weren’t clear, but from the writing and the condition of the paper, she guessed they might be the 1930s and 1940s, just guessed. Then the journal began again.

***

My Journal. 

My New Life.

Birth control. That is the key. Now I can enjoy myself without worrying about having more babies. I’ve had enough of those. Thank goodness everybody is old enough to fend for themselves and I can meet Carl at his place or mine. We spend a lot of time making love. We both want to, not just him. I think he’s relieved we can just focus on each other and sex, on real pleasure, without worrying about the consequences. I’m still married, but when I walked out it was like a divorce, even though for a good Methodist (like me) divorce is a last resort. We just went our separate ways and no questions asked. I’ve never thought about whether my husband has a lady friend, and I didn’t really care. He was so old-fashioned he’d have had me pregnant almost every year until I was 50.

Carl is a wonderful lover. He knows what I like, he takes his time, is gentle… all the things they say a man should do. We will never have children or babies. He is married as well, but his wife just wanted to sit at home rocking cradle after cradle as if they were dolls. He wanted a wife with something to say, somebody to go out with, to have quiet dinners and not much more. She was married to her eternal babies, so he left her soon after he met me. Carl’s hands feel so right on my body, everywhere. I am also good at arousing him. He has so many little things he does to send me into ecstasy. We’re like two teenagers and sex never gets old with us. It just keeps getting better. Diana knows first hand, but she’s no longer my bed companion. I’ve got Carl for that when I want one. Still, she sits on a high shelf in my closet like a real china doll, smiling her lovely crooked smile. 

The journal entries continued for another dozen or so pages. The handwriting was very old-fashioned, very like the way people wrote a century before. The descriptions, however, were like a modern novel or film. Amalia was both enthralled and embarrassed, because she knew she was reading something never meant for eyes other than those of the journal’s author. The letters were also like that, with different writing, but passionate and detailed, reliving what the couple had done on their last meeting and what he wanted to do when they were together again. From the number of letters in the rounded packet, the meetings had been many, the nights long, and the pleasure was more than sublime.

The journal had not been signed by its owner at the beginning, probably to keep its contents anonymous. There had been first names and a couple of middle names, but Amalia had not been able to identify any of the people, or so she thought. The journal was also not signed on the last page. The letters had been altered so the sender and the recipient were illegible. It was very frustrating for Amalia as an archivist not to be able to identify dates, places, or people. The journal seemed to have been written with the intention of destroying it some day. What a pity, she thought.

Amalia then looked inside a small flap in the back of the volume. It wasn’t exactly a flap but a final page that had been folded accordion style, tightly. After so many years, the pleated page had almost sealed itself. Prying it open, Amalia found a single name she recognized: Harriet Dimmick. 

Her great grandmother.