Arrival

A fierce storm raged overhead.  Rain came down in torrents.  Lightening slashed the black midnight sky, and thunder rolled and rumbled through the heavens.  The clock in the town square slowly pealed twelve times, the sound flowing over the darkened, sleeping little city.

In a large clapboard house on the corner, however, all the lights were ablaze, the storm was hardly noticed.  In a bedroom on the first floor lay a young mother, twenty-two years of age.  Her husband of six years was with her, and so was a doctor who was helping her through the final stages of labor.  For the young mother it was the first time she had been away from family when one of her babies was born.  The new child was baby number four for her, and all four of the babies had been born at home.  The mother was afraid if she went to the hospital to give birth she might not bring her own baby home.  That was unthinkable!!

The town clock pealed once, it was 12:15.  Labor continued.  Time passed so slowly.  Then the clock pealed twice, it was 12:30.  Labor was ending.  A little after midnight on January 24, 1925, as the storm screamed and howled around the corners of the house, a baby girl was born.  I was that baby girl.