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With dear husband away on conferences, I had to go to our first prenatal class on my own. I really didn’t mind. While everyone else was busy conferring with their partners, I was free to shoot from the hip. Some tall stories followed. I couldn’t resist. It was an easy room, and next week DH (thank you, babycenter, for that one) will steal the limelight for sure, so I had to get my laughs now.

I’m actually quite happy he couldn’t make it, because he missed a rather gruesome birthing video. Did I mention already I didn’t want a mirror? Well, I don’t want to see other women in this particular (compromising) position either. It may be beneficial to know what happens during labour, but I wish somebody for once shot the whole thing from the woman’s point of view instead.

I probably would have had to say that I didn’t learn anything new today, had the bus driver on the way back downtown not intervened. There were three of us there: him, me, and an old homeless Native American man. The homeless man provided the opener. Sprawling across the aisle from me, he winked and said I looked very pretty. I said that was nice of him to say, because at seven months pregnant it was getting quite difficult to feel anything but big and frumpy. (I was worried he didn’t notice the bump, and was pointing it out as a kind of shield against any further advances.) That was all the driver needed. He perked up and chimed in instantly. And this is pretty much what he had to say:

You do have a glow. That pregnant glow. Pregnant women get it from all the hormones. Because they get all hormonal, and there needs to be something to stop the rest of us from killing them. So the others sense those hormones, and feel affection instead and want to take care of those pregnant women. It’s a biological advantage, the nature’s way of protecting them.

First of all, I had no idea pregnant women being hormonal was making the rest of society homicidal. Secondly, I worry somewhere out there is a sad little National Geographic documentary, all alone and almost forgotten, and feeling so very, very misunderstood. (The alternative is just too scary to contemplate. What if that driver did get it right?! Perish the thought!)