Tonight, 18 years ago, I was having twinges - not big ones but enough so I thought I'd better leave Simon at his grandparents place for the evening. I took a photo of him - beautiful boy with big blue eyes, soft blonde curls - about to become a brother. Tonight, 18 years ago, I drove my car home. I didn't want to because the twinges were getting stronger, but somehow I was talked into driving my own car home by myself. Greg drove his own car home - he'd come to his parents' place later than I had. I had to stop at the gas station for petrol on the way - I had three relatively strong contractions while I filled my car - I leaned against the pump and breathed through them. I drove the rest of the way and made it home safely. Tonight, 18 years ago, I'd phoned the hospital when I got home and told them how I was feeling, they thought I should come in. Greg was already in bed and asleep. I tried a number of times to leave for the hospital but Greg was hard to wake - which, now I think about it, was unusual because normally he's a painfully light sleeper. But we didn't leave the house until 1am. Tonight, 18 years ago, I was having strong, painful contractions in the passenger-seat of Greg's car as he drove towards National Womens' Hospital. I was urging him to drive faster, to go through red lights - there was hardly any traffic. He felt reluctant to do so and it seemed he drove sedately to the Maturnity Entrance of the hospital. Tonight, 18 years ago, I was crippled by the waves of contractions in the carpark of the hospital. I nearly didn't make it to the door I could barely walk. The Duty Nurse was grumpy with me because I had phoned her over 3 hours before when they'd told me to come in and had taken this long to get there. Tonight, 18 years ago, by the time they got me up onto the examining table, I was in transition. I was shaking and cold. The contractions weren't 3 minutes apart or 2 minutes part or 1 minute apart like they say in the books.. there was only one contraction and it was endless. Tonight, 18 years ago, my daughter was born at 1:47am before the doctor could arrive. She came so fast she had red racing stripes down her face. She was born quickly and striped with red over blue. She took a heartbeat or two to breathe but she managed it. Tonight, 18 years after she was born, she is out. Out of me and out of the house. Out with her friends for her birthday. Tomorrow night she is out with *different* friends for her birthday. Saturday night she is out with *all* of those friends for her birthday party. She said, if she's not *too* hungover on Sunday, she will try to find time to have dinner with us for her birthday, but she's not promising anything. She told me this over coffee this afternoon which was nice - both the coffee and the company. Tonight, 18 years after she was born, I think about how fast those years have gone though at times some of them have not been fast enough. She's still the same little girl in fairy wings and gumboots - no really, she's wearing wings for her birthday party. She's grown and she's beautiful and talented and annoying and popular and neglectful and wonderful and a pain-in-the-arse and I love her. Happy Birthday Amy.

Me: This Blackstrap Mollasses says "may have mild laxative effect".. I'll tell you what.. there's nothing mild about it. Greg and David: ... Me: And I'll tell you something else for nothing..my iron tablets colour that mild laxative effect dark forest green! Greg and David:... Me: yes, sucks trying to treat low Iron count letmetellyou! Greg: I think you're not keeping enough *in*. Maybe you need a butt plug. David: I think you're letting too much *out*...maybe you need a *mouth* plug!

Lying in bed. Tucked in with a firm hand and a "Go to sleep", the blankets hold me tight against the sheets slowly warming to my body heat. I lift my head and look down my body's bump under the bedspread. The candlewick has bald patches where I've pulled at the tuffs of soft white cotton earning me numerous stinging slaps on the legs for my plucking obssession. I look and wish my feet could touch the end of the bed. As it is, illuminated by the hall light keeping boogy monsters out of my room, I see they barely reach half way. I point my toes, stretching and willing them with all my might to reach the far end of my bed. I fall back into my pillow and believe I will *never* grow up enough for my feet to ever reach the end of the blankets. I slip from my bed. My bare feet soundless on my bedroom rug and into the hallway. I'm used to moving silently around the house when I'm supposed to be in bed. I hear the muffled sounds of the television behind the closed door of the lounge. Sometimes I sneak into the laundry. I like to sit in the basket piled high with the day's laundry. It always smells like sunshine and summer and I can sit there in the near-dark for hours, just thinking about things. It's perfectly safe there, boogy monsters don't come into the laundry. Sometimes I go into the toilet. I can turn the light on and shut the door and have the room to myself for ages - plus if I get caught I can say I had had to "go". I don't do that in the toilet at night though, what I do is press my hands and feet to the opposite walls and push. Making tiny movements with feet and hands, I can slowly creep up and away from the floor. The ceiling is a million miles above me, but my goal is to reach it one day - so far I can get high enough that it stings my feet when I jump down. But tonight I go into the bathroom. The cold linolium is a shock to my warm feet but at least it's light enough in there, once my eyes adjust, to see without turning the light on. The scales in the bathroom are pink and chrome. Sometimes I'm in the bathroom to play with the Gilette shaving razor blades because it's fun to slide them out of the packet though I always cut myself trying to get them back inside the dispenser and it gets me into trouble. I stand on the heavy metal scales and the dial rockets into action. It spins past my weight, then dials back the opposite way, past my weight and below. Slowly the dial settles very near the number that indicates how heavy I am. I look down. My bare feet on the cool pink metal surface of the scales. I don't like the number I see. I hunch down, pressing myself harder onto the scales, trying to make that number increase. Adding one, two increments? Hunching down trying to make myself a heavy lump. I jump up and land heavily on the scales sending the dial spinning again but when it settles it's still sitting very near the 3. 3!! how can it say 3 when I'm so much older than that. I get off and go back outside convinced I'm never, ever going to grow up.