Pregnant: Pt. 4 of 4

March 23, 1957

“Oh, God Mitchie!” Clenching her jaw against the pain of the contraction, “It hurts so bad.” When the pain passed, “what time’s it?” she asked for the fifth time in as many contractions.

Holding her hand, wiping her forehead with a damp washcloth, glancing at his watch, “8:32.” Getting the early morning call, Mitchell had arrived at the hospital about two hours earlier.

The contractions had now dropped from five to three minutes apart.

“Whew!” Taking a deep breath, forcing a smile, “know what?”

“No, honey.” Lifting her hand to his lips, “what?”

“I don’t like this no more. Tell ’em I wanna… emmm! Tell ’em I wanna go home.” Like the stretching of a rubber band, the cramping sensation once again tightening within her lower abdomen, “oh, God!” Biting her lip, “bad!” Screwing her eyes shut, the veins in her neck and forehead standing in embossed relief against her pale, damp flesh, “this one’s so bad!”

Feeling a stinging in his eyes for his wife’s pain, “honey, it was closer this time. What do you want me to do? Should I get a nurse?”

Breathing rapidly through pursed lips, “yeah, Mitchie, go get ’em and tell ’em  I changed my mind.”

“Changed your mind?”

“Yeah! Natural childbirth! Tell ’em screw natural childbirth! Tell ’em I wanna be knocked out!”

Remembering the conversations with her aunts, cousin and Rosalie, Mitchell could not tell if she was serious. “You don’t want to be awake?” Wanting no mistake in this. “You really want me to tell Greenblatt that you do not want to be awake when you deliver?”

No response for a moment, then, as the squeezing lessened and the pain lessened, “no,” Marsha whispered. “I guess not.”

“No? You guess not what, Marcie? That you don’t want to be awake, or you do want to be awake?”

“Yes!” Her fingers tightening around Mitchell’s, “oh, God! Oh, my, God!”

                                                     ***

“Marsha!”

Feeling her shoulder being shaken.

“Marsha!”

Opening her eyes, she saw the bright glare of a powerful overhead light. Squinting, Marsha looked from the light to the white-gowned, masked figure standing alongside the gurney, or whatever she was laying on, thinking, If it’s Mitchell, he’s shrunk. “Huh?”

“Marsha, it’s Doctor Greenblatt. Do you want me to put you to sleep or do you want a saddle block? Mitchell said you didn’t know and you’ve got to let me know, now!”

Coming out of the light anesthetic, feeling another sharp contraction, grimacing in pain, “yes, yes, yes!” She said, emphatically moving her head from side to side negatively.

“Marsha, do you want to be awake or asleep?”

“Asleep, Doc!” Said without hesitation. “I want to be asleep!”

                                               *** 

Oh, God!

Cradled in her arms, the nurse held the baby tilted upward so he could see its little, red face.

“Oh, God!” he said aloud, thinking… Actually what he thought was not so much a thought as a deeply felt sensation that even the thought that he, Mitchell Lipensky was a father was… incomprehensible. Tapping on the window, “hi, my baby,” he said as, feeling foolish, he glanced to his left, at an elderly couple, obviously grandparents, kootchie-kooing to a newborn grandson or granddaughter from the  nursery window.

Turning away, the nurse began to lay the baby into a basinet, but, tapping on the window, he motioned to her by holding a finger forward, mouthing, “one more minute, please.”

Simply put, the reality of this would not sink in, and once again Mitchell Lipensky wondered, how can this really be? The idea of him being a father, a “daddy,” was about the same as the concept of pushing a feather through a rock: Impossible!

Holding the baby forward a minute longer, the nurse then lay him onto his back in the bassinet, and still he stood, looking at this little person that was his baby, his child. Mitchell’s heart swelled with joy and pride, and the sweet strain forced a tightening in his chest and throat, and tears came to his eyes as, pressing his forehead onto the window, covering the sides of his face with his hands so no one would hear his whispering or see his tears, “I love you, my baby,” Mitchell whispered. “Your daddy… Oh, God, Your daddy loves you so much!”

                                                     ***

Her eyes closed, Marsha appeared to be sleeping.

Sitting alongside the bed, taking her dry, warm hand into his, “Marcie,” he said softly.

Opening her eyes, “hi, Mitchie,” she said drowsily.

“Hi, honey.”

“So, did you see him?”

“Yes, I did. He’s beautiful, Marcie! You made a beautiful baby.”

“No. We, Mitchie! We made him; you and me! You think so? You really think he’s beautiful?”

Lifting her hand to his lips, kissing the tip of a finger, “nah, I was lying,” he lied. “He looks like a shriveled up old man.” Which, actually, the baby almost did. Teasing her, “one thing, sure,” he added. “The kid’s got your nose.” Which, actually, the baby did. “And what about the bobbea meisseh (old wives tale) about heartburn meaning lots’a hair? The kid’s bald as a cantaloupe.” Which, actually, he was.

“Yeah, but he’s got your bubble chin and pixie ears.” Which, actually—though it was too early to tell—he did.

“Yeah, okay, you can blame me for that neat stuff, Marcie, but he’s sure got your mouth; you should hear him cry!”

“Michael was crying? Maybe he’s hungry!”

Michael? Preferring a girl… or a boy, they hadn’t been too sure of the name before, but then, as Marsha said it, “Michael” fit perfectly.

                                                 March 31, 1957

                            The Brith Milah: The Bris: The Circumcision

On the eighth day in the life of Michael Lipensky, Rabbi, Murray Kay, the ‘Mohel’: a physician who is trained and authorized to perform the ritual circumcision intoned, “Brukheem ha-ba-eem b’sheym Adonai.”

Standing alongside his grandson, whispering, Morris Barrish translated, “Blessed are you who come in the name of God.”

Enthralled by the florescent light on the ceiling above his head, Michael Lipensky lay naked atop a blanket on the table in the nurses lounge adjoining the Weiss Memorial Hospital nursery.

Besides the Mohel, there were the ten men that formed the minyan: Walter, Morris, Mitchell and his uncle, Al Marcus. From Marsha’s side there was Eli, Roger, Eli’s brother, William Goldman and Marsha’s other uncles, Harry and Stanley. Also in attendance was Marsha and Mitchell’s friend, Marty Fishman.

“The rite of circumcision has been enjoined upon us as a sign of our covenant with God.” Rabbi Kay said in English as, dipping a strip of sterile gauze into a goblet of Kosher sacramental wine, he placed it between Michael’s lips.

Tasting the sweet wine, Michael greedily gummed and drew on the saturated gauze and, the few drops of alcohol immediately numbing him...

Kay placed a small, stainless-steel clamp onto the baby’s penis between the foreskin and glans, shut it tight, then...

Mitchell, along with most of the men, closed their eyes, as...

... With one precise cut, the Mohel removed the foreskin.

“Mazel tov!”

Only then did Mitchell open his eyes.

“Mazel tov!”