Dear God

Prologue

The clock shows quarter past 10 in the evening. After brushing his teeth, young Aaron approached the bed where his mother sat, with her back to the headboard while reading a book. "Ma? What are you reading?" "The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer," replied Vivian. "Did you brush your teeth well," she asked. "I did!" Aaron replied as he crawled to the other side of the bed and slipped into the covers, ready to call it a night.

Vivian set aside the book she's reading, turned to her son and said, "Hey little man, I think you're forgetting something." "I know...," Aaron replied. He went up, but just as Vivian thought her son was about to pray. "Ma? Is giving birth painful?" asked Aaron with an inquisitive note in his small voice.

With her eyes still fixed into his son's eyes, it took Vivian a moment to realize what her son's asking about. "You have no idea," she replied. She turned her gaze to Aaron's baby picture, secured in a wooden frame on her bedside table. And as if pulled out from the conversation that was going on, she saw her son enveloped in a blue blanket, placed in her loving arms just minutes after she gave birth to him. Unguarded eyes, flickering at the slightest sight of a light, chubby cheeks as pink as a rose, tiny nose and cute pair of lips. All of which never escaped Vivian's memory even up to this day. So does other moms, I guess.

Turning to her son, Vivian continued. "Giving birth is not easy, you know?" "Can you see that?" as she pointed to the wooden picture frame. "What about me?" asked Aaron. "Yes, that's you! Minutes after I gave birth to you," continued Vivian. "Imagine that baby boy getting out of a person's mouth, that's how hard it is to give birth!" With a sudden change in his face, Aaron said. "Now I understand why that woman on TV kept screaming the whole time." Wait, did I just hear TV again? Vivian thought. "We better cut the hours you spend watching TV I figured," Vivian said. "And that Doctor was so mean to her," Aaron muttered, as if not paying attention to what his mom was saying. "Mean? How so?" asked Vivian who's so into the conversation at this point. "Because the woman was screaming so loud, she was even crying and the mean doctor keeps telling her to push! He even said it 3 times. Push! Push! Push!" explained Aaron.

Vivian seemed momentarily lost. She can't seem to process what her next reaction would be. Will she carry on and make a lecture on giving birth? Will she be able to explain it in a way that a 5-year old kid can comprehend? Will she laugh at the thought that when all the other kids like her son's age talk about Simpsons or Sesame Street or Paw Patrol to their parents, her's was talking about giving birth? Will she dread the power and influence that television can bring to a kid, most especially that Aaron is left alone by himself while she's out working, giving him the absolute freedom to watch whatever he wants to?

She felt utterly lost. But like what they always say, a mom knows best! There are two things that she's sure of. Her son is an intelligent kid and there's just no substitute for the truth. So she ended up telling her son how she gave birth to him.

It was on an evening on the 9th of October that Vivian gave birth to Aaron John Cordero. Unlike the rest of the expectant moms in the same hospital room where Vivian had to be admitted, there was no man beside her to hold her hand each time she'd feel the discimfort of labor contractions. Apart from her very dear bestfriend Grace, everybody that surrounded her were people wearing surgical scrubs and masks waiting for her first delivery. For first timers, giving birth is way difficult, but it wasn't for Vivian. She dealt with it like a pro. When she gets asked as to how she nailed it by some of her workmates, she'd tell them, "Maybe I wanted my son in my arms already, that when the Doctor said push, I summoned all the courage that I have and pushed like nobody they have ever seen before." She may not have the husband who'd be running through the hospital halls shouting, "I have a boy! I have a boy!" But to Vivian, "who cares?" Locked in her nurturing arms is the boy who changed her life after that blessed night in October.