...from between my thighs in the delivery room.
That and the raging tide of Numorphan in my veins brought me back to the days when I had had the exact same question.
When I met my husband, most people around him assumed he was black. His skin was cafe-au-lait and his features looked African-American. But I had gone to a very diverse school as a kid, and I had never seen anyone with any degree of African-American heritage who had hair like his. It was stiff, smooth and blue-black. (At that time, it was too short for its natural waves to show up.)
So I asked him one day, and...
..."I'm Hawaiian," he told the ob-gyn.
"Oh really! I'm Indian," said the doc.
"Cool."
This was a welcome distraction from being poked and prodded. What I most remember about giving birth was that I just wanted everyone to leave me alone. Stop checking me, stop feeling me, stop everything. Shut up, go away, turn out the lights. It must have been some primal instinct--your reptile brain doesn't know that those hands are wearing gloves and everything is sterile.
I lost the thread of their talk (Numorphan again) and came back as the doc was cheerily saying something about "...whatever the local brown minority is." My husband was laughing.
A perfectly everyday moment during what was, of course, a perfectly everyday event.
It doesn't feel everyday. Nor should it. The entry into the world of a being who can never leave it again except by death. And no one knows what that end will be.
She was born with her eyes open.
