"Labor."

During a fun call night recently (3 deliveries=a fun call night) one of the deliveries I attended was a nice Mennonite woman who was having her seventh child. I have NEVER seen a delivery quite like this.

First of all, she got to the hospital with her hair neatly pulled up into a bun, a small white cotton cloth covering it. Even at 4:30 in the morning she was already neatly dressed. Unlike me, who looked like a bum in blood-spattered scrubs. Her husband was right at her side, quite excited about having another child.

Secondly, she wasn't even sweating. NOT A DROP. She just looked like she had breezed into the hospital from the beach, after a few days of soaking up rays and lying down. Instead of where she actually came from, which is working at home caring for SIX children aged 19 to 7. And possibly various farm animals.

Thirdly, she did not get any kind of anesthesia. Nothing. Not even IV medication. She just calmly and extremely quietly sat in the bed, as if she couldn't even feel the large, nearly eight pound human making his way down through her nether regions. Even while pushing, she did not look like she was doing much more than sneezing.

Then, shock of all shocks, she BEGGED the attending to cut an episiotomy. (If you don't know what that is, ask your wife. Or look on wikipedia.) She preferred to deliver that way.

Well. I guess after 6 deliveries, she would know.

Her beautiful baby boy came out squawking and red. Mom took one look at him and said to her beaming husband, "He looks like our babies." It made me a little teary.

And the whole time, they were just praising God for his goodness to them.

I hope my labor will one day be like that.