The concept of Birth

Somewhere on this globe, every ten seconds, there is a woman giving birth to a child. She must be found and stopped. - Sam Levenson (1911 – 1980)

My birthday made me wonder….

Giving birth is quite a phenomenon. We men are never told about it, and are left to fend for ourselves. The smart men (and there are very few) find out early about this whole birth thingie…the rest of us…. depend on movies to teach us the nuances of life.

I think I was somewhere between the smart and the not-so-smart for when I was in class six I found out that birth was quite a natural phenomenon. All a man and a woman had to do was get married and naturally the child followed. For long I wondered how the child knew that his/her parents were married and it was time for him to come …

It took me two years to realize that it was the kiss that was instrumental in the birth of a child. So whenever I saw a small baby, I would look at his/her parents…and wonder why they weren’t shy. They ought to be shy….they had kissed…and now that the baby was born…everybody had come to know that they kissed.

I think it was my biology madam Geeta Kumari madam… that’s what we would call her…who taught us the whole birth cycle.

She was quite a not-so-bold lady and openly announced in the class that after marriage it generally took 10-12 months for the baby to be born. We were supposed to take the hint. But one young lad, who would have otherwise sat down staring at his Big Fun stickers (remember the ‘collect runs/wickets and take home a cricket bat’ offer?) jumped up at Geeta Kumari madam’s wrong lessons.

“No…a baby is not born immediately after the marriage!” he shouted.

The madam was visibly perplexed…but that day we had failed to notice it.

“Shombit Chatterjee, I did not ask you to talk,” the teacher censured the young lad.

This really put down the kid. He never got such opportunities to showcase his street-smart ways – the whole class looked silent and confused – but he knew something about it. And he wanted to share it.

“What you are saying is wrong. The child is not born after marriage,” Shombit said.

Even as he said this, he turned towards me and egged me on. But I held on to my nerves and my seat.

The teacher did not know how to react. Shombit carried on.

And then he dropped the bombshell: “The parents need to kiss each other for the baby to be born!” Even before he finished, he threw a glance across the class…a glance that meant he was superior.

Shombit and I had discussed this earlier. I had told him that the parents need to kiss for the baby to be born. But since then, I had learnt that a lot more than just a kiss would be required to come up with the most beautiful creation in the world – a baby. Unfortunately, I had not updated my uncouth friend.

As soon as Shombit finished, most of the class (especially the girls) and the teacher let out a sigh of relief. Not to mention…all that laughter that followed. All the guys were silent…and confused…..

That day I realized that girls ARE fast. Ever since, I have left the women in my life lead me like a little boy. I have also known that it is neither marriage nor a kiss that results in a child…but a very happy wife. At least that’s what Rekha tells me.

Related posts You might want to read:

1. Natural child birth is painful for the husband too
   This post is dedicated to all fathers, whose contribution to child birth has gone unnoticed and unrewarded. If you have been reading Ouchmytoe for a while now, you probably remember than on 29th March 2007 our daughter Rhea was born in a hospital in Kannur, Kerala. If you remember reading this post on Rhea’s birth [...]...
2. Communicating a baby’s birth to the World
   I don’t know how my family communicated my birth to the rest of the world. Some of my guesses are: Drum beats sounding like the much fashion-walked song ‘Cotton Eye Joe’ Painting the trees in the area red (when the trees got cut and towns got built the phrase changed to ‘painting the town red’) [...]...
3. Birth pangs
   I was born by Caesarian. You can’t usually tell, but whenever I go out of the house, I take the window. - Steven Martin Today, I was telling my Reporting Manager (I use the word because it sounds less sinister than ‘boss’) that I wanted to have a baby. I mean not deliver…but be the [...]...
4. Baby Daughter’s Birth – Day one
   The word has spread and all the nurses have ganged up against me in order to save Rekha her husband. This is the problem with today’s World – news travels fast. Esp, news of somebody being a flirt. My sense of humor didn’t help me either when I met my match in ‘Sister’ Rosa Kutty [...]...
5. Kissing – how it all began
   Kissing is fine if it is within the five walls of the house. Yes, ours is a unique house. Once, outside…it is a big mess. Unless of course, you live in the US of A or the fashion capital (or French capital?) Paris. After the Kareena Kapoor-Shahid Khan kissing episode that hit the headlines of [...]...
6. How babies come into this World…
   Rhea is now 20 months old and it has been a long journey. If I were to draw a parallel, it has been like crossing the Niagara Falls on a tight walk rope. That’s why in the last 20 months, while playing with Rhea I have always sat down on the floor. I still remember [...]...
7. All Males Unite!
   I have a feeling that very soon it would not be cool to have a male child. I don’t know you if you agree with me, but it is a fact that today 50% of the households start expecting a boy child as soon as somebody in the family gets pregnant. The rest are OK, [...]...
8. Golden rule of marriage remains unbroken
   This Friday Rekha read my blog after a long time and as expected wasn’t impressed with the way I had been projecting her to the World. After leaving damaging comments (which I have deleted now) she decided to call me at office. “I would like to discuss our marriage with you,” Rekha roared into the [...]...
9. Man is a born businessman!
   I think man is a born businessman. As soon as he is born he starts crying for attention and when the doctor gives him a blanket for free…he stops crying. All you feminists out there, please bear with me. Though I mention him/he/man etc…I don’t mean to be unfair. I am referring to both man [...]...
10. A helping hand
    Their thoughts were racing faster than the moving sceneray outside the the train window. It was cold, but Catharine had coerced Shankar into keeping the window open. She wanted to take in as much of India as possible, afterall she would be going back to Canada in a weeks time. Even as she sat glued [...]...

Posted by Jamshed V Rajan on May 2 2005. Filed under Sex. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry