The Baby is on the Way

One Day in January
By
Jo
My story begins in 1971; it was a cold winter day. The house my family rented was in a holler with a creek bed for a road and a path beside it to use when the creek had water in it. We had no electricity, we had a kitchen stove that burned wood for cooking and another room had a fireplace to warm the house. Our nearest neighbor lived about a mile away.
I am ten years old, and have a two year old sister and one year old brother, and mom was nine months pregnant.
The day began like any morning, we got up and built a fire in the kitchen stove, fixed breakfast which wasn’t easy, you had to make biscuits from scratch, slice the bacon etc. I was mighty hungry by the time breakfast was done, My step dad James left for work after breakfast and Mom said she wasn’t feeling well. She was going to lie down for awhile for me to watch the babies.
Mom slept most of the day when she finally got up and we started dinner she still wasn’t feeling well and when James got home late that evening she told him she was in labor, We didn’t have a car so he walked to his brothers house about five miles away to borrow his car.
Meanwhile Mom realized the baby was coming then and James wasn’t going to make it back in time and we needed to get ready. She told me to boil some water on the stove. I didn’t know what for so I filled all the pots in the kitchen ,and then got some clean bed sheets ready , Mom said to go and get the neighbor's wife to come and stay with her till James got back. Now this was a problem, you see it was dark outside and I had lied to Mom and I wasn’t in a habit doing that and it was on my conscience. I believed the devil came out after dark to wait for sinners.
I needed to go a mile through the woods to get to the neighbors and I was afraid to since it was almost midnight but mom was depending on me so I got up my courage and stepped out in that cold dark night and started through the woods. There was a full moon to light the path as I began to noticed the shadows moving around me. I knew the devil was coming and he was going to get me(You see I had snuck into some moonshine a few weeks earlier and mom had asked if I been in it. I looked her in the eye and said no).
I started to run ,the cold night air made my chest hurt and I thought I’d never make it to the neighbors house. When I got there I knocked and knocked on the door and finally the man came to the door. I told him what was happening and could his wife come and stay with mom. He said no. She said she would but he still wouldn’t let her , so I ran back home .Mom said the baby was coming now I would have to help her so I talked to her and told her stories to get her mind off the pain. I also told her the truth about the lie I told her and was good to get that off my conscience, well finally that baby popped out and the cord was wrapped around his neck.Mom said to unwrap it but I wouldn’t touch it because it was slimy so she reach down and did it herself. By then the fire was dying down and it was getting cold so I covered up the baby. Mom said to go back to the neighbors and try to get help again. I wasn’t scared this time because I told Mom the truth.
I got to the neighbors and banged on the door. They wasn’t answering so I started hollering and they finally came to the door. I spoke to the lady this time and she told her husband she was going back with me this time and she called a ambulance. We got back to the my house and after awhile James got back with the car with his brother but it was too late (he had started watching a John Wayne movie and forgot about the time ). While they was thinking about what to do next, the neighbor’s husband shows up with the ambulance driver carrying the stretcher because the road was too rough to drive the ambulance. The driver didn’t know what to do about mom and the baby so James decides to try to get a retired midwife who lived a few miles away to come and cut the cord. She came and done what she needed to do and told me I was brave and had done a good job. All ended well that night and I got to name the baby. It was a boy and I named him Tony Andrew.