eight years ago today

"...was the scariest day of my entire life." Jonathan just said that to me.

He was making fun of me for writing again. I tend to write one day a week, but that day I write 2 or 3 times. Anyway.

"You're writing again?" he said.

And then I reminded him that today was Groundhog Day. "Was it 1998 or 1999?" I asked him. (I am terrible with dates.)

"Oh my God, it's Groundhog Day? It is. It's Groundhog Day. Wow. It was 1999," he told me. "1999, because I graduated the following year."

"Eight years ago today," I said.

"Eight years ago today," he said, "was the scariest day of my entire life."

Eight years ago today we found out I was pregnant.

We had only been dating for--well, let's just say a ridiculously brief time. And let's just say for the record that I am definitely not a loose woman. There was just something about him, okay? Anyway. We had only been dating a brief time. And I just knew, I knew I was pregnant. My period wasn't due for about a week when I went to my doctor for a pregnancy test. They did a test and told me it was negative. I couldn't believe it. They explained that it might just be too early to tell, and told me to come back in a week or so if my period was late. I said, "I will."

I don't know how I knew. It makes no sense to me, because with both Blue and the Lion I didn't know! That first pregnancy was so different from the other two from the very start.

Anyway. February 1st, eight years ago, I left work late at night, and I told my coworkers I was sure I was pregnant. One of them, a girl named Maria, said (for some reason I can't remember now), "If you're pregnant, I'll bake you a chocolate cake and bring it in to work." I drove to Wal-Mart and instead of buying tampons, I bought a pregnancy test.

I took the test the next morning and I was right. I was pregnant. And it's funny because I am such a wuss--I didn't call Jonathan right away. I started crying and I called my friend, Gillian, instead who was a year older than me and was already married and had a baby. I had no idea how to tell Jonathan. I asked her what on earth I was going to do. She told me, "You're going to hang up, call Jonathan and the two of you are going to go to that emergency clinic to get a blood test. You need to make sure."

I told her I was sure. She said, "Well, then Jonathan will want to be sure."

So then I called him. And I tried to sound normal. I was determined to tell him in person. So I asked him what he was doing. It was fairly early in the morning and he was about to leave for class. I asked him if I could come over. Even though we didn't know each other that well, he knew something was afoot. He told me to come right over, that he would skip class, and after we hung up, he turned to his roomate and said, "Oh my God. Erin is pregnant."

So you see, he knew, too.

The rest of the day is less clear. We went together to get the blood test. While we waited for the results, he took me to Friendly's. On the way back to the clinic, we listened to the Beach Boys song, "I Can Hear Music." The damn nurse told us, "It's positive," right out in front of all the people in the waiting room. We hugged and didn't say much. I could hear Jonathan's heart it was beating so loud. We went to Borders to buy What to Expect When You're Expecting and we rented "Mulan" because it had just come out on DVD. I went to work that night and I told Maria, "You owe me a cake."