Waiting on Amanda

We are driving to Hairun to drop off our dog Kobe before Sabrina's baby heartbeat and contraction monitoring appointment. Sabrina snaps a groupie of her, Kobe, and me on the drive. I look old, chubby, and out of shape. That is my misplaced or correctly placed focus.

Two days prior Sabrina felt the baby, Amanda, might be coming and got things ready for the hospital. She hesitated to wake me up. Need to work on that. By morning she was feeling better and we went to her normally scheduled pregnancy appointment. Sonogram. Baby and contraction monitoring. The elderly doctor, who I offensively refer to as the sugar nazi, insists Sabrina go to hospital for a couple days of observation since her blood sugar is a bit high. We go to hospital, run the same monitoring tests again and the hospital doctor says everything looks good. We go home.

So here we are with a due date in two weeks anticipating that baby Amanda could come anytime. To say we are ready is an overstatement. I still go on two-hour walks in order to listen to podcasts. The walks somehow make the listening feel more productive. I worry about how to complete/transition my work tasks when during the four weeks I'll take off. We have a stroller, a car seat, diapers, bottles, and formula so I guess we are ready. I've changed a diaper before, I think. Worst case there are Youtube videos. Or would TikTok be better?

When we planned Amanda my intent was to become a full-time dad but now it seems I will keep on working until they tell me to stop. I wanted the full-time dad experience. When I took a year off formal work in 2011, I got to take care of then three-year-old Elisa which I really enjoyed.  Now, I'm thinking about stock vesting.

We are 95% settled on the name of Amanda after a flirtation with Aimee. For most of the pregnancy we didn't know the sex of the baby since local laws don't allow it to be communicated. (Sabrina found out by playing a game of two questions). Most of the names we had come up with before Amanda were laugh out loud funny to Lydia and Elisa. They aren't thrilled with Amanda either. Lydia sends me new suggestions regularly.

When I think about Amanda..well..it isn't that real yet..but I know it will be in a few days or a couple of weeks. And it will change everything. Soon Amanda, Kobe, and I will be going on two-hour podcast walks and taking unflattering selfies.