In the Pink

Yes, it's a girl.

Dan and I could not have been more surprised on Friday by the sonogram if there had been five or six babies in there. We just have been thinking of ourselves as the parents of boys, maybe because The Max Show is so all-boy-all-the-time.

I have a lot of emotions. Like I said, I am really stuck in a mode of thinking of myself as the mother of sons, and I have to admit that it's hard getting myself out of that mode. I mean, dresses? Bows? Barbies? Really? I was never that great at being a girl--I always felt most like myself when I was doing things that I tend to think of as gender-ambiguous. I never felt particularly girly or feminine--I don't dress that way, I don't think that way, and I don't really feel like I relate that well to women who do.

But the feeling I've had with this pregnancy up until now, the feeling that this is all old-hat to me and nothing to get that excited about, is sort of gone. I mean, I was excited, but not like I was when I was pregnant with Max: that feeling of anticipating a totally brand-new experience. But with a girl, now this feels like a whole new ballgame to me, and I'm finally starting to feel excited in a way I wasn't before.

Also, I'm starting to anticipate what this kid will be like. Max is so much Dan's kid: it's Dan who he wants all the time, and while it gives me a little free time to be pregnant and exhausted (both of which I really am; I am looking enormously pregnant already and I am so overcome by exhaustion that I am usually asleep on the couch within an hour of getting home from work every night), it does make me a little wistful when Max only wants his dad and never me. I keep joking that I'd better be this kid's favorite, and it's only half a joke.

I really wonder what being mother to a girl will be like. I am trying not to get too hung up on what ages 12 through 19 will be like (those are the years of my life that I like to refer to as "The Seven Year Bitch"), and instead think about all the things I am so enamoured of in Max: his sunny personality, his enthusiasm for everything he does, his curiousity, his one-track mind, his eagerness to please everyone, especially himself. I'm trying to imagine those traits in a little girl, and when I do that, it doesn't make me want to hide under a large piece of furniture for the next 20 years.

Like I said, Dan and I couldn't have been more shocked on Friday when the sonogram technician said, "To be honest, everything I'm seeing here says girl to me." We had a boy name picked out, but it's not even remotely unisex, and we hadn't really gotten anywhere with a girl name--that's how sure we were that we were having a boy. We have a few ideas, but I am open to suggestions. I made the observation to Kimberly the other day that as much as I tend to dislike the ultra-popular, Best-Girl-Names-Ever baby name lists, the fact is just that some names are popular because they're just good names. The requirements are as follows:

1. Nothing that rhymes with Max or Maxwell (what rhymes with Maxwell anyway?)
2. Must sound good with the last name Chase (Grace, for example, is out.)
3. No unpleasant associations: Dan's first wife's name was Melanie, his mother's name is Rosetta, and he has an ex-girlfriend who I found totally stupid and annoying named Erin. I went to school with a really mean girl named Nikki and another named Carolyn. Thumbs-down to all of these.

Also, if you happen to have a girl and you're now pregnant with a boy, and you'd like to trade baby clothes, send me an email. I dressed Max much more stylishly than I ever dress myself, and I feel incredibly sorry for this girl, who will probably inherit my sense of feminine style.