When my son Daniel was only eleven months old, I went for my annual check-up with my obstetrician. While I waited for my name to be called my mind drifted. I had spent a lot of time there the previous year, preparing for Daniel’s birth. The smell of the office was familiar and made my body almost feel expectant again.
I imagined that if I went through the waiting room door and into one of the cubicles beyond it I might travel back in time. Maybe my pregnant belly would reappear and I would discover that my baby was due next month and that the last year was a hallucination. It happens in soap operas. I remember when they brought Bobby Ewing back to life on the night-time soap opera ‘Dallas’ by explaining that the entire previous year’s episodes had been a dream of one of the characters. What an escape hatch!