Here's a crazy thing. It's week 8 and junior is just over 2 cm from head to bum (because the feet and legs are all curled up, many measurement systems don't include them). S/he has a small fluttering heartbeat. S/he has elbows! Elbows for gawd's sake. I've never really given much though to elbows. Elbow the band, sure. e-Bows, the musical device, yes, but not the ones in the middle of your arms that are made out of spare bits of scrotums. It's nice to know s/he'll have them though!
What else? Er... oh, fingers start to develop. For a long while yet s/he'll be all Man from Atlantis and have webbing between them. Of course, if this isn't my baby, and K___'s been having an affair with a Canvey Islander, we can expect this webbing between the fingers to be permanent, and we'll also have to prepare for an unexpected proficiency on the banjo...
Similarly the buds that are his or her legs start to develop toes. The ears, eyes and nose should appear this week. Well, start to. They don't just appear in situ. That would be a bit wrong.
By next week, s/he'll have grown over 50% of this week's length; now that's a growth spurt! S/he'll also start moving around, though probably imperceptibly at this stage.
The more you read about this stuff, the more incredible it is. The comedian Bill Hicks was fond of remarking that bringing babies into this world was nothing miraculous. In fact, what he actually said was, 'No it's not [a miracle]. No more a miracle than eating food and a turd coming out of your ass. It's a chemical reaction, that's all it fucking is.'
Of course, he's quite correct about that. It is just a series of chemical reactions and it's not unique or clever and yes Bill, a true miracle is indeed raising a kid who doesn't talk in a movie theatre, all quite and perfectly correct.
But I can't help but wonder whether more kids wouldn't talk in movie theatres if more parents weren't a little bit more genuinely in awe of the whole giving birth thing. If more parents understood the incredible magnitude of what they are doing and recognising the incumbent responsibilities upon them, wouldn't that increase the chances of that child getting a decent, loving upbringing and turning, one day, into a decent human being who doesn't actually decrease the overall level of happiness in the world...?
Hey. I just disagreed with Bill Hicks. I am a heretic.
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