The Art of Reproduction

A recent trip to Vegas with my husband, to celebrate my 30th birthday, took me back to another place in time. Specifically, a trip I took with my brother and sister to Vegas to celebrate my 21st birthday.  Watching my brother play high stakes poker. Giggling over my "first" sips of alcohol with my sister while we played the slots. Shopping. Eating. Talking. That trip was great and I was eager to replicate the experience.

But when my husband and I arrived in Sin City, I was taken even further back in time.

To my semester abroad in Europe.

For all of the negative things said about Las Vegas, it's truly a marvel of replication. My husband and I opted to stay at the Paris Hotel, with our bedroom overlooking the Eiffel Tower. Sure, the tower is only half the size of the magnificent original--which my roommate and I hiked to the top of to avoid paying for the elevator--but it was a spectacular forgery. Inside, the Paris Hotel is paved with fake cobblestone and reproduction street lamps. My husband and I strolled arm-in-arm scouring knock-off Louis Vuittons and talking to the vendors, who were mimicking French accents. I felt myself taken back to my time in Paris with my four college friends.

Without even a train ride, in fact just a few steps to the north, we walked into Italy. In the Venetian, the counterfeit gold ceilings look remarkably accurate, and the gondolas look as realistic as the ones I had ridden in Venice 10 years earlier. The entire strip of Vegas mimicked some of my favorite trips around Europe. The stone work, marble steps, archways, fountains, art, stained glass, and sculptures were so authentic-looking it made me feel at home again, re-experiencing the greatest adventure of my life.

Even beyond my study abroad, Vegas recreated some of my favorite trips I have taken with my husband. In two short days we revisited New Orleans (Harrah's), NYC (New York, New York) and Hawaii (Mandalay Bay).

Around and around we walked in the August heat, marveling at how the places we had spent time and money traveling to could be so easily, and damn near accurately, replicated. Aside from the constant drone of slot machines and the smut being shoved into our hands, Vegas was everywhere we had ever been.

Craving replication is human nature. Replication is extremely comforting. So much so, we are constantly trying to replicate moments in our lives. Saving the top of a wedding cake for the first anniversary to try and recreate that special day. Anticipating the sequels to movies. Going to the same restaurant to hopefully repeat a fantastic meal. Watching old TV reruns to relive memories. Listening to the same song to evoke an emotion. This is what traditions are. Trying to replicate an original experience.

When Jim and I decided we were ready for a second child (and, boy howdy did feeling ready take a while) I had only one true concern: that the second child wouldn't measure up to our first.

I confessed to my husband that I was terrified to have a second child because our daughter was, in a sense, unbeatable. She is beautiful. Lion hearted. Silly. Verbal. Kind. Funny. And smart as hell. I feared that if the second child wasn't identical to our perfect, talkative brainiac, then I wouldn't feel as much love for it.

I needed to reproduce my first born.

But in the middle of all my concern that my second child wouldn't be as great as the original, Jim made a game-changing point. He reminded me of the night Lowery was conceived. To be reminded of that night, and all the horrific events that led up to it, always evokes a laugh from me.

Ten months of blood tests, vaginal ultrasounds and fertility medications led us to one specific night our doctor said we must obediently (and in a particular position and at a certain time) fornicate. But that night was the precipice of a strange series of unpredictable events. For starters, Jim had to undergo emergency dental surgery that would guarantee him excruciating pain and immense swelling for days. Also, my grandfather's health had taken a dramatic turn for the worse and we knew his time was coming to a close. Daily trips to the fertility doctor had me both hopeful (we were finally seeing results) and scared (please don't let our first chance to truly try for a child be when my husband or grandfather needed me the most). But, like all things in life you try to plan, everything came up at the most inopportune time. My husband had surgery late Monday afternoon. My grandfather's funeral was scheduled for Tuesday morning. And by 5 o'clock that night our window for conception would be officially closed.

We contemplated canceling the cycle and trying for the following month. When we explained the situation to my doctor, she very strongly urged us not to risk losing out on this chance. Plus, the money already invested in the endeavor was not easily ignored.

So, after a brutally sad and emotionally draining day at the funeral, and with my husband's face as swollen as Rocky, we had to follow the doctor's orders. Jim still insists that because of his state--drugged up on high potency narcotics--this wasn't entirely consensual.

But it was successful. And it made some truly awful lows in our life become one really fantastic high.

And yet, the second time around, having just decided we were ready to try again, and would call the fertility doctor the second we returned home from Vegas, we got pregnant with just the help of a little champagne.

This time, unquestionably consensual.

With my husband's reminder of our two vastly different conception stories, I realized there were actually aspects about my experience with my daughter I never want to replicate. For starters, I threw up multiple times a day from the minute I conceived Lowery, every day, up to and throughout labor. When I was pregnant with her, I was in the thick of my doctoral program--unequivocally the most stressful period in my life. I don't want to replicate her birth story--18 hours of labor and two hours of pushing. I don't want to replicate many other issues that followed Lowery's birth: breastfeeding, postpartum depression, constipation after an episiotomy.

Yes. There are things I don't want to relive.

But I've become so accustomed to my first child. She was born with her eyes open. She spoke early. She has a glorious (and inexplicable) mess of curly blonde hair. She's constantly getting praise from her teachers and strangers for her verbal skills, personality and eyelashes. She has changed the way I view myself. Her existence has been such a remarkable milestone in my life that I can't imagine another child could measure up to her, or have as profound an impact on me.

But the clues are already there that this second child won't be Lowery. No one could be. And I need to accept this. This unborn baby already has some points in its favor. Conceived easily and hasn't made me vomit once. A May due date will be a helluva lot less humid and miserable than Lowery's entrance in July. And perhaps this one won't talk in its sleep.

Though there's nothing quite as special as a first pregnancy with all the newness and anticipation, there is something that is making this pregnancy extremely unique. Last week my toddler came up to me as I was resting on the couch. She lifted my shirt, cupped her hands around my belly button and yelled: "Hi baby! I love you so much!"

So yes. No need to worry about replicating anything.

All I can really hope for is another one-of-a-kind.