Maybe she's born with it, maybe it's....totally not what I think.

She's probably my age. Over 40. She is heavily pregnant, on the hottest week of the last 6 years here in Zurich, and she's walking along the sidewalk holding hands with a 3 1/2 year old on one side and a 2 year old on the other. She's sort of smiling. No one is screaming. She's wearing skinny pregnancy jeans.

And suddenly all the little props I've given myself this last week, for keeping two kids basically hydrated and safe from sunburn, and a dog away from heat exhaustion, kind of seem little. Small. Ridiculous. How does she do it? How does anyone with more than 2 kids do it? How am I so lost with my paltry two children and measly 25% work?

Luckily, the next thing that comes to mind is the conversation from the other day with a mom of two from our daycare. And her story of one preemie and both kids being born within an hour (one, single, 60 minute hour) of the start of her contractions. Her good memories of birth. Her story that once again brought to mind how silly words are. She's given birth and I've given birth. To two kids each, roughly at the same time in history, and in the same place. Yet there are oceans and mountains of difference between our experiences. To the point where you almost shouldn't call them by the same term. Or at least we should start inventing a multitude of terms for "birth", to distinguish all the varieties it takes on - varieties of happy and sad, joyous and disappointing or scary, long or short, easy or hard. Why do we use just that one word?

And this brings me to remember comments I've gotten about birth and pregnancy and motherhood. The women who sound upset that my second child is so young and yet I've got no extra weight to speak of. I know that tone - it takes up a lot of time in my head, that "how come you got that and I didn't?" feeling. And if we don't have much time to talk, they don't know that I'm on antidepressants, on part time work, that I didn't eat milk products or onions or garlic for 4 months after my second was born. They don't know that the choices I've made are mostly due to fear - of not sleeping because my baby's tummy is upset, of being desolate and depressed, of having back pain. So I should be assuming that behind every smiling parent pushing a twin stroller is a story as well, instead of berating myself for being less than because I've seen the perfect moment by chance.