Hump day, slump day...baby bump day?

I've been going through my stuff in preparation for my upcoming move, and it turns out I've been a bit of a pack rat over my last seven years in Provo. Among the relics I've discovered: the tights from my costume shown in the previous post, the receipt from the time I rented Zoolander (I have no problems with linking to my previous posts, Joey), some of my amazing song parodies that I've written for various ward talent shows and FHE musicals over the years, and a $5 bill in an old birthday card.

I also found a bunch of old floppy disks, containing most of the papers I wrote in my undergrad days. I got an external floppy drive from my brother and sister for my birthday (along with "Earl Weaver Baseball," because my siblings read my blog), so I've been able to look back and see how my writing has improved over the years (not much; I was really good back then too).

The paper I was most interested in finding was my final project from my folklore class--a collection of stories, songs, urban legends, traditions, etc., about sister missionaries. I chose this topic because I had a great centerpiece for it: a coworker had once told me the story of one of her mission companions having a baby while in the field. I've mentioned this story to several people recently (although I'm unsure if any of them read my blog) but couldn't remember all the details. Now, though, I have it again, so I think I'll post it here in it's entirety. It's long, though, so I think I'll serialize it.

Here, then, is part one of my former coworker Joni Miller's story (I wouldn't be surprised if Corina and Anna know Joni, but again, I don't know if they're among my readers). According to my paper, it was "transcribed from audio cassette with 'um's, pauses, and many 'like's, 'and so's, and 'anyway's removed."

"Okay, I was a missionary in Brazil. My second companion out in the field, there’s an interesting story about her, I guess you could say. I had only been out in the field for two months, I was a greenie with my American companion and my American companion left, so I was left with her, this new companion, and all other Brazilian Sisters [in her house].

"Every time I’d go out with her people would say, “Gee, you look pregnant” to her. She was a little bigger but nothing bad at all, and I’d always be defensive because, she sort of looked pregnant but, hello, she’s a sister missionary and I didn’t think anything of it, so I’d be like “No, she’s not” and get mad at the, sometimes I’d get mad and frustrated at the people in Brazil that would judge her.

"Anyway, so, one day we woke up and she, I remember her being really tired, and she stayed in bed, which is really rare for her because usually she’d get out of bed and study, and this day she didn’t she just studied in bed and she was sleeping so I thought man, she must be really sick. So she got up and she asked if she could borrow one of my skirts which I was fine with, and she, as we were leaving she was like “we’ve got to go call the doctor, because I feel really sick” so I was like “okay” and it was a common thing because she was sick before with the other sisters that she’d been companions with, sort of common for her to be sick but we thought nothing of it.

"Anyway, she, I thought it was because of the food because the food down there is really fatty, I guess, really sticks to you I guess. When she was leaving I remember walking out the door and I looked at my dress and I was like “Oh, man, she already sweated in my dress” because in Brazil you sweat all the time and little did I know that that was her water breaking.

"And so, we went and called the doctor, and she talked to the doctor and she told me, like, “okay, we have to go to the hospital,” and I didn’t think anything of it ‘cause that’s where the doctor was doing his rounds. When we went to the hospital we went to the maternity ward and I still didn’t think anything of it because I knew she was going to see a female, or a ob-gyn kind of doctor. So I was like “oh, no big deal”. And she was very adamant to tell me that lots of people stay in the maternity ward, even men. And I was like “okay, I don’t care” and so the doctor came and saw her and brought her into a room and I was hoping I could go in her room with her because I just wanted to hear what the doctor had to say but she wouldn’t let me.

"So anyway I stayed there for a while and the doctor came out and said “how do you know that girl?” And I was like, “well, she’s my friend.” And he said, “They’re getting her ready to have a baby.” And I was like, “No, no, no, no, you are wrong, because she’s not pregnant, you’re wrong” and he was like, okay, and he looked at me strangely and I was thinking maybe I’m wrong, so I went and I, I remember thinking well, maybe there’s a different word to the word gravida, which means pregnant.

"So I looked it up in my English-Portuguese dictionary and I saw that the only meaning was pregnant! So I was like what!? And so, the doctor came back and he talked to me in English and he said “Okay, we’re getting her ready to have a baby boy” in English and I was like whoa and I’m like “no, no, no, no” and right then, like, what goes through your mind, like call the mission president, and then like, it was a mistake, like maybe the doctor’s wrong, maybe she’s wrong like, maybe she didn’t know it’s like Jerry Springer or Ricki Lake.

"And so, I said “Can I talk to her?” And he said “Yeah, come into her room.” So I walked to the room and as soon as we got to the room she ripped open the door and she’s like, she’s dressed and she’s runnin’ out and she grabbed me by the arm and she was pulling me out of the hospital and screaming “This doctor’s crazy, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” all this stuff, and I in my broken Portuguese was like, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sorry” to everyone because she’s making this big scene in the hospital.

"So we left the hospital and I’m freaked out because I don’t know if everybody in, like all the doctors lie and stuff like that, or if the doctors aren’t smart enough or if my companion’s lying, so I’m really confused."

I'm going to take a pregnant pause here (ha!), but I'll post more of the story tomorrow.