Baby Boom

I went to visit my mom in the hospital today.  She tired out quickly but I told my dad that I wouldn't be home for at least another hour.  Sometimes it's best that we aren't in the same house, no matter how big it is. 
So I had time to waste.  Wandering around hospitals is not easy.  A lot of doors are locked and some floors have restricted access.  I'm not sure how, but I did pass Emergency, Intensive Care, NICU, Oncology, etc.  And I found myself where the newborn babies are.  It isn't like the movies where the hospital is like a zoo for babies and you can peer through the glass window into the incubator room where they keep the babies in individual fish tanks.  I only found myself in the waiting room.  Families were there.  Waiting anxiously for the newest member to join them. Some families were chatting in chipper voices, others looked much more nervous.  I thought about the child that was being born as I was waiting there. 
What was each one of these children entering?  Probably not all of them would be entering a happy family.  And each one of those children would experience pain.  Maybe one of the kids were born to a family only later to be taken away to be sent around from foster home to foster home.  Maybe some of these children will find themselves without a father figure because he couldn't handle the added stress of an infant. Maybe, like me, one of those children will find themselves back in the hospital much to often, to say goodbye to friends, family, to visit with their mother, or to get better themselves.  
The children were born to the world today, now susceptible to the pains.  They have no idea what is happening and already they could be suffering.  That child that was born does not deserve to have to come back here in seven years to receive radiation therapy.  A child that was born in that hospital today does not deserve to have to hear their parents fight every night, or watch their mother suffer abuse from their father.  
I realize that it is possible that these children may not experience hardship early in life, not as children.  They may not experience a funeral until they have graduated highschool, They might have parents who love them and grandparents who spoil them.  Their lives could be great and they could be happy.
But at some point, every child born in that hospital today is going to see things and at times they will hate the world.  They will hate that they were brought into this mess. 
But one of the children born in that building today will make a difference in the world. Maybe small or large, to better the world or hinder it.  They will take their experiences and change the world, it will be different because they were born today.


My mother is doing fine, if you were wondering. She will probably come home next week.  Something is wrong with her, we just aren't 100% sure what it is yet.