My brother was born when I was almost three. I don't remember my Mom being pregnant, but I remember when she went to the hospital to have him. We drove down a road with a field of mowed grass on one side and a row of tall hedges grown over a chain link fence on the other. The hospital was on the right - the side with the big grassy area but beyond it. Industrial tan brick, aluminum, cement and plate glass.

My sister and I stood on that lawn and waived at my Mom in her room. I got the distinct impression that she found peace in the isolation of her room. I think she believed there was something delicious and tentative in the place between the time when her two children were not allowed access to her and the time when there would be another that demanded her every second of the day.

The rest . . . well you'd have to have been there. It was a battle between protection, enforcement and judicious protocol in order to gain autonomy. All from a couple of pre-school girls.