A Missed Post... see note.

NOTE:  I just found this, unpublished, in my drafts.  No idea why it didn't get published then.  I suppose I thought it wasn't finished and then forgot to get back to it.  No idea how I would have completed it, so I'm posting it now (You, December, are over 15 months old now.) on the date it was originally saved as.

Hi.

By the time you read this, there is so much that you will be taking for granted that I am only just now wrapping my head around... like the most basic fact that I am your father.

This time yesterday you were still very much an abstraction. 

You, as I am confident you will know, were not part of the plan.  I've said it a dozen times now that if a person was to pick the day they were to find out that they were going to be a parent, you would never pick a day in the first week after moving into a new one bedroom apartment with your partner.  But just because you weren't part of the plan doesn't mean that you aren't now, or aren't already cherished - your Mother is a different person when talking about you, and you aren't even born yet.
We were very deliberate about making sure we wanted you in our lives.  About four weeks ago, just before the Vancouver 2010 Olympics - which I suspect are always going to be connected our memories as being a part of our lives with you, your Mom and I, after weeks of consideration stood together under Burrard Bridge and I said something that we both already knew, but had yet to actually say out loud to one another.
"We're going to do this, aren't we?"
"Yes.  Yes, we are."
We hugged each other and kissed, and that was that.

But still it didn't quite seem real to me.  Despite all the pregnancy symptoms that your Mom is going through, it could have been confused with an unfortunately timed illness.  Of course I knew the truth, but it was hard to really wrap my head around.

Yesterday afternoon was the first time you really felt like a reality.  It was the first ultrasound.

The technician put the wand down on your Mom's belly and swooped it left only the tiniest amount and, bang - there you were.  Face to face for the first time.  I hadn't expected that she'd find you on the very first try - that may have been naive.
You are going to have to forgive me this, it's a sentiment I've heard ad nauseum in my life.  While imagination can come close, there is in fact no way of understanding such a moment until you've lived it.

There you were, my child.  Our child.  No idea whether you are a boy or a girl; whether you have your Mom's icy-blue eyes, or my so-brown-they're-nearly-black?  To quote from Firefly - "I wonder who is in there?"  But none of that really matters.  There you were.  Undeniably real.