The vibrant moment of light traveling from a universe birthed in the belly of Mama

The rush of heater air through the house vents. The static white noise from the baby monitor. Random swoosh of cars and trucks passing on Highway 1. The creeking joints of the old cat shuffling past my chair.

It's the comforting stillness of pre-dawn family that links the frantically busy days for me, giving them tinker-toy structure where there otherwise would be none. Allowing me to feel my think after too many mind-numbing synaptical transactions.

The physics of this is even simpler yet more ambiguous than it seems, the fact time is relative from moment to moment, seeping beyond and within the linear construct we give it. So much life in so little space like tidal pools we miss under the rush of seas.

These moments are vibrant, like light traveling from a universe birthed millions of years ago -- and they are cruel, like earthquakes killing tens of thousands of impoverished people (find out how to help here).

And they are loving moments of mindful presence, fossils of the heart -- like the moment we met, the world we've seen, and the Bea we conceived.

We took two pregnancy test before this last Christmas: the first was negative, the second positive. We left the second one out like we did the first time with Beatrice, just to ensure that it wasn't an illusion.

But definitely no illusion with the intense punctuated moments of nausea over the holidays and the past couple of weeks, and that was just me (rim shot, please).

Then the pièce de résistance -- the first prenatal visit and sonogram on Thursday -- the vibrant moment of light traveling from a universe birthed in the belly of Mama.

A new universe call Bryce, arriving on earth August 2010.