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The 1970's Baby Book Drama in a Thrift Store

So I was at D.I., our local charitable thrift store, perusing the books. I often do. It's so rewarding to find lightly used books that look brand new for only fifty cents a piece.

I happened upon a teeny-tiny pink book, small enough it could fit into a suit pocket or a purse. At first I thought it was just an old book of poems, but upon studying it closer, I found out it was an expectant mother's pregnancy journal, kept by a young woman in 1970. My mother and father were only born few years before, so I was particularly intrigued--this book was journaled by a woman my grandparents' age as she anticipated the birth of her first child.

Some of the poems included made me laugh and still seem quite relevant:






And these two pages made me feel so connected to that mother from five decades ago (p.s. I didn't keep the personal information like names written in the front because that would be weird and it wasn't my place. But I thought this info was sweet and time-period-esque so I photographed it) :





I enjoyed the beautiful handwriting, the detail, the comparisons I made to my own pregnancy with my own first child last year.

And then, it hit me in the oddest way a few moments later... The woman that kept this journal no longer has it. It's here. It's here in the D.I. and not on her bookshelf. If she wrote this in 1970 and it's just now showing up here...

I'll never know, but I started to wonder. Did she pass away? Were her grown-up kids cleaning out her library, and in their grief and exhaustion, pass this carefully kept little book? What happened to her? What happened to her... Are they okay... are they okay...?

Again, I'll never know. But I'll be honest, I got a little weepy for wondering. Somebody mighta coulda probably lost their gran. Their mom. Their wife. The dear woman who, in her excitement and anticipation and joy, was expecting a baby girl in 1970 and wrote all about it.

So if you saw me teary-eyed in the book section of the thrift store two weeks ago, welp, now you know why.

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