Farewell Poppy... Welcome Hugo.

Poppy... Who are you?

For nine months, we called it Poppy. It started with the idea that the little cluster of cells that would slowly turn into a baby was probably the size of a poppy seed when we found out and it stuck through the whole pregnancy.

We weren't planning on finding out the gender of our baby so calling it Poppy allowed us to identify with the growing bulge in my belly and call it something more affectionate than... well... it.
Over time, we developed a relationship with the mysterious being growing inside me. One that I could keep to myself, like when I smiled inwardly, feeling little kicks, while pretending to listen to the conversations around me or share, like when I invited a friend to place their hands on the shifting bump visibly distorting my otherwise perfectly round stomach. Our connection was impossibly intimate and mostly private until one Sunday morning in March, when a little boy emerged from the water and with his arrival, signaled the time to farewell Poppy.

We named him Hugo, a name that immediately became intrinsically linked with this little person we were meeting for the first time. While Poppy represented all possibilities, Hugo is the one and only combination created on that fateful day in June. His hair, not black or blond but light with a hint of red, his eyes still slate grey - their true color to be revealed later, his long feet and skinny calves, his small nose, like a button above a delicately drawn mouth.

Every so often, I have to stop myself from calling him Poppy and for a fraction of a second, my mind goes blank searching for his name... Hugo. We are still getting to know each other, after all.

Like a whisper, Poppy dissolved into thin air when Hugo, a little bundle of flesh and blood came to claim his rightful place into our arms and the world. For nine months, we imagined every possibility and in an instant, Hugo, at once new and  entirely familiar proved to be so much more than we could ever imagine.

He is beautiful and he is ours but above all, he is entirely himself and that is so incredibly exciting!