I’ve started reading "What to Expect When You’re Expecting". Although the book claims to be for expectant fathers as well, I can’t believe how much of this book is dedicated to caring for and explaining the changes that are happening to one’s nipples. I can’t say that I find this to be overly relevant to my situation.

But it is fascinating, and alarming, to explore the mutations that pregnancy visits upon a woman’s body. It’s like a Victorian horror story, teeming with corporal mortification and oozing with humanity. The chafing, the bloating, the gas, the hair, the varicose veins, the mucus, the nausea, the saliva, the sweat. And I'm not even to the part about the delivery yet!

Don’t get me wrong. It’s a beautiful thing, and I’m not being glib when I say that I would gladly undertake similar alterations if I could carry the baby myself. I know that is a cliché that husbands have said for millennia, safe from having to make good on their claim because of the limitations of science and creation. Perhaps someday “Junior” – not Arnold’s best work – will not only be a travesty of filmmaking, but also a technological reality. Presumably by then my childbearing days will be behind me. But future generations of fathers should be careful what they wish for.