Happy Birthday, Daniel

March 10, 1963, a particularly interesting day for me. For one thing, I was in a comfy warm bed with competent a doctor at my side, well, at my end. Ron had taken me to the St Cloud hospital in the middle of the night and when I wasn’t in a rush to produce, he went home to check on our older children - thirteen, twelve and ten years old - alone in the country. Fathers were sent to the waiting room in those days but he was not pleased to sit around drinking coffee. He was more than a bit concerned about his creative and active kids left on their own and he paced. He was reasonably confident of my birthing expertise but he had to get out and get a smoke.
And honestly, he was less confident about his very pregnant Irish Setter, Daisy, because the Minnesota weather had turned bitter cold as it is wont to do in the middle of March. Imagine for a moment the sub zero temperature and an animal, even though adjusted to outdoor living, bulky with a body swollen ready to deliver her first litter. She had to be fed and watered regularly and supplied with clean straw in which to burrow. Her body was cumbersome so she was not agile. He was really worried. She was anxious the day before and he wanted to make sure she would get along all right.

Turned out she got along better than all right. Ron opened the front door to find Daisy and her very wet, recently delivered puppies, all lively and healthy on the foot-wipe rug just inside. Mike explained he had froze his fingers when he went out to feed her. Being sensibly endowed with human compassion he brought her inside before she birthed to be safe and warm. Him, too.
Ron apologetically explained the mess when he returned to find I had expelled our fourth child, our third son. It was a doubly eventful day. We joyfully recalled the experience on the anniversary for years after. I still do. Happy Birthday, Daniel Albert Sherer.
Naomi Sherer