By Gregory Clark, May 2, 1931.
The new room for expectant fathers at the Private Patients’ Pavilion of the General hospital in Toronto is a smart little room containing three chairs and a prim settee, big enough for two to sit on. As if two expectant fathers would ever want to sit that close together!
The room has no pictures in it. It has only a mirror, in which the fathers may inspect their haggard faces. A few nice cheering pictures such as “Napoleon in Hades” or “Dante, the Smoke Inspector” would be a gracious thing to hang in this room.
Some six years ago1, The Star Weekly suggested to the General hospital that in planning its new pavilion it should include a cinder track and a small dressing room well supplied with running shorts, for the use of expectant fathers, so that during their hours of suspense they might consume the time humanely by running fiercely around and around the track. The General hospital has ignored the suggestion, and has given us instead a little stylish sitting room with a mirror and chairs so comfortable that the only thing the fathers can do is sit and listen to the hollow beating of their hearts.
The least they could do would be to provide private rooms, or at least little cubicles or alcoves, so that each father might be secluded alone with his fright and terror.
When you arrive at the hospital, breathless and scared, you are shown into this little club room by a kindly and reassuring Head. She has not much time for you, but she pats you on the back (nearly every man is about the right size to pat on the back when he is about to become a father!) and thrusts you into the room and tells you it won’t be long.
Thank your stars if the room is empty.
But if it is a club room, heaven help you. Man is a gregarious creature. He loves the company of his fellow man. Especially in time of trouble or danger, does he crave the companionship of other men, and braver men.
But strange, in this trouble, which seems the greatest trouble a man can meet, the sight of other men fills him with loathing and bitterness.
I have often been chased by a bull when I chanced to cross a corner of a field which held both my trout streams and his wives. And I am sure if I had had horns I would have chased the three forlorn looking objects out of the waiting room the morning I was recently ushered into it.
Sitting over by the window was a young man, a mere stripling, and it was sheer bumptiousness and conceit on his part to assume to be a father. I disliked him the moment I set eyes on him. He had a white, long face, and his lower lip looked as if it might tremble any minute. And he sat staring at nothing, and seemed to be listening.
In the double settee sat a tall, haggard man who looked as if he might have two or three children already, but it didn’t make any difference to him. He sat forward, his elbows on his knees, and slowly, slowly, he rubbed his palms hard against his gaunt cheeks.
In the third chair lay back a stout little man, and he shaded his eyes with his hand. He was motionless. He did not move a lip or a finger tip. I had to stoop down and tuck in a shoe lace in order to see that his eyes were wide open and unblinking. If he had been asleep, I was about to do something to awaken him.
I sat down in the fourth chair and glared belligerently around at them. But they did not raise their eyes. For them, I was not in the room.
I cleared my throat as a warning to them in case any of them might dare to speak.
But they looked as if they would never speak again.
Out in the hall the feet of hurrying nurses passed and repassed. And at every footstep the young chap at the window half rose from his chair and raised terrified eyes to the door. But no nurses came in.
The tall, bony man rubbed his palms slowly and interminably up and down his cheeks. Apparently he had not shaved overnight, for presently I heard a faint and most irritating rasping sound.
The small man slumped down in his chair and did not even blink. I felt like demanding that he blink. I blinked several times for him, to relieve the strain.
The tiny voice of a baby wailed somewhere in the hall outside. And we all ceased breathing. I thought the young kid at the window might never breathe again.
He turned his tired face to look out the window and his lips moved as if he were speaking. Maybe he was promising God something.
I wondered how long the others had been sitting here. Then there came sharp footsteps approaching and into our midst walked a stout, sandy man very well dressed, with loud tie and loud handkerchief to match. He grinned around at us. None of us saw him.
“Well, gentlemen,” he said in a jolly voice, “don’t let it get on your nerves.”
None of us paid the slightest attention, except the young chap, who got up eagerly and said, “Have a chair, sir.”
The ruddy man sat down at once, clapped his hands like a commercial man sitting down in a Pullman smoker, all prepared to start the discussion.
“Ah,” said he. “Well, here we are again! Fifth time for me! Getting to be a habit. I would be at the office if it weren’t that I expect to be seeing my new one in half an hour or so. Ha, ha!”
The young chap stood for a moment looking down at this sturdy monster and then suddenly walked out of the room. I could see him passing and repassing the door as he marched the corridor.
The ruddy one stared around at the rest of us, with a look of pity on his face. He sighed heartily. Just to show he had the last word, he took out a cigarette and a morning paper and ignored us.
How glad we were! The lank man continued to rub his jaws, and the short man to lie back with shaded and unblinking eyes.
A smiling nurse appeared at the door. She crooked her finger at the tall, gaunt man. He nearly fell over as he leaped up, his mouth open, unable to ask the question.
“Girl,” I heard the nurse say with a gulp. So I knew that lonely big bony man wanted a girl. Or maybe his wife did.
Hardly had the door cleared before another nurse appeared with that look on her face, and she stooped over the small man shading his eyes. The nurse nodded. Her white cap was like a flame in the heavens. The little man rose tremblingly. His mouth. worked and he turned his face from us as he blindly followed the nurse out of the room.
Then the young kid appeared at the door. His white face was damp. He looked at me beseechingly, as if I knew the answer to his question. He hovered in the door. Why do some fellows want to be fathers at that age?
I winked at him, and he thanked me with his eyes for that wink. He put his hands together when he sat down, and squeezed his arms between his knees.
Then another nurse bounced in. Just bounced. Maybe she was the young kid’s sister, but she just leaped across to him, they met in mid-air, she seized his elbows and the two of them bounced out of the room without a sound or a word. I wish I knew if it was a boy or a girl. Not that it matters. But that young kid of a man deserved a boy. I mean, he would give some little boy a wonderful time. I wouldn’t doubt he had miniature hockey sticks and cricket pads and boxing gloves all ready in the rumble seat of his roadster waiting out on University Avenue. I don’t even know if he had a roadster. But he was that kind of a kid. Whatever came to him, he was waiting for it!
Now the ruddy man behind the morning paper was alone with me. He lowered the paper and looked at me. I rose and walked out towards the hall. I wanted no conversation.
In the hall I met my sister. A minute later I met a cousin of mine who is interne on this marvellous floor. He had just come from headquarters of the Stork. He held out his hand and announced that I was now a mother, for I had a daughter.
And as we marched like an army with banners up the corridor, the ruddy man was standing forlornly in the waiting room door.
His half hour was up. And now he was to do overtime.
Alone.
Editor’s Note: This is another story regarding the birth of Greg’s daughter Elizabeth, who was born on April 9, 1931. You can read about her coming home here. She was the last surviving child of Greg. She passed away recently, on December 29, 2025 at the age of ninety-four.
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