The
babies came one after the other in my family, six in eight years’ time,
then a miscarriage, a seventh, and finally a dire medical warning: An
eighth child might leave the rest without the young woman who had
brought us into this world. My mother went to her general practitioner
first, then the Roman Catholic bishop. The doctor said stop. The cleric
said shame if you do.
In
our neighborhood, we were the small family, at least among the Irish
and Italians. A few doors down, there were 12 kids in one house, 14 in
another. We could almost field a full baseball team. But the Flynns,
they could put an entire football lineup on a snowy field at
Thanksgiving, with reserves.