The first I knew of Andrew being born was the sound of his voice; a brief cry that said, "What's going on?"

With that one sound, everything changed. The bond I felt was instantaneous. As had happened before with Alexander and with Nolan, that very first sound put all kinds of puzzle pieces into place: the fact of his being alive; the fact of his being mine; the fact of his being a part of me and my life; the fact of my love for him. I know it all can sound so mushy, but it wasn't, entirely. On the one hand, it was simply "these are the facts": Andrew was here. But, yes, on the other hand, the emotions were here, too.

One of the medical staff asked, "Does he look like your other boys?" I wasn't sure how to answer. The best I could come up with at the time was, "He looks like... him. He looks like Andrew."

But after a little while -- after my brain could process what was going on -- I realized that, in fact, he bears an uncanny resemblance to the way his brothers looked on they day they were born. I mean, besides being all purple and squishy. Their body types are similar, and their faces are *remarkably* similar.

Take a scroll through the pictures of Alex when he was three and younger, and then scroll through the photos of Nolan, and you'll notice how remarkably similar they look(ed). Look at the baby photos and compare them to Andrew's. Yeah, I guess they do look alike. [Note: Alexander and Nolan used to have separate pages; I have since combined them, for various reasons, into one page for all three of the boys. --AGR 2/18/2009]

There are some notable differences: Andrew was born with a lot more hair on his head than Nolan (and, perhaps a wee bit more than Alex, as well), and his feet are not as big as Alex's. Andrew's birth weight is almost exactly halfway between Alex's and Nolan's, but there's also a sense that this guy is likely to give Nolan a run for his money in the size department when all is said and done.

He's a big kid, but not tubby. He's well proportioned, and his apgars were excellent. This kid is as healthy as newborns come.

So, while phoning everyone to tell them the news, everything could be pretty much summed up by the lines, "He's healthy, and Paulette's doing well, and the event was as about as by-the-numbers as they come." But I wanted to say so much more than that. It seems like the fact that Andrew was as healthy as he was and that Paulette came through as well as she did demands more, and says more. It certainly fills up my heart more than that sentiment implies. But, alas, it only takes up one sentence when converted into words.

Speaking of words... let's talk about names.

"Andrew" was the leading contender to be Baby 2.0's name until near the very end, when we switched to "Nolan" for various reasons. This time around, we kinda threw out the rule book. The only two rules that really stayed with us were: 1) the name be relatively easy to spell, and 2) the name not be particularly career limiting. While I must admit that Barak Obama is proving that names may not be as career limiting as I'd once suspected, I still think it unlikely that we will ever elect a President "Moon-Unit" or "Lemonjello".

That said, "Andrew" instantly became our de facto choice for first name, but the middle name remained something of a challenge. With Alex and Nolan, we chose middle names that commemorated Americans we particularly admire. Several others we admire (such as Abraham Lincoln) have names that don't quite scan well between "Andrew" and "Rousselle", or sound a bit more pretentious than we would prefer. The trick is to pick a name that evokes someone admirable and thereby augments Andrew's name, but without hijacking his name.

In the end, we selected "James" because we like the name, it scans well as part of Andrew's full name, and it serves as a tip of the hat to James Madison, principal author of the Constitution of the United States -- one of the most amazing documents ever written -- and the Bill of Rights, which is far too overlooked by today's political parties. He was a champion of checks and balances in our government, which may well be the saving grace of our nation.

But, enough about James Madison. Here's to Andrew James Rousselle... an American original!

(Incidentally, this picture shows Andrew in the arms of his grandmother, while being surrounded by his older brothers.)