The one with the early years

Once upon a time, in the year 1991, my mom and dad held hands a lot.

They were dreaming of expanding their little family. But no matter how tightly or how often they held hands, their dream didn’t come true. Eventually, after applying lotion to soothe the burns from all that handholding, they decided it was time to seek professional help.

They visited a local shaman, famous for helping other handholding couples. Unfortunately for my mom and dad, the shaman wasn’t having his best day. Earlier that morning, he’d bumped his head on a bus handlebar and caught a nasty flu. Dizzy and distracted, the shaman muddled his incantations badly. Not one, not two, but three babies were made that day!

As the news sank in, my mom and dad spent the next nine months bracing for Ragnarok—the end of life as they knew it—surely about to rain down on their tiny island of Amager. They decided to move to a bigger house to prepare for the arrival of the unexpected trio. My dad built a set of side-by-side bunk beds, and my mom painted the walls with scenes from The Jungle Book.

With fingers, toes, arms, and legs crossed, they plunged into parenthood.

But as they soon learned, even the best-laid plans couldn’t hold back Murphy’s Law. No more than two years into their battle to protect their sanity from the terrorizing triplets, my mom and dad parted ways.

My dad quickly found a new handholding partner, and before long, they decided to chain up. Rings of metal appeared on their fingers, sealing the deal.

Meanwhile, my siblings and I spent most of our time with my mom, living in the house she and my dad had once shared.

Right before I turned six, my mom met my stepdad and moved into his cozy wooden lair of luxury.