My weirdest Christmas: I spent three hours in a car with a screaming baby - and she completely changed my life

Just days before Christmas in 2018, I took a flight from New York City to visit my family in southern Italy. My wife, Elvira, and daughter Caroline had moved to a small town in the countryside a few years earlier, and I planned in due course to join the festivities permanently. ‘This was going to be my first Christmas as a grandfather’ … Bob with his daughter, granddaughter and wife in Florence.Composite: Guardian Design; handout I’d made the trip before, once or twice a year since they moved, mainly to get the lay of the land. But this time was different. Caroline had recently had her first child and our first grandchild. And now, after making do with photos and videos, I was finally going to meet Lucia Antonia, all of 11 weeks old. Rarely in my life had I felt more giddy about an encounter in the offing. Coming out of the airport, I spotted Caroline, cradling the baby in her arms. “Hello, Lucia,” I said, reaching out to take her tiny hands in mine. “I’m Grandpa. I’m thrilled to meet you.” So far, so good, I thought. Except we all then got in the car for the 134-mile drive to our houses in Guardian Sanframondi, an ancient town of 4,700 residents perched on a hillside in the Campagna region. And Lucia immediately started crying. Hard. For the next hour. We stopped for lunch at a roadside restaurant, where Lucia took a breather. But once we buckled her back in her seat, she resumed crying, only more intensely now. She wailed like an ambulance siren, her eyes crinkled shut, tears streaming down her cheeks, gasping between sobs. All the while, Caroline cooed to Lucia in a tender singsong voice, trying to soothe her. “We’ll be home soon, baby,” she said. “Then you can go right in your crib and feel better.” My son-in-law Vito did the same from behind the wheel, but to no avail. Lucia kept squalling away for another hour, her lungs billowing like bellows. As we neared our destination, after almost three hours en route, Lucia reached a crescendo, her decibel level almost operatic. “I’m so sorry, Dad,” Caroline said from the back seat. “Lucia must be making quite a first impression. Are you sorry you came?” “No,” I said. “Why would I be sorry? I’m listening to our first grandchild. I can imagine no sound in the world more beautiful.” And I meant it. Naturally, I was sorry Lucia was upset. Maybe she was hungry or thirsty or felt stifled strapped into her seat. But this much I knew: babies cry. And may cry no matter what you do. I assumed Lucia had her reasons. By then, even though we’d just met, I already had some history with Lucia. Seven weeks before her birth, we’d seen her image on a sonogram. She was floating in utero, all three pounds of her, ensconced in her amniotic castle. We heard her heartbeat thump away, too. My wife...

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