Baby!

Not long ago my wife and I were blessed with a baby.  A beautiful, healthy, little girl.  Our lives are joyously forever changed. 

It’s amazing how delicate the whole thing is.  Two tiny cells come together, and start dividing, and dividing, and specializing, and then they become organs, and those organs start functioning, and then…she came out with all her countless complexities working just fine.  How does that happen?  And then, after she is born, she’s totally dependent on us for everything.  For nutrition, and warmth, and care, and protection…everything.  She’s so delicate.  I feel as if the whole thing could go wrong at any point, and that it hasn’t so far is an absolute miracle. 

I recently heard a sports commentator say that having a child is something that unites all people, in all lands, across all times.  It’s just something you don’t understand until you experience it first-hand.  And when you do, you see how hard it is – how crazy it is! – and then you realize that it’s something that every single parent in human history has experienced.  There’s not a lot out there that unites everyone. 

I keep thinking about those ancient humans, wondering through fields or mountains or deserts, without the comforts of 21^st century America – how did they do it?  How did they struggle so hard for simple survival and take care of little ones?  How did we, as a race, survive? 

Maybe my daughter isn’t so delicate?  Maybe humanity is stronger than I think?  No…she’s pretty tiny, and pretty helpless.  Beautiful, but totally helpless. 

I also think about the baby Jesus, being just as dependent on his parents as my daughter is on my wife and me.  That God humbled Himself to become a human is something I’ve tried to understand; that He became an infant is something I never even thought about until just now.  I got that there was supposed to be a connection between God and me though Christ, but right now, I think, I feel a certain connection to Mary and Joseph, a connection that has caught me off-guard, and one that has brought me even closer to the divine. 

For the birth of my child, and for all children – Thanks be to God!

Take 5

I’ve noticed that I only tend to write when things aren’t going well or when I’m terribly stressed.  I don’t know why – I wish that weren’t the case – but the truth is, I think, that I use writing as an outlet to distract me and my emotions.  I don’t necessarily write about stress or about hardships in my life…I write about nature or religion or medicine or surgery or whatever happens to strike my fancy that day.   I should say more clearly that I don’t overtly write about my life, but if you happen to know me and happen to know what’s going on, then I suppose it’s not too difficult to connect the dots between anything I’ve ever written and my life.  Hell, there are only so many possibilities. 

Writing, for me, is kind of like running – I feel much better afterwards than I do during it.  And so when life is going well, I tend to not put the effort into writing.  I guess I get lazy. 

So here I am, out of shape, wanting to get back into the game.  Not because I was ever particularly good at it, but rather because, in a very real sense, I know that I need it.  And I need it as much as when I’m happy as when I’m sad. 

And so let’s be clear – I am very happy, and very stressed.  I’m tired of people telling me how terribly stressed I look, how much more gray my hair is, how sunken my eyes are.  I drink more coffee than I ever have, and I get more heartburn than ever before…I’m never far from my stash of Tums. 

And why?  Why now?  It’s not because of anything particular, and not because of anything anyone has done to me…it’s just my life.  I just need to complain.  I realize my issues may pale in comparison to yours, or somebody else’s – I get that in the spectrum of humanity I really have no business to complain at all.  I get it.  But I also just need 5 minutes, then I’ll shut up and write about happy things.  Promise. 

You see there is this pesky thing called oral boards that is the culmination of the last seven years of my professional life, and it’s beginning to weigh on me.  It’s less than two weeks away, and it’s pretty intimidating.  It’s kind of freaking me out.  I’m supposed to know everything and talk my way through it.  And then there is the job hunt that should be much further along than it is – it’s really not going well.  And the prospect of having to find a real job, and move, and get a house, and start new schools for the kids, and a new job for my wife, and hope it all works out…it’s just kind of bad timing right now.  And trying to be a good husband and father to a child and a brand new baby through this all is not very easy either.  I often feel like a terrible husband and father, not because I do anything bad but because I have so little time and energy to do all the good things I’m supposed to do.  And it makes me feel terrible, and inadequate.  And then when I’m at work I’m taking care of the sickest people in the whole damn hospital, and somehow I’m supposed to be doing that with compassion and a smile and not mess up even though I’m terribly distracted.  And sometimes it all seems like a too damn much. 

That felt good.  So that’s all, I complained…and I’m done.  Thanks for listening. 

I can do this – I can do all of this, I know I can.  Heck, I know I will.  I just need the occasional pat on the back, the occasional reassurance, the subtle compliment.  In the absence of that, I just need vent and let it go.

Grace under pressure…that’s what a good goalie is, that’s what a good trauma surgeon is.  I’m ready!