Naming and Becoming: Birth

Isaiah--March 23, 2010

Waddling down the hospital hall,  I feel the muscles round my protuberant belly tighten, squeeze until the pressure wraps round my back and I think the baby will just pop through my white, blue-veined skin—“hee, hee, hoo . . . hee, hee, hoo . . . hee, hee, hoo . . . .” The squeezing lessens, fades, and I straighten, waddle towards room 119, the birthing room—the get-this-baby-OUT-NOW room.

And this baby’s been floating too long, 40 weeks and 8 days too long, just like his brothers, and I want to see if he’s brown like Josiah, like me, or blonde and blue-eyed like Micah, like Jon.

I hear light, athletic steps in hall behind me, Jon running in from parking red mini-van.  Knowing better than to touch me he says, “which room?” I point to 119 and he walks beside me the last couple steps. Inside 119, I lean against the cool, metal bed-arm, breathing through another contraction squeezing that baby down. A blur of blue enters room, walks to bed and says,

“When you finish this one, Hun, get in bed and I’ll check you.” I nod between hee, hee, hoos and focus on nurse’s fingers as she slips on rubber gloves, one pencil-finger at a time. Then as I roll my whale-ish self into hard, slanted bed, nurse moves to check baby’s progress into this world. Nurse’s head pops up quickly from bed end, walks to door, yells down hall:

“We’re complete in here! Get the doctor!” And nurse asks me, “Were you planning on an epidural?” I shake my head “no.”

Jon relaxed-laughs: “She was at the gym an hour ago, just had to finish that work out! We almost didn’t make it in time!”

And my belly tightens, and it’s all a rainbow of colors and voices. Doc is in surgery and can’t make it. Nurse velcro’s a monitor on my arm, feels arm for a vein--I’ve got plenty, big and blue, just like my mother’s. But there’s no time to poke needle in vein. Baby’s coming. I’m gonna push. I’m gonna push. A doctor comes, not my doctor, and I push and push and it hurts, the ring of fire, the curse of Eve—why did she eat that apple!? Fire and burn, and tingling in my face, arms, legs, and the thump, thump of baby’s heart pounding in my brain. Then a scream, not my scream. And he’s on my belly, all white and slippery and rooting, and he’s blondish and big, like Jon, like Micah.

“What’s his name?” says nurse in blue.

“Isaiah.”

Isaiah, his name, and it means “the Lord is salvation.”  

As I caress white-ish skin, slick with birth-water, I wonder:  Will he live his name?  Will he know the Lord’s salvation? Isaiah.  

And in the dim light of birthing room, naming happens, like Adam naming in the garden, we name our son.

And with the naming, the becoming begins.

Making He/She, We

Nine years ago today we said “I do,”
our he/she began melding into we.
Nine years ago we declared:
“I love thee freely, I love thee purely,
with all the breath, smiles, tears of all my life!”

Yet we learned--
the course of true love never did run smooth,
You said, “It’s ten minutes to everywhere!”
I protested, “We’re late for everything!”
I suggested, “How bout some hummus?”
You laughed, “Hummus, shmummus, bummus!”
You said, “Let’s read Ephesians before we doze.”
I said, “Ok . . . ” yawning,  drifting to repose.
You said, “I’ll be a trader-discipler.”
I said, “A what? Seminary was? . . . I do not concur!”

And God looked down and said,
“What fools these mortals be!”  
Me trying to stay she.
You trying to stay he.
This he/she melding into we—how can it be?

We asked: “How do I love thee?”
Embracing your he!
Accepting my she!
Loving our very own
We.

Making together–love, we-love
an ever-fixed mark that
looks on tempests and is never
Shaken.

Making together-love, we-love
strong as death
fierce as the grave
Unquenchable.

And I said:
“Follow your dreams,
And I’ll follow you,
Wherever.
Whenever.
However.”

And you suggested:
“Macbeth is playing in the park—
Out! Out! Damn Spot!—
Let’s see it,
under the stars,
sipping Riesling.”

I affirmed:
 “Your soul-caring
Ways—reading the Word
to me, to our boys,
and Praying.
Always Praying—
I love those Ways.
Never stop.
Never change.”

You offered:
 “Can I wash the dishes?
Change a diaper?
Watch the kids?
So you can go for a run?”

I prodded:
“Help me understand
Your trader-discipler
Dreams
Your heart
Your vision.”

You gave:
“Here’s a cup
of coffee.
Made it French Press,
just as you like it.”

We-love, together-love, says:
I love thee to the depth and breadth
And height
My soul can reach.


*Blue text=quotes/paraphrases of Shakespeare, Elizabeth Browning, Song of Solomon.

Loss and Life

My husband’s Grandpa, 92 years old, breathed his last breath Easter Sunday. Fitting, I thought, when Jon told me the news, to die the day Jesus rose and gave eternal life to his own.

Grandpa was alone that Easter morning, in a nursing home that smelled of urine, cafeteria food, and bleach. We’d been expecting that last breath for months, and now it had come and gone, like a whisper in the wind. So we packed our bags and blue cooler to travel North for a funeral—to honor Jon’s memories of fishing and camping and cards with a Northwoodsman who’d survived a depression, war and hard labor.

And as we drove up North we told the boys: “Your Great-Grandpa died.”

And Micah asked: “Did he love God?”

And Jon answered, “I think so. He said he loved God.”

And I thought: I think so. . . .

And I wondered: How can you know so ? . . .

Standing with Jon and the boys in the funeral home, piano music playing over the intercom, boxes of white tissue on every end table, plush pink flowered couches scattered about the foyer, the brown casket open—Grandpa’s body displayed on white satin—skin translucent, blue-veined; eyelashes mashed together under unseeing bifocals smudged still; hands folded across blue tie (I’d never seen him in a tie), and the neck, thinner than I remembered, disappearing into blue dress shirt--and I wondered:

Where is the 92 year old soul that breathed inside this body?

I wrestled a squirmy Isaiah in my arms, as Micah stood solemnly beside the casket, as Josiah clung to my dress pants.  Jon reached down and lifted Josiah’s warm three year old body over the side of brown casket. Josiah’s warm brown eyes gazed on cold 92 year old body. Josiah talk-whispered: “Grandpa’s dead? He died? He’s dead!” Grey-headed relatives near casket smiled—thankful for the distraction of young life from old death.

Micah talk-whispered: “Yeah. He’s dead. He’s in heaven, with God, . . . I think.”

I think. . . .

I wandered away from casket, set Isaiah's flailing feet on carpet--he squealed and ran towards plush pink couches. Grey-headed relatives smiled again at new life, fresh life, innocent life. And as my son wandered free, chubby fingers exploring floor vents, knocking over tissue boxes,  I pondered: 

When I die, will people say, "I know she loved God more than life!" ? 

And I asked myself:  Do I love God more than life? When my body lies cold in a casket will my boys say: "My mama loved God, this I know!"? 

Does my life love my God? 

"They will know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes they'll know we are Christians by our love."

"Let us not love in word or with tongue, but in deed and truth. We shall know by this that we are of the truth and shall assure our heart before Him." (1 John 3)