Marriage & the gospel are essentially selfish: they are things we enter into to make ourselves happy — what I’ve missed for so long is that for my marriage to make me happy, I have to strive to make my wife happy. For so long, maybe because of what I thought I saw in the world, I thought that just “being together” should be enough for any person in a relationship. But what you are entering into when you marry is a covenant to try to make the other person fulfilled. Yes, we need it to fulfill ourselves, and that’s a lot of what drives us to it. But the way that marriage fulfills us isn’t by proximity, or even the suddenly allowed physical intimacy. It’s because it gives us the opportunity for a very personal and intense experience of focusing on what can make someone else happy and fulfilled.

Does this mean there is no room for ourselves in a relationship? I ask this thinking of how single persons will react to the ideas in the previous paragraph. Admittedly, partially this is to justify myself. But it is a valid question. Especially for a person who isn’t married. Certainly I do not want to suggest that there is no value in an individual — after all, every soul is precious in the eyes of God. Every soul. There’s a lot of talk of love making one soul out of two, and I think there’s a lot of validity to the conceptualization. But one needs to remember that before the ONE soul is made, there were TWO, COMPLETE souls.

And that’s why I began with saying that these thoughts apply both marriage specifically and the gospel writ large. Personally, I need to work out things pertaining to my marriage, but I think I’m saying very little that can’t be absorbed in that context.

Again I point out that this is a path to personal fulfillment. Christ says “he that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.” And he also says, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” The first seems to be about subverting the ego. Losing ourselves in the work. But losing yourself, according to this scripture isn’t about losing identity completely. By focusing away from ourselves, and into the better part, we find out who we really are. Who WE are. The second points out that true love doesn’t focus on ourselves.

We can’t be completely unaware of the irony here. That’s the point of the idea, after all. While we are striving to fulfill the other, the other is, if she’s working on the same, working to fulfill us. We achieve our happiness both through performing service and through the service rendered by the other. The two together are what make the whole. And that is the plan of happiness.

“I’m so cute.”
Maire, age 2, has no problem with self image, apparently. She’s right, she’s about the cutest thing ever. But she’s not supposed to SAY it.

“Jesus is a mammal.”
Rachael made this conclusion at age 3 when we were talking about whether people are animals. She puts 2 and 2 together. Which leads to:

“4+2=6″
Not a major revelation, unless you’re 5 and haven’t been taught addition yet. Rachael figured it out because Sarah was away with Grandma and Mom was away for the day. Which meant two were gone, and there were four of us at home.

“The dark has stars in it.”
Maire made this observation when she was looking out the window at the night. It is perhaps the most poetic and hopeful of observations to come out of my family.

Saturday I took the girls to Target to spend their dollars. Naturally, I ended up in the toy aisles. I’d like to pretend this was because I had three people under the age of 8 with me, but we all know my penchant for buying and playing with toys. Plus the girls wouldn’t stop in the G.I. Joe and Star Wars aisle. To make a long story short, I saw two new lines of toys. This was surprising in that Christmas was less than two weeks previous, and it seems like January is a poor time to market a new set of toys, but there you have it. I was no less excited over the prospect.

The first one I want to talk about is the new set of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figures. They look really different than previous lines, but this is hardly a shock, since they’re based on the new film coming out and the character design for the new films is very different from previous movies or shows. I’m not very convinced I like the new designs, but I’m excited for the movie (though it could very easily turn out to be lame). Maybe my position will reverse on this issue in a couple months.

So I didn’t buy any turtles. I did, however buy April O’Neil. April in the new line is dressed like a ninja — complete with katana and overly large tonfa that is bigger than her leg (normally a tonfa is only slightly longer than your forearm and fist). This would be an entirely new approach to the character than I’ve really seen before, which intriguing less that the figure is this way (toy lines have made her a ninja before) but that it reflects what will be in the movie. Yes, I’m interested. They could very easily blow this, but still.

Anyway, April gets the thumbs up. She looks good, if cartoony (and well, what did you expect?), plus she stands and isn’t fragile. You go girl.

The other set of toys is the brand spanking new line of Marvel Comics based action figures coming out of Hasbro. At least a year ago, Marvel announced that they would be discontinuing their contract with Toy Biz and moving to Hasbro, but I didn’t think it would take a full year to ramp up to actual distribution of collectible figures. Foolish Eric. When I first heard the news I was disappointed and apprehensive. Toy Biz has made the best figures I’ve ever seen, hands down, with their Marvel Legends line. Super articulated with quality sculpts, they’re fun to look at, sturdy, and highly posable. Hasbro, on the other hand, does the craptastic Star Wars figures that are out now. 90% or more of the current Star Wars figures cannot stand up without leaning on something. The poses are awkward and while the sculpts have improved over the last couple years, they’re still mostly suckaliscious. I suppose that’s good for my wallet though, seeing as even though I hate them I still buy all sorts of Jedi figures. I need help.

So, yes, I bought all six figures in Hasbro’s new Marvel Legends line. I tried to convince myself to only grab one or two for approximately .36 seconds before acknowledging the futility of the argument. As soon as I saw all six figures where there, I took them, despite the physical impossibility of carrying all of them. I had to enlist my daughters, already laden with the popcorn and lemonade they had bought, into helping me until I found a shopping cart. Despite the fact that some of them were, well, stupid. Don’t get me wrong. While the Hasbro figures aren’t as articulated as the ones from Toy Biz, they’re quality sculpts, sturdy figures, and still quite posable. In terms of quality, these are very good toys.

See, the thing is, with the Toy Biz lines, you could never get some of the figures of any given series. Let’s use Series 13: Onslaught Series as an example. It was relatively easy to find Lady Deathstrike, Blackheart, and Pyro figures, but very difficult to get the others unless you preordered or bought off amazon, which takes half the fun out of it. This is because those three I mentioned are, well, stupid. D-U-M, dumb. Plus they weren’t great sculpts, relatively speaking, particularly Lady Deathstrike. You couldn’t make most collectors care enough to get them, even though you have to buy all six figures to be able to build the Onslaught figure. Naturally, I did buy all six, eventually. Because I am Toy Biz’s bitch.

The thing that got me was the building additionial figures. Most of these figures are cool, like Onslaught, Galactus. And usually only one or two of the figures in a series suck too badly, which makes me feel better about buying them. But some of the build figures are pretty darn insipid too. I mean, I can almost see Mojo, but Modok? Frickin’ MODOK? who cares about Modok? No one. Nobody cares.

But what got me about the figures in Hasbro’s new line is the character selection. There are some silly figures in the Toy Biz series, but they’ve done over 100 figures. Even with some alternate versions (such as First Appearance Iron Man or black costume Spidey — yet, sadly, never a Ben Reilly costume Spidey… how we hates them, yes we do…), you’re going to have to dip into some less impressive characters. On the other hand, Hasbro is introducing a brand new line. Trying to get a new following, from scratch, essentially. So why are there second- and third-string characters on the shelf here?

Ultimates Iron Man is shiney, both in the literal sense and in the Firefly slang sense. Planet Hulk … er… Hulk is both timely and original looking. Heck, he looks like Spartacus. And let’s face it, Emma Frost is both popular right now and oh so very smexy. These are figures that will attract buyers. If I were starting a toy line based on Marvel properties I know who my first six action figures would be: Hulk, Spider-Man, Captain America, Iron Man, Wolverine, and well… Emma Frost. These are the first stringers. The most iconic of Marvel characters. These are characters known even by people who don’t particularly care about Marvel. If you want to mix it up you could replace a couple with villains — choose from The Green Goblin, The Red Skull, Magneto, and Venom, all recognizable characters. Sure, Toy Biz has done most of them during hte last few years, but come on, new line. It replaces the old. *These* are going to be the ones everybody wants now.

I don’t really know what to say about including Hercules. I mean,for starters, the sculpt isn’t to die for. He can barely hold on to his mace, and his head looks like it grows from his chest, with a neck behind it. For some reason, Marvel keeps wanting to think he’s a significant character, even though most of us forgot (often on purpose) that he’s even in that universe (they do this with characters like Namor and Black Panther too — seriously guys, stop trying to even out sales and focus on characters we already like). He’s not even Thor, who is at least a character that people recognize as a superhero. People only recognize Hercules as a bad TV show and a worse Disney cartoon. Some of the unwashed masses might remember he’s a figure from ancient mythology, but no one thinks “comic books!” when they hear the name Hercules.

Then there’s X3 Beast. Not Beast. But the Beast as played by Kelsey Grammer in X-Men 3: The Last Stand, the worst X-Men movie of the lot. Ok, well, at least it’s not Elektra, but still. Look, I’m willing to give them a lot more props for this movie than most people are, but neither I, nor anyone I know, is exactly clamoring for an action figure of Frasier. And what we got in that movie was a hairy blue psychiatrist. Couldn’t we just have one that looks good like the comics?

Finally, there’s Banshee. Yeah, Banshee. He’s never actually been in a movie. This is because he sucks. His superpower is yelling. Now I know it’s cool to show the character using his power, but well, come on. Banshee’s craptacular sculpt makes him look like he’s coming on to the other male characters. This is not good.

So yeah, in general thumbs up. But there’s still some problems I’m not happy with. But yes, I still bought them all.

I had to in order to have the parts to build Annihilus.

No, I don’t know exactly who that is.

Congrats Hasbro, you win. I am now your bitch.

In the beginning

was Matriarchal Beauty –

Eve: progenitor.

The Mother of great children,

Quantity and quality.

Just as Sarah: a

Mother of generations,

raising a nation.

She raised her brood and taught them

righteousness, then sent them forth

Spread on the face of

A holy, promised nation,

Israel and America.

Beloved Grandmother Alley –

Holy Rachel, Rebekah.

Traveler, like Ruth;

Returned to Holy Lands to

raise a family.

Teaching principles of good

To children in love and faith.

Then scattered, like a

Sariah, descendents gone

to foreign places.

Gather today, give honor

to Diasporic Mother.

Partakers all of

a love that recalls that of

Matriarchs of old.

Holy Writ an exemplar,

showing us our matriarch.

Humble Mary, the

prophetess Deborah, and

exemplar Abish.

The caring of Dorcas with

the support of Miriam

together we find

fulfilled in our grandmother

Fam’ly Matriarch.

Watching your wife give birth is a wild ride, at the very least. Having been through it four times, I feel qualified to speak a little bit about it. I have a friend who claims that watching his wife give birth is harder on him than actually giving birth is on his wife. I find that probably a touch insensitive, though I can understand what would lead him to the idea. You can’t help when your wife gives birth. Not really.

Guys move the furniture around. They get asked to do it, and they flex a little, knowing they were asked to do something specifically because of the body they have. It’s a bit egotistical, but it’s also quite subconscious. And every guy does it. No matter how much we pride ourselves on our minds and whatever else, we still are proud to be the ones who do the lifting and other grunt work.

But we can’t with the whole giving the baby thing. God made it that way, and not even the manliest man can change that. He has to sit and watch his wife do all the work; watch her strain, sweat, and push and flex. On the one hand, it’s hard as a human being, just to watch someone go through the pain and the effort. In addition, it’s the sort of thing YOU’RE supposed to be doing. It makes you feel helpless on a lot of different levels. You can’t make her feel better, you can’t help her get the job done, and she’s doing the physical work that’s supposed to be your department.

So, in a very real way, watching your wife give birth is sort of a psychological torture. You are completely useless.

Of course, the last sentence is not completely true. In fact, the whole purpose for being there in the room, with her is the emotional support. Which, of course, is traditionally her job. I get to hold her hand for several hours (about eight and a half, this time around) and tell her to “breathe.”

I understand, on an intellectual level, that telling her to relax and let her uterus do the work, and to breathe normally, is actually very helpful to my wife emotionally and even as a reminder of what she’s supposed to be doing. However, it’s not a tangible thing. When men think of service, we think “build stuff,” or “repair stuff,” or, even better, “tear stuff down.” We can go to a yard, rake up all the leaves, then stand back, and say “You can see what I did here. There were leaves, and now there aren’t.” With “breathing…” well, how do I know it’s even been done right? How can I see that I did any good? It’s all well and good when my wife says “thanks” and tells me how it helped, but I still don’t see it. I have to take her word for it (not that I think she’d lie… in fact, my wife would scream at me if I did it wrong).

And don’t forget physically exhausting. My greatest fear at this point is that people will think I’m diminishing what my wife does. Sure, she’s done more. She is more tired. I know that. But the next time you wake up at 1 am to tell someone for the next eight hours that she’s doing fine and to keep going that you won’t be tired. No, I didn’t have some muscles constantly flexing, sometimes painfully, and I didn’t push that 9 pound creature out of my crotch, but I’m still tired and in need of a nap.

So, clearly, there’s a lot of ground to argue for the man’s suffering. I don’t know that the two types of trials can be compared directly, actually, since people have varying capacities for dealing with problems of different sorts. However, the biggest problem with my friend’s argument is that as a man watching your child come into the world, you aren’t thinking a whit about any of that.

At one in the morning on April 29, 2006, my wife elbows me in the ribs. “Eric? The contractions are ten minutes apart. I need your help.”

Granted, this is the most trying part of the labor for me. I’m still in bed. It’s still absolutely dark, and there’s very little either of us can coherently say during the 9 minute stretches between the end of a contraction and the start of another. My eyelids are in complete and utter rebellion, trying to force a cranial shut down for at least another five hours.

However, combating this impulse are two very important concerns. First, if I don’t stay up, I am officially a jerk. There is no argument that could defend myself successfully. Even if I’d been awake for the 24 hours previous, I am a jerk if I don’t stay up. That would be my own judgment on myself, not some judgment (perceived or true) made by the rest of the world.

Second, I’m excited at this point. We’ve been waiting forty weeks for this to happen (actually, forty-one weeks). While I wasn’t thinking about it all the time, as soon as that due date passes, you can bet that I’m jumping at the slightest hint that labor is imminent. Even though no sane person not between the ages of 14 and 22 is awake at this hour, it’s like Santa Claus is going to appear any moment.

My job at this point is not just to hold her hand, occasionally massaging her lower back or legs, but also to watch the clock. When she says “here comes another one,” I need to be able to say how long it’s been since the last one started. This means I can’t go through motions. I have to be conscious enough to do basic arithmetic using a number I saw ten minute previous. Good thing I’m excited. If I’m really on the job, I’m counting seconds too, so I can say how long the contraction lasts.

This stage goes on for an hour. After each contraction ends, I stare at the digital clock and mentally will it to progress. If we can establish that the contractions are coming at regular intervals, (or even better, ever shrinking times), then we can go to the hospital. Once we’re there, the baby will come. We’ve got motivation to get this done. Of course, since, once again, there’s nothing I can do to stimulate the contractions, this leaves me trying to alter the course of time until I hear “Here comes another one!”

After an hour to ninety minutes of this, I finally feel brave enough to suggest my wife needs to call the doctor. One of the problems with being the father of the coming baby is that you know you’re out of your league. No matter how well you’ve studied all the manuals your wife made you read, you are in the position, roughly, of the freshmen intern hired primarily to make coffee. You have no good ideas. If you suggest something, the best result you can hope for is laughter. More likely, you are going to end up with a red, hand-shaped welt on your face.

Fortunately, for me, my wife agrees. I get the bag and the camera, and get myself a bowl of cereal (hey, maybe she can’t eat, but I’m gonna be hungry quite soon — my belly is quite Pavlovian, wake it up and it starts to drool). Then, when my wife is off the phone and getting on something she can go into public wearing, I call grandma. Grandma knows a whole lot more about what’s going on and when and why in life, but this is the one time in my life I can tell her to do something. In moments she is on her way.

The car ride in is awkward. Not in the “what do I say?” sort of way. But if it’s difficult to go watch regular labor, knowing that my wife is having a contraction while I’m doing 60 (gradually increasing to 70 and beyond) on the highway is maddening.

The following several hours are a marathon of impatience and frustration. The contractions are regular, but they aren’t getting closer together. There’s a machine that somehow measures contractions — how strong they are and when they’re happening, so I don’t have to wait for my wife to tell me. I can just watch the seismic readings on the chart being printed out. I get excited as I see a big one coming. But I have to hold it in, or face the wrath of a woman too busy to distinguish joy over the labor progressing and joy over someone in pain.

Then they start slowing down. What? Slow down? They’re not supposed to get father apart? We’ve been doing this for hours! The man in me wants to grab the phone, call the doctor, and tell him to get his over-educated self down here and do something about this. But that man also knows that he is not on his home turf, and he does not call the shots. You keep your head down and fire when ordered. So I wait.

Eventually the doctor gets his over-educated self down here and does something about it.

Things finally start to move, and eventually, we get to the final stages of labor. Generally, I can handle this. Watching the head emerge is a strange experience. There are at least three different things going through your head. One is “Holy…! That’s a person’s head in there!” Another is more like “Yikes! You’re gonna get it out of there?!” The last is much more “She’s almost here! Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

This time, however, maybe it was because it had been many hours since I’d eaten and been standing for a while, I nearly pass out. For some reason, I was really worried that everyone present would think I had a weak stomach. It’s the one area where I have any sort of authority. No one is listening to me anyway, so it really doesn’t matter.

Finally the baby comes out. Getting perfect Apgar scores.

Describing emotion is not something that language is really equipped to do, so this is where we enter the most difficult part of describing what goes on.

The baby comes out and the doctor puts her on mom. My wife gets to hold our new daughter. Tears stream down her face, from exhaustion, pain, relief, or joy, I can’t tell, but I’m pretty sure it’s all of the above. She (my wife, not the baby) is emitting sobs and laughter at the same time.

And the only think I find myself capable of doing is stroking my wife’s hair, and staring at this wonder, every so often uttering, “That’s our new daughter.” I’m a bit lost. I find that while I’m re-entering the part where I’m supposed to be in charge again, I have no idea what to do. I keep feeling moisture gathering at the corners of my eyes, but I’m not sure if I’m supposed to let them come out again, so I simply say “our new baby,” again. I’m vaguely aware that I sound, and probably look (what with the tears there but not coming) pretty stupid. But I pretend no one else is there. I need to hug someone, and I do my best to put my arms around my wife who has collapsed into the bed. I’m not entirely successful, but she puts her head against me. I say, “I love you. You did it.” The two thoughts aren’t really connected. I don’t love her because she did it, but they’re both coming through my head.

There’s a great urge to hold the baby, nonstop. I get annoyed at the nurse who took the baby and is still still cleaning/checking, and doing whatever else she’ll need during these first few moments. But I let her be.

I finally get my chance. She’s nine and a half pounds, which is quite large for a newborn (though not excessively so), but she’s small and fragile. How on earth does she have fingers smaller than the last segment of my pinky finger? This hair is so soft. Her cry isn’t in the least way bothersome. It almost sounds like conversation. There’s nothing so soft as a baby’s face on your own, either.

There’s a bond that’s almost visible. You can certainly feel it. I’m connected to this child. One part of me, the man that’s frustrated he hasn’t been in charge wants to yell out, “I made this!” But I think, no I didn’t, it all happened inside her. But how else do you explain this touching of spirits? She is truly my daughter. I’m swarmed by emotions: I’m possessive, protective, caring, tender, loving, and joyful. Like an elevation of something spiritual inside me. Yes, she is indeed mine, and now I have to spend twenty years teaching her to no longer be so much mine as she now is. Yet, that bond will always be there. No matter where she does, what she does, or who she’s with. She will always be mine.

It’s incomprehensible that I could be so intimately involved in such an incredible event, yet I am. “I love you,” I whisper again as I sit next to my wife and lean in close. I say it not to my wife, nor to my new daughter, but to them both. At this point, they are all that’s in the universe.