A Lover and a Fighter

The doctor left for some needed rest. "This baby's not coming for awhile yet. Call me when it's closer to time." I was sad, because I was ready to meet this child, our second son in two years. The doctor had ordered another shot of Demerol, a goofy drug that had given me about ten minutes of reprieve before the pain came roaring back. My tough, natural-birth-only resolve had withered. My experience with drugs during childbirth could be summed up as this: you get some edge taken off the distress initially, but then the pain comes back and by then you're drunk. So you can't cope. Awful. But alas, I was in the middle of it when the nurse put a needleful in my IV. Immediately, that man-child did what he has been doing ever since: he kicked and decided to make his entrance. There was much scurrying, a nurse ran downstairs to retrieve the doctor. He rushed in the room, someone snapped gloves on him, another person held his tie, and he caught the 11 pound, 2 ounce (23-1/2" long) baby lumberjack that popped out. Daniel ("God is my judge") Josiah ("The Lord heals"). Giant kicks and somersaults inside my unwieldy girth had already told me that this was no pansy man. I sensed that he was a warrior-poet-sort of fella. Strong willed but tender at the same time. He came here like a tornado and then snuggled right into my heart. 

He was only a few months old when big brother would do funny things and Daniel would start laughing, holding his stomach and gasping for air. He understood humor and sarcasm right out of the gate. He was surrounded by big, bossy personalities and decided he'd lighten the mood with his rapier wit and be a buffer where there was none. A second-born always faces the challenge of whether to fight or get along. He decided to do both. In wrestling, they called him "The Bulldog." When he decided to knuckle down, his opponents weren't getting loose. Years later, when he got into MMA fighting (cage fighting, heaven help us, and his name was "The Lumberjack") -- his determination and grit propelled him to the top of his weight class in the state of Georgia. He was big, quick, more stubborn than his opponents, and never lost in the big ring. He became a skilled carpenter, but was bent on being a firefighter. His Mama tried to dissuade him. It's not safe. It doesn't pay well. And oh yeah, it's not safe. A long, winding road led him finally to his dream, where if Mama needs an ambulance, he's gonna be the one hauling her outa here. He spends his days honing his skills and fitness, always pushing himself and everyone around him to fight harder, even if he makes enemies doing it. At his heart, he really does long to serve and protect. It's what God made him to do.

This son, God's blessing to us. Sometimes difficult, often hard to read, yet always tender underneath the bravado. The Lord sent him a wife perfect for him just when he needed her and then a baby girl who thinks he hung the moon. As this Mama is sometimes tempted to cry over her empty nest, I only have to stop and think of our eagles and of God's mercies as they fly, then stumble, then soar. The many layers that make up Daniel, the depths of thought and spiritual wisdom that rest in his soul after all these years....the fighter and the healer are finally one. God is good.