Girl

We recently had our first sonogram, or as I like to call it, the belly-lubing cinema.

Seriously, does that much K-Y® Jelly need to be used on anyone? My poor wife's navel needed a half hour benzyl and turpentine scrub to dislodge that gunk.

But it was all worth it for a glimpse of our baby girl. Although the initial images looked like nothing human, I soon saw a little butt and two little legs. "It's a girl!" I shouted, loud enough for Lisa, our smiley sonogram tech, to offer a polite "Yup. You've got a good eye, dad." Or, in nice-lady-getting-paid-handsomely-for-excessively-KY'ing words, "Thanks for the wise input and feel free not to do that again, doofus."

After a few minutes, smiley Lisa paused the fuzzy image on the sonogram monitor and left the room to get a chart. The Mrs. decided on a bathroom break.

And so it was, in a dimly lit room, that I found myself enchanted by a 13 ounce girl on a black and white screen. Only the computer's hum accompanied the song of thanks bursting forth from my racing heart. Although her shape and form remained ambiguous, her purpose was unmistakable. She was a treasure, and she was nothing less.

Songwriter Derek Webb said it best, "So could You love this bastard child, though I don't trust You to provide? With one hand in a pot of gold and with the other in Your side." How gracious and compassionate is my Father to lay upon one such as me the blessing of this child.

I suddenly felt grown up. "I have a girl, and I'm a man! I can now grow a beard and talk about fatherhood!" But then an overwhelming sense of parental and facial hair inadequacy flooded my mind.

"You, little girl, will lean on me for support? I bear the responsibility of disciplining the selfish, world-loving nature out of your life? I'm supposed to teach you? This isn't right. But I'm king of selfish! I can't be taught!"

And there she was, my girl, reacting to my muddled confusion with simplicity and quiet. She, being knit together by the Giver of all good things, will be a treasure to simplify and quiet my heart.