Peaches!

  Week 13 is here--the last week of the first trimester, or so I'm told.  Supposedly I can breathe easier now, as though I could actually stop worrying about this baby as an act of will.  If it were that easy for me to stop worrying, I'd have a lot more free time!

  The child is now roughly the size of a peach, nearly three inches long and 4/5 of an ounce.  Hopefully there's no pit!

  Do you know how, whenever you eat a peach, the juices run down all over your hands and wrists, forcing you to go wash your hands afterward?  Even with the mess, though, you're still thrilled that you got the chance to enjoy that peach.

  I think having a child is somewhat like that.  You go into the process really excited about it, and then just as you begin you realize how messy and unprepared you are.  It's invading every corner of your life, and you realize that, if you had known everything you now know, you might have tried to be more prepared going into the process.  But it is so joyful, such a sweet process, that you are so glad you did it, so certain that your life is enriched, that you don't mind the mess.  You're simply grateful that you have the chance at all.

  That's where I am--just grateful for the chance to be a father, to celebrate the gift of life and pray for the wisdom and courage to try and be the kind of father my heavenly father is to me.  I will fail, but I will strive, and that makes all the difference.

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