July 8: Almost Comfortable, Fatherhood, My Nephew

Santiago tries to get comfortable . . . 

The fish never changed his course nor his direction all that night as far as the man could tell from watching the stars. It was cold after the sun went down and the old man's sweat dried cold on his back and his arms and his old legs. During the day he had taken the sack that covered the bait box and spread it in the sun to dry. After the sun went down he tied it around his neck so that it hung down over his back and he cautiously worked it down under the line that was across his shoulders now. The sack cushioned the line and he had found a way of leaning forward against the bow so that he was almost comfortable. The position actually was only somewhat less intolerable; but he thought of it as almost comfortable.

There are times when something lifechanging happens to you, and it takes you time to become comfortable with it.  When my daughter was born, I fell in love with her immediately, but it took me some time be comfortable with fatherhood.  Babies don't come with owner's manuals.

My nephew became a new father today.  Pretty proud of him.  From what I've heard, he only threw up once during the delivery.  He has a son.  Melvin Thomas.  My nephew's life is never going to be the same again.  It will be so much better.

I don't have any father advice.  Haven't written that manual.  What I have learned in the 21 years I've been practicing being a father is this:  all you have to do is love your kid, no matter what.  Start with that, and everything else will be cool.

My nephew will probably never read this post.  That's okay.  He's going to have his hands full for the next, oh, 20 years or so.

But Saint Marty wants to say that he knows his nephew is going to be a great dad.

A poem for my nephew tonight . . .

Rules of Fatherhood

by:  Martin Achatz

When I first heard my daughter's heart
Ten years ago in the doctor's office,
I had no clue how to care for a girl,
Those unwritten rules new fathers
Must learn over time. Make your girl
Sit frog-legged in the bathtub
To allow warm water to flow
Into areas of her body where skin
Turns raw, pink or red as grapefruit,
In the privacy of diaper or panty.
When she turns three or four,
Teach her to wipe front-to-back,
Not back-to-front, to avoid kidney,
Bladder infections. Comb her hair
As soon as she's done bathing.
Slide the teeth through and through,
To remove all tangles, then braid.
Start simple, one ponytail at the back
Of her head. Work to French braids,
Beautiful as sweet, curled loaves
In bakeries at Christmas. Never
Utter the name of the boy she likes
When she's five or seven or ten.
Just watch them play together.
Notice how he always insists
She climb the steps of the slide
Before him, his neck craned upward,
Cheeks flushed, as she goes higher and higher.
Invite said boy to her tenth birthday
Party, watch him squirm when you sit
Beside him and say, "What are your
Plans for the future, son?"
Even though you don't believe
In guns, buy one to hold
In your lap when she goes
On her first date. When he arrives,
Stare at him, the way a lion stares
At a wounded water buffalo.

All these rules I've learned
Since that day the doctor waved
Her wand over my wife, pulled
From the top hat of my wife's belly
That sound: crickets singing
On a summer night, Love me, love me, love me.

January 28: Almost Comfortable, Simpler, "The Tin Man's Heart"

Santiago tries to get some rest . . . 

The fish never changed his course nor his direction all that night as far as the man could tell from watching the stars. It was cold after the sun went down and the old man's sweat dried cold on his back and his arms and his old legs. During the day he had taken the sack that covered the bait box and spread it in the sun to dry. After the sun went down he tied it around his neck so that it hung down over his back and he cautiously worked it down under the line that was across his shoulders now. The sack cushioned the line and he had found a way of leaning forward against the bow so that he was almost comfortable. The position actually was only somewhat less intolerable; but he thought of it as almost comfortable.

I can do nothing with him and he can do nothing with me, he thought. Not as long as he keeps this up.

I could write about loss again.  It's on my mind a lot these days, except when I'm sleeping or crazy busy.  And it seems like I'm always crazy busy or asleep.  But I have decided to take a break from that subject today.  Sort of like Santiago forcing himself to take a snooze.

So, tonight, I just offer you a poem.  One that I wrote a long time ago, when everyone I loved was still alive, and my life was . . . simpler.

This poem makes Saint Marty smile.

The Tin Man's Heart

by:  Martin Achatz

The Wizard gave the Tin Man

A Heart with a clock

That unwound after sundown,

Hands slowing at midnight

In the dark bed of his chest,

Each second an immense field of poppies,

Fragrant as Dorothy's thick braids.

In the forest under the stars,

The Tin Man listened to his heart tick,

Like the sound of lovers kissing,

Waiting for his spring to uncoil, 

Praying for that moment:

He and Dorothy in the poppies,

The sun on their gleaming bodies.

January 27: Almost Comfortable, Human Versus Nature, Wild Flowers

Santiago settles in for a long night . . . 

The fish never changed his course nor his direction all that night as far as the man could tell from watching the stars. It was cold after the sun went down and the old man's sweat dried cold on his back and his arms and his old legs. During the day he had taken the sack that covered the bait box and spread it in the sun to dry. After the sun went down he tied it around his neck so that it hung down over his back and he cautiously worked it down under the line that was across his shoulders now. The sack cushioned the line and he had found a way of leaning forward against the bow so that he was almost comfortable. The position actually was only somewhat less intolerable; but he thought of it as almost comfortable.

I can do nothing with him and he can do nothing with me, he thought. Not as long as he keeps this up.

It's a pretty classic confrontation:  human versus nature.  You see it all the time in movies and books.  The Old Man and the Sea.  Moby Dick.  Jaws.  The Biblical narrative of Noah and the Great Flood.  Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds.  Right now, the entire planet is in the grips of a deadly virus that most scientists think originated in bats or pangolins.  (Sorry, conspiracy theorists.  It wasn't intentionally released from a top-secret Chinese lab.)

Here's the thing:  nature happens.  Human beings, since we first appeared on this planet, have been exploiting its resources.  Sometimes this exploitation has been in harmony with the environment (see any Indigenous culture in the United States), but, most of the time, we have caused/are causing great harm to the world in order to get what we want.  And, by hurting the world, we hurt ourselves.

When this pandemic first began, human beings simply ceased their normal, everyday carbon-footprinting lifestyles.  We weren't flying or driving anywhere.  Instead, we just stayed home.  Read.  Watched TV.  Played games with our immediate families.  Christmas was simpler, calmer.  New Year's Eve was marked quietly, with the hope that the coming 365 days were somehow going to be better.  For the first time in 30 years, the peaks of the Himalayas were visible from India because of the reduced air pollution.  In the human versus nature battle, nature seemed to be winning for a while.

It didn't last.  Because human beings are inherently stupid, selfish creatures.  As soon as the politicians kicked open the doors, we started storming and pillaging again, even though it wasn't (and still isn't) safe to do so.  (I'm talking to you, school superintendents!)  

At the moment, I'm sitting on my couch.  Everyone else has gone to bed.  As has been happening these last seven days, when I become unbusy, the compass needle of my mind zeroes in on thoughts of my sister, Rose.  Her simplicity and smile.  She wasn't perfect.  None of us are.  But she was pretty damn close.

Since I've been talking about nature, I will say that Rose's nature was like those pictures I've seen of the Himalayas from India.  She was always there, in good times and bad.  Sometimes she was fogged by the things that pollute our days--anger, pettiness, impatience.  Through all of that, she just sat at the dining room table, playing cards with my mom.  Latch hooking rugs.  Writing letters to family and friends.  Drinking Diet Coke.  Her needs for happiness were pretty basic.  

This is what I know about the struggle of human versus nature:  it shouldn't be a struggle.  Mountains don't ask to be stared at.  Trees don't ask to be photographed.  Lakes are pretty happy just sending waves to the shore.

Rose didn't ask to have Down Syndrome.  It was just a part of her.  Like snow on the peaks of Mount Everest.  Or the aurora flashing green in winter skies.  Rosemarie.  Rosie Begonia.  Rose.  Rosebud.  She was a flower blooming in this world.  Luke writes in his gospel, "Consider how the wild flowers grow.  They do not labor or spin.  Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these."

Saint Marty thinks the world is a little less splendored these days.  But that's the nature of life.