It's A Girl!

Congratulations to my brother, Shoe, and his wife, Girl Friday, on the birth of their first born daughter, Babs!

Scheduled for near Christmas, baby Babs kicked her water out and her way into the world on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. How cool is that?

Born in the wee hours of the morning, she clocks in near 7.5 lbs and 19.5 inches, with long narrow feet and a head full of dark hair.

From all reports, Girl Friday and Babs are recovering well and it's love at first sight. A sleep-deprived Shoe was reported as saying, "Um, yeah."

Babs joins an extended family of Nods -- she is the first Nodling at Outpost 4, but the 7th girl and 10th Nodling overall.

As they say over at Outpost 2, "We're just doing our part for Western civilization."

Ain't it the truth? "Hello, Nurse!"

No Respect For Big Families

Thought I might take a train trip up north and decided to check the fares. Putting in 2 adults and 5 Nodlings brought up this error from their Web site: Problem with too many children.


I find that kind of rude. I understand the need for a business to make a buck, and children's fares are discounted from adult fares, but still! Boo on Amtrak!

"Please correct the error(s) shown"? How would they like me to do that -- "selective reduction"? It's not like I'm trying to take the entire fifth grade to Concord.

It kind of illustrates a problem that our entire society has with "too many children". Five children isn't large. The Duggar Family, now that's large. Five kids just fills a minivan; I don't need special transportation to get them to and from places.

How can there be too many children? That is like saying there are too many flowers. --Mother Teresa

It used to be that people respected the family; a man with many children had his "quiver full". Justice demands that a man be paid a living wage.

[Wikipedia] The living wage is a concept central to the Catholic social teaching tradition beginning with the foundational document, Rerum Novarum, a papal encyclical by Pope Leo XIII, issued in 1891 to combat the excesses of both laissez-faire capitalism on the one hand and communism on the other. In this letter, Pope Leo affirms the right to private property while insisting on the role of the state to require a living wage. The means of production were considered by the pope to be both private property requiring state protection and a dimension of the common good requiring state regulation.

Pope Leo first described a living wage in such terms as could be generalized for application in nations throughout the world. Rerum Novarum touched off legislative reform movements throughout the world eliminating child labor, reducing the work week, and establishing minimum wages.

• "If a worker receives a wage sufficiently large to enable him to provide comfortably for himself, his wife and his children, he will, if prudent, gladly strive to practice thrift; and the result will be, as nature itself seems to counsel, that after expenditures are deducted there will remain something over and above through which he can come into the possession of a little wealth. We have seen, in fact, that the whole question under consideration cannot be settled effectually unless it is assumed and established as a principle, that the right of private property must be regarded as sacred. Wherefore, the law ought to favor this right and, so far as it can, see that the largest possible number among the masses of the population prefer to own property." (#65)

It may not be fashionable to have large families, but let me just quote Paul's Law: If you want your values to survive into the future, there is no substitute for fertility.

Songs of Childhood

Nod-girl loves her parents.

I know this, because she is at that age where she makes up random songs and sings them to us. It's the original scat.

Oh, I love my parents /
I love to hug and kiss them /
Because they're so good to me /
And I'm their child

I find it rather endearing because I'll look back on this time and miss it. She's so open, so unsophisticated. She's just enjoying being a child who is loved and loves her parents.

It's like a breath of fresh air. Ahhh!

Don't read this ...

... unless you are prepared to cry.

There is a season for everything, even things that make us cry or move us deeply. It reminds us that we are human and that we do feel.

I was thinking of posting something light, but this article took all the wind out of my sails: Knowing My Stillborn Son.

Go home and hug your wife and kids.