A Little Thump

“Oooooh! I can feel Joshua moving around in there!”

I smiled at my beautiful bride.

“I wish you could feel him, but it’s too soon.”

Last Friday the ultrasound gave us a tour of our little one. The round head, corneas reflecting the ultrasound brightly. Spinal column, pulsating heart. The correct number of fingers and toes. And, a little appendage between the thighs indicating the baby’s gender followed Pop’s not Mom’s.

Joshua Joseph Greenleaf.

They said it would probably be a week or two before his kicks and punches would be visible and felt by anyone from the outside world.

Still, my sweety suddenly grabbed my hand placed it on her abdomen.

“Feel right here!”

Nothing.

We waited and nothing.

At least a minute and a half.

And then it happened.

A little thump beneath my thumb.

“Oh!,” we said together.

What a thrill. I really am going to have a biological child.

This whole relationship has been swift. It has been a blessing.

Partly I attribute that to the thorough screening system of eHarmony. Their matches were good, and though I went through hundreds of choices, and emailed scores, and dated dozens, when I met her it was perfect, swiftly, wonderfully, perfect.

I’ve had friends who questioned that.

That doesn’t bother me. I know from the outside it may see sudden.

Perhaps they forget I am not impulsive, that I think deeply about everything in my life.

There were cautions about divorce, which I found amusing. I stuck by first marriage long after most would have quit. Six times I forgave my first wife and gave her another chance.

I’ve one friend, someone I care about, who is so angry about this “hasty” marriage that there has been a refusal to talk to me, or even make eye contact. I regret that loss but I understand that those outside cannot know what I feel on the inside.

There is the emotional aspect of this. I don’t mean the heady infatuation of new love. I mean a deep contentment that comes from doing a very right thing. And the deep contentment of having someone in my life who calls on me to be myself in ways I’ve never felt free to be before.

I feel I am growing into who I was created to be. I am feeling a growing solidness to my personality, a sense of identity, of maturity, of stability that is more natural than any stage I have felt in my life before.

I also feel my Lord’s presence, His guidance, His assurance.

That is the real point I wish to make here. I may be well versed in matters of science, yet I have no doubts that there are spiritual truths (which we are simply ill equipped to measure scientifically) and that these things of the Spirit are true, are real. A personal relationship is what I have with the divine, and that this marriage has been given to me.

This past week, during Spring Break, I replaced light fixtures and repainted in the living room. It feels so good to sweat for someone I love.

And now, I feel a little kick beneath my thumb as I press my hand against my wife’s swelling belly.

I feel joy.

I feel gratitude.

I feel a contentment I have never known before.