My wife and I finally left the hospital with our baby after she spent 21 days in the special care unit. Twenty-one days of being poked and prodded. Twenty-one days of a feeding tube. Twenty-one days of being hooked up to loud, beeping machines. And 21 days not at home. Twenty-one days of tears leaving the hospital. Twenty-one days of uncertainty and fear.
And then suddenly we got to take her home. And the 21 days doesn’t seem so bad anymore. Carrying our baby out of that hospital in a car seat was one of the best two or three moments of my life. I felt freer than I ever have in my life while also weighed down with the solemn burden of fatherhood.
I know some people spend their whole life talking about the “good old days” and reminiscing about a time when they were younger, but not me. All I can think about is the here and now and the future! My little girl’s future. My daughter will, inshahallah, live until the year 2100. 2100. It’s only 2018. Eighty-two years ago it was 1936. World War II hadn’t even happened yet.
Today’s day in age it can be tempting to just “watch it burn.” The Baby Boomers saddled my generation with crushing debt and white-washed the moral fabric of our nation in pursuit of wealth. It’s tempting to shrug off responsibility. And many millenials do: brunch and the childless life, they choose. Having been taught no differently, it’s hard–even though I do–to blame them. Young couples cannot afford homes. Massive wealth is concentrated in the hand of a small number of elites. There is no clear route to financial stability for many. No gold watch and a pension. No pathway to respect. No collegiality. The Church seems as irrelevant as ever. It can be tempting to just say “this world is broken, so I am going to get mine and not worry about the future.” Mortgage the future. Over-leverage. Embrace a soulless consumerism. Double-down on the Baby Boomers’ seemingly unquenchable search for wealth (even at the costs of the own children’s souls–not to mention pocketbooks).
But then these eyes look back at you.
And you have to believe, right? Despite it all, you have to buy in. You have to pass on a better world to your own flesh. How could you not?
