Coat of Many Colors

My son, Abram, was born this week– very premature, but doing well and his mother and I are thrilled to discover our new little person. For now, we have some walls separating us as he works very hard to finish being ready for the world, but I look forward to the day that he can come home.

In Buddhism, there is a story about the birth of the baby Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama. His parents were of a highborn Hindu family and because of a prophecy, his mother was traveling to his father’s kingdom late into the pregnancy. While they had stopped so that she could admire a garden, the baby Buddah was suddenly born! He walked a few steps, announced to the world that this would be the reincarnation where he would reach enlightenment, and then promptly settled back down into being a baby.

I bring this up because in the delivery room, none of the doctors or nurses mentioned our child suddenly getting up and talking, so he’s probably not going to be a reincarnation of the Buddha. Which is good, because since neither his mother or I are Buddhist and it would be terribly difficult to explain to our rabbi, or to my Christian side of the family.

For now, I plan to keep posting when I can. Writing and studying is calming, even as I sit with my wife as she recovers.

I did promise a few moments of navel gazing, but I swear it will be over quickly. Let’s be blunt: if you’re reading this, it’s not because you cherish regular updates in a blog. Or, if you do, you have the patience of an elephant. We’re nearly 1000 days old with 83 posts– and while once every two weeks sounds pretty good on paper, it’s really just been fits and starts with periods of lots of progress followed by long periods of inactivity. I apologize for that.

My plan is to get back to a regular posting schedule with a mix of “main narrative” posts as I continue to work my way through Genesis, plus interruptions as I finish up my Torah Family Tree project and all the little one-offs that I find so mesmerizing. My wife has also made a special request for a post which I hope to finish this week. This should continue over the summer, but I will be having a child in August and I have no idea how that will affect my ability to read and study. My hope is that now that I am out of school (for a while), I’ll be able to devote more time to blogging over all.

As we get to this magic 1000 days of blogging, I value  your feedback. What do you like and want to see more of? What less? You can reach me most easily on our Facebook page, or on Twitter at @coatofcolors.

Can I promise that I will be a better blog-host? Absolutely not. But darned it, I want to be and I want to share this journey with you. So please hold on, and there’s some fantastic stuff coming!