Two friends became lovers and started a journey together in July 1969, and in September 1970, after travelling thousands of miles from their homes in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, nestled into another home in Los Angeles, California. There, they sought to bring the man’s dreams of being an artist to fruition. This did not happen, but they both found other employment — manager and teacher — and after a time, made a commitment to themselves to add another person to their circle. This momentous decision, made by two people who had confidently quit their jobs and embarked on a six-week journey across the country toward an uncertain future, successfully finding other employment in another state, proved to be problematic in ways the two had not anticipated.
The woman had medical issues that were impediments to the attachment of the fertilized egg to the lining of her uterus, but the couple was determined to have the child they imagined, and when the woman called the man at work to say that her temperature was at the peak point for successful conception, the man left his office and went home. After some time, the couple entered pregnancy, and they studied with a group to learn the Lamaze Prepared Childbirth technique, learning about back labor, effleurage, “slow chest,” and “hee-hee” and which breathing to use before the time to push. When people asked of the couple, “What child do you want to have? A boy, or a girl,” the man always answered confidently: “I made a girl.” And in 1972, people coughed into their fists and averted their eyes, for an amniocentesis was the only way to determine the sex of the fetus, but the procedure was too risky for a problem pregnancy. In the last trimester, when the woman was ordered to abstain from work in order to insure that the fetus would stay implanted, the man foolishly brought home a puppy that defecated into his bride’s shoes. Neither the puppy, nor the thief who stood at the foot of the sleeping man’s bed — staring at the 8-month swell of his bride’s belly — served to dislodge the girl from her mother’s uterus.
The girl in utero had a name that long preceded her birth. She was named by the man and the woman before they had committed to have a child, or even to marry. When the two friends had come to the realization that they loved each other as “more than friends,” the artist in the man looked for a unique way to communicate that love. Instead of saying, “I love you,” they invented “Ra∞Shine.” And when they decided to augment their loving with another one loved, they agreed that she should be called by the name that means “I love you:” Ra∞Shine.
On Friday, December 22nd 1972, the man bundled his gravid bride into the couple’s orange 1972 VW Super Beetle and drove to the hospital. The woman breathed and the man effleuraged and when the time came, she pushed and pushed and at 11:24 p.m., an 8 pound, 14 ounce girl was delivered to the world. The man said this to all those assembled there: “I knew we made a girl.” The man went home to sleep, and when he returned in the morning, his bride told him, “By the way: Our daughter has a first name.” It was then that “Lisa” was added to “Ra∞Shine.”
I carried my bride and my new child, who was wearing a red and white Santa hat that the hospital placed on her head, home on Monday morning of December 25th.
Happy birthday to my Lisa Ra∞Shine Woods.