Holding his five-month-old daughter, Danny Schlabach sways gently on his feet in their small room at a youth shelter in Eugene, Oregon. Their room is scattered with the detritus of a new baby: A+D ointment, formula, baby shampoo, bottle brushes, six pairs of miniature shoes lined up in the closet.
Schlabach, 23, is wildly in love with this child – his first. Her tiny fuchsia sweatsuit, her shock of dark hair. He’s raising her mostly alone. “I wasn’t really on the right track, until I got her,” he says. “When that happened I realized – I have to shape up.”
