What Matters Most

I have really been enjoying writing this blog. I've gotten a lot of positive feedback, and I'm glad people are taking an interest in it.

In reading through the last several entries, some of them sound to me like I'm complaining. There is a lot of anxiety around the waiting, and the paper chase. It's easy to get caught up in the little petty details and lose perspective. Sometimes I forget what it must be like for Kai, and all the other little ones on the other side of this process.

Tina forwarded the following text to me. Our agency administrator, Stefani Ellison wrote this and posted it on a website. It makes me stop and think about why we are doing this, and helps me remember that bureaucratic mix-ups, walk-in clinic fees, and closet space doesn't matter. These are all just the little steps along the way. If we're going to get there, we need to keep focused on the goal, and not let the little stumbles along the way distract us.

So if I haven't made you cry while reading this for a while, I'll let someone else take a shot at it. This is from the perspective of someone who has been through the process of international adoption...
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There is a reason that we call this an adoption journey. It’s because it is process and there is actually no end. Yes, the adoption is completed but its effects last a lifetime. Your mind is changed, your heart is changed, and you are no longer the person you were when you began.

So, when you come home and you don't fit in, you are right... you don't. No longer can you sit through pointless social gatherings and you become glassy eyed at the long spirited conversation your neighbors have about whose dog upset the trash can like it really matters. THINGS and the chasing, collecting and maintaining of those THINGS lose their glitter when you think of the sparkle that could be put on the face of a child for mere donated pennies or some of our time tying blankets. You lose patience with those who cannot understand the urgency of the task before you.... that children are crying. Children are dying. And the world keeps on shopping. Spending billions of dollars on things... that... don't.... matter...

When you look into the eyes of a child in the SWI you visit, your eyes never see the world the same again. Most of the world "doesn't get it" and to those that do, we must stick together because otherwise it’s a lonely place. For those of us who continually hear in the back of our minds the crying of the children left behind, we cannot rest because we cannot forget. There is no silence. Our friends, families, spouses may not understand and we ourselves may not understand why we cannot make the crying stop or make the urgency end. So we do what we can do. We give what we can give. And often, we join in the crying.