happy birthday to family

The songs in your head are now on my mind...

Of course it hardly seems possible that a year ago, we were ready to land.  Dr. He and an assistant met us at the (enormous) Beijing airport.  We were so tired, so unprepared.  We allowed our lives to gallop right up to the minute we had to leave, and the only quiet moments to ponder, to even try to still ourselves, were the ones in the plane. Mercy.

Of course (again) nobody is ever really ready to be a parent, but I thought the years of waiting would give us an edge.  Boy is that funny!  Walking into the foster home, looking through the dim interior for the baby we would be taking home, was maybe the weirdest naked feeling ever.  Struggling to understand the language, overcome with emotion (and more than a little fear), not knowing what would happen next...and then we saw him!  

It was more than good to have a week at BlueSky before joining our travel group.  I'm sure every adopting parent would covet that luxury.  For us, it made the difference between survival and crisis.  I learned how to use a catheter and colostomy supplies from some incredible volunteer nurses (American and Swedish), and I practiced under the watchful loving eyes of the ayis (who gave great advice I will never be able to translate).  I was so scared I wouldn't remember all the instructions, and that it would cost YoYo his life.  We spent our mornings around the dining room table, sharing peanut butter sandwiches with our little boy, wondering if he knew what would happen next.  We took turns rocking him, stole him away from the other children for snippets of bonding time without attracting attention.  We took walks around the block and navigated our first store outings without translators, we took him to our guest apartment and read stories to him and gave him snacks and napped.  It felt like we were doing something wrong (at least to me), or like we were playing house, pretending that this little one was ours.  I kept thinking any minute that someone would approach to demand whose beautiful boy-child we'd taken, and I would not have the language to explain he was ours.

Everyone at BlueSky was so gracious to let us ease into being with him, and I guess to let him ease into being with us.  The parties and gifts and care lavished on us made me wonder when they would find out that we are really just teachers and not royalty.  They were so happy for us, and I felt guilty to know we were taking their little Prince-even though I could tell myself again and again that the timing was just.   I could almost believe we were their fairytale people, and then the strain of all we were learning medically and the fear of what may come would overtake me and I would lash out at my dear selfless husband in private for tiny nothing things.  Oh, bittersweet, that labor brings joy and pain to life and commits it to memory.

Two of the kindest gifts came from the nurses.  Gunilla had lovely flowers in the guest apartment when we arrived.  Forever and ever those will be the first flowers I received as a mother.  Then wise Tammy stepped in the day before we had to take YoYo from BlueSky, and she insisted we go to the Orchard for one last date before parenthood consumed us.

She sent her driver (!) to collect us, and he carried us to an estate which had belonged to a very old family.  It was seized in the 40s, but lately has evolved (somehow) into a privately owned restaurant.  The gardens surrounding it are lush, sections of the orchard are intact--it is breathtaking.  It was somewhere during the elegant meal that parenthood dawned on us, and that epiphany carried us through the remainder of the journey.  Tammy was able to give us the moment of quiet stillness we needed before plunging in.  I thought of her this week as I transplanted creeping sedum to my beds of iris, now a riot of color.  I first saw creeping sedum banking iris at the Orchard, and I echo the combination now, in my garden, in thanks to Tammy and Gunila and Sunila and Dr. He and all of BlueSky.

Though the hope for another child and the shadow of grief for infertility sometimes feel like betrayal to the precious gifts we have received, I think we can honestly say that we are so very happy that we can hardly take it.  At the dentist yesterday, a nurse smiled to say we rescued YoYo, and I said with full heart, "No, he rescued us."  

4 is the magic number

Photos to come...my macbook crashed and the guys at the genius bar (no really, that's the name?) won't see me til 9 am Tuesday.  I am seriously compromised-I'm desperate enough to write this on hubby's macbook, the school one, which I prefer to call "The Hobo."

ANYWAY.

Monday-April 6! The little prince turned 4, and we were filled with joy, and I had no idea the emotional soup it would be (for me, in my head, trying to keep it all smooth and calm outside). 

YoYo woke up asking, "Am I 4?"  And it hit me (so so much harder than I imagined) that it is our first birthday with our first little one, and he is 4 and I've already missed so much, and I feel like a guest and not a parent (because we missed birthdays 1, 2, and 3), and I wonder about his birth-parents and what they are feeling.  

HOW is it that this way to family is so very unending with its happy/sad surprises?  YoYo knew just what I needed, a good 20 minutes of snuggle time before jumping into the day.  We had pancakes cut into 4's for breakfast, then some TV, and then lovely playing with the lovely toys the grandparents giddily stuffed our house with last week.  (PS-Grandparents, we know what you're doing.  Don't think we don't.)  Then off to school to pick up Shane for pizza lunch!  We ended up at the mall, thanks to the macbook-did I mention I HATE the mall?  

We played restaurant for dinner, and that was an absolute hit.  Our party party was last Saturday at the park.  Just YoYo, a very few friends his age, and the most glorious how-did-we-luck-out day weatherwise that has happened in the last three weeks.  Seriously-it's snowing outside as I type this.  Snowing.  April.  Tennessee. 

I'm relieved now.  This passage had so much potential for hardship-and I didn't have any idea it could until an idle conversation.  We've talked so much about turning 4, and he has been excited.  Then I talked to him about my cousin's upcoming wedding in DC, and the drive, and the hotel, and how fun it will be.  His response was a question.  "And then I can no go home to Mama and Baba again anymore? I will no see Baba ever?"  It took me a while to put it together.  Each birthday has been spent with different people-and each one has been followed by separation.  When he turned one, he was in Singapore, recovering from surgery.  He was doted on by a couple there, and he loved them.  A month after his birthday, he returned to Beijing.  Birthday number two came, and a couple of months later he traveled to the US for more surgery.  Months later, he returned to Beijing.  His third birthday was in Beijing, at BlueSky Healing Home, and it was packed with people who are part of YoYo's story-volunteer nurses, marathon runners, fundraisers, volunteer workers, teachers...all of them knew he'd be leaving soon for good and they came to say good-byes.  And less than a month later, we walked into BlueSky, and his first words to us were, "You will take me with you on a plane far away."  And he misses his sweet family from BlueSky.  He will talk about, "When I lived at HaiHe's house," or "When I was at QinQin's house," and sometimes the stories aren't even real, but his feelings are, and it's so hard to know that even though he is only 4 and may not remember much of this later, it is very real to him now, and it is grief and loss and separation, and it is profound, and no matter how much he loves his Mommy and Daddy, that love for him is mingled with the loss.  Our beginning as a family was the end of what he had already known and loved as family.

That this birthday came and went for him, without tears, with some rememberings, with much tenderness and laughter and play and singing and dancing, is a miracle.  And a gift.  I am so thankful for him every day, and I have no idea how it is that we are blessed enough to have him.  With hope for many more birthdays together. 

Pride goes...

I planned a great Saturday.  It was full of errands-things that could be checked off lists to make me feel Productive! and Efficient!  The only thing I wasn’t looking forward to?  Buying underwear.  I have underwear that has traveled to more countries than Sarah Palin.  Underwear that should be retired.  But clever me-I had a coupon for Victoria’s Secret!

We went to Textile Fabric to see the remnant sale first.  The only way I could keep YoYo interested was to steer him toward telling me the textures of the fabrics.  He LOVED that game.

I put off the mall until the end.  I hate the mall.  But I had checked so much off my list-this was the last thing!  We walk into VS, and I think, “It’s underwear-YoYo’s 3.  He doesn’t care.”  Sure enough, as we walk in, he points to a mannequin.  “What’s that lady doing?” 

“She’s not a real lady-she’s just pretend.”

“Is she wearing lady clothes?”  Hadn’t ever heard it put that way, but ok, I guess that makes sense.  They’re clothes (kind of), and they are on a lady (kind of).  It’s like I don’t see what’s coming next.  “Yes, those are lady clothes.”

“Is that lady pretend, too?”

“Yes, all the ladies in here are pretend.”  Now I’m actually a little smug, because I think I’ve dropped some kind of social commentary on my toddler.  He’ll be so sophisticated!

We get to the table thingy that has all the underwear in the little back room, and I’m safe.  We’re past photos and mannequins, and this room’s harmless—panties & bras. 

 So YoYo turns around to the Sale rack and goes into fabric store mode.  He does the fabric drill—touch it with your fingers, rub it on your cheek—and he says (so so so loudly), “Mama, this is AMAZING!  Are ALL these lady clothes?”  The store is suddenly so very quiet. 

I still have that coupon, if anyone wants it.

Uncle Fun

In the spirit of catching up, I'll share a bit about the phenomenon called Uncle Craig.  

Uncle Craig is a giant who lives in Boston.  The combination of his 6'5" frame, the fact that he rides a chair through the sky to see us, and his striking resemblance to the Baptist Sunday School Board Jesus of VBS days gone by make him the stuff of obsession for small children.  I think I mentioned in an earlier post that he actually eats babies.  

When Uncle Craig came for a visit a couple of weeks ago, I wasn't sure how YoYo would handle him.  We ride this wacky pendulum these days, swinging from, "I hear a grownup, but I'm not sure I care," to, "No, I will NOT acknowledge that grownup."  Ok, so maybe it's not so much a pendulum.  But apparently Craig is magic.  Legend.  A few months back, Craig gave YoYo some antique Chinese coins for Lunar New Year.  I really can't explain what that meant to me.  This time, he played with that little boy for hours at a time, and it didn't matter how stinky YoYo was to him, he would cram his body into impossible spaces, watch the same Clifford episode 30 times, lose at every single game imaginable (including head-on truck crash livingroom rally), and keep YoYo AND PaPa AND Shilo the puppygirl ALL mesmerized.  If he ever ever moves back to Nashville, we will hold him hostage.

What's the photo?  Typical stuff for the visit.  Craig somehow folded himself inside a Little Tykes playhouse (4 feet x 4.5 feet x 4.5 feet) and then lured both YoYo and Shilo inside.  Not that there weren't already two dozen stuffed animals in there.  And a plastic chair.  They were in there for maybe a half hour-by choice, mind you.

Thanks Uncle Craig.  I can't wait til Easter comes, and we use the old-school PAAS egg-dyeing kit and fill YoYo's basket with Uncle Craig's bag of treats.  I hope YoYo always knows how cool you are and how much you love him.   

Catching up

There's so much to tell-so many beautiful days and grumpy moments and fears for the future and sighs that things were easier than anticipated-and that was just in a few weeks!

So we'll start small for now.  The other night we had the lovely lovely Songer family over, and their 3 year old little man enjoyed an evening with our 3 year old little man while the parents ate and laughed and enjoyed as normal an evening as can be had-hooray!  I played "restaurant" for the boys (thanks Mr. Rogers for the idea).  The grownups had their own meal, but the boys, seated at YoYo's play table, were given menus with the evening's options in crayon--grilled cheese, hotdog, chicken nuggets, with apples, fries, or grapes on the side and milk or apple juice to drink.  They soooo loved it!  They chose the same things, and we used some really cute placemats that look like racetracks (thanks Mom!), and I even put some carnations in a cup on the table.  (I cheated there-we had the flowers already, because with the advent of Spring, YoYo has been in love with flowers and wants a bouquet every time we go to Kroger!).  

YoYo totally got into it, and when the boys had been served and I finally sat down at the grownup table to eat with our friends, he called, "Excuse me, lady?  Lady?  Could I please have some more juice?  And we need some ketchup, please, lady."  I took care of them, and gave my best, "Will that be all, gentlemen?" and he chirped, "Yes, lady-thank you so much!"  He has been fascinated with a Mr. Rogers tape that I found at a used bookstore, and has watched that dear man visit a restaurant to order a cheese sandwich so many times that I KNEW he was thinking of the waitress in the video every time he called, "Lady?  Miss Lady!" (even though Mr. R. didn't do that).  So when he asked, after the second refill of apple juice and an additional side of fruit, "Are you the lady from the restaurant?" I answered, "Yes, just like the restaurant in Mr. Rogers."  He was so delighted that I am forced to admit my skill with the English language is not sufficient to do him justice.  His eyes absolutely danced and he laughed with so much glee and found so many tiny tiny reasons to call his waitress back to the table that Shane finally intervened to inform the young gents that their waitress was on break.  

I could only catch photos at the evening's end, when I realized that of all YoYo's friends, we don't have Corbin on our fridge.  Silliness ensued.

At least we got a nice normal photo in first. Mind you, the Vulcan death grip YoYo has on his young friend's neck raises concern, but they're both smiling, so that's a good sign.  The big thing I notice is that while Corbin is almost a full year younger than YoYo, they have changed places- months ago, YoYo was the taller one.  (A special shout-out to Reed here, who's totally responsible for the awesome Small Paul shirt YoYo sports-she keeps his cool side cool!)

There was a wonderful visit from Uncle Craig a week ago, and happy times with cousins Brandon and Erika in Indiana, but I must save that for later-I've got to get some sleep!

Day in the Life

Joy of joys, we are finished with the mega-antibiotic!

Today was a typical non-preschool day...

YoYo woke up around 10 am. I let him sleep in because this week Shane has been working on a set for the next high school play. He leaves every morning at 7 am, then returns around 10 pm. After a few days of that, YoYo begs to stay up long enough to see BaBa for a little bit before he goes to bed. Who am I to deny him that?!

I took care of my email before he woke up. Then we started our routine-fuss over breakfast, get dressed-he feeds our dog and folds napkins for meals. I do laundry and start cleaning house. I answer my voicemails (ok-3 of them before he starts clamoring for attention), help him with his projects (another installation, 30 min. of TV, some alphabet time), and then it's time for lunch. Ahhh, gyoza dumplings and noodle soup-a favorite!

After lunch we run to the grocery for a mid-week mini-list. When we return, it's time to read a book & take a nap. Mind you, I'm not detailing the cath times that have happened, the colostomy blowout and subsequent clothing wash, or the etsy & ebay items I listed this morning.

When he wakes up from naptime, it's just like any day-I'm mopping the floor while waiting for a guy to come pick up the 8 rolls of insulation I just sold on craigslist, and while Shane helps him load them into the truck, the nurse comes by to take our blood and urine samples for the life insurance folks. Of course we send her on her way afterwards with a box full of potted African violets, then it's time to go out for a belated birthday dinner, courtesy of Shane's parents (thanks, Jane!).

We're on the way to Chili's when we see a toddler and his mama by the road-their car broke down and she's held out for 2 hours for a ride because she doesn't think she can carry him AND her 3 bags of groceries 15 miles. No kidding. We shove them in the car & take them home, then it's back to Chili's for dinner. Oh wait-it's time for a cath again. Let's just use Chili's restroom this time. I hear a little girl say, "This bathroom's for little girls, not boys!" to her mama, and I realize I'm surprised that it's taken so long for that to happen. But then of course her mother replies, "Well, honey, HE still has to use diapers," and I think of all the things I don't want YoYo to hear me say to her. Ok, lady. Hope you savor that superiority.

After a lovely dinner, it's back home for birthday cake and an episode of Mr. Rogers Neighborhood as a family on the couch before we make our ways to bed. I read YoYo "The Little Engine that Could," and he points out that it's like the little boy we met earlier this evening. Ok, I'll buy that one.

Gogo, too?

"It's kinda like I love you, but it's SNOT!"  (get it?)  YoYo's favorite joke.  Thank you, mystery infection/cold thing.

Well, we had our first freakishly scary episode with the little man.  I left for the grocery store the first evening of our elephantine antibiotic round, and Shane called me 20 minutes later, asking, "Can you please come home right now?" in a voice that frightened me.  He'd left YoYo on the couch to start dinner, and a strange behavioral episode ensued which seemed an awful lot like a seizure.  When he couldn't get YoYo to respond (no eye contact, no body language, no vocal response), he was terrified.  We paged and paged our pediatrician, unwilling to risk a visit to the ER to explain to some random intern our little man's laundry list of rare issues that may or may not coincide with this kind of thing.  The good doctor reassured us, and as YoYo drifted off to an exhausted, sicky-boy sleep, we breathed sighs of relief.

Of course, there is nothing that YoYo goes through that GoGo shouldn't go through, so it happens that GoGo's ear fell off suddenly and without explanation-unless you count, "I don't know.  I just kissed him and his ear came off."  (I can't tell you how many times I've heard that one.)  I donned a stethoscope and played doctor as GoGo came to the Kitchen Table Memorial Hospital (complete with 3-year-old-siren blaring, thank you).  

After a shot and a good sewing-up, GoGo let YoYo trim his paws for good measure, and then he had the kind of cleaning that I think may only be able to happen one or two more times before he is beyond repair (oh, please, God, give us some years before we get there).  Hovering over the bathroom sink with homemade soap and a lice comb (the only thing that could comb out the pills in his fleece), I suddenly remembered all the times I wanted to give a special doll or stuffed animal a bath and grooming that would make him as good as new. So when this turned out really well, I took a picture.  Is it me, or does GoGo look a little indignant?

I feel like I'm learning to breathe.  I worry so much about doing the wrong thing that when we're around friends, I bring YoYo up short constantly--I'm so afraid he'll push another kid or break something that belongs to someone else or cause a fuss--and I've always been afraid of that for me, too.  When we went to the theater for the first time on our own, my brother and I nearly killed each other because I wanted us to be so perfect in our behavior that I jumped on him for every breath he took!  So today, I didn't fuss when YoYo wrote all over his palms, or when he stuck the ball-point pen in the screwdriver hole on his table, or when he wiped his mirror til it was cloudy with a fresh wet wipe.  He's trying to experiment with so much, and I am so ingrained in 15 years of not having a kid that I'm used to focusing only on what I think needs to get done.

Mercy.

p.s. I took every box I could find in the house and shed last night and made a "train" in the living room.  He's crammed every toy and stuffed animal he owns in there.  And it makes him happy!  He made tickets for all the animals to board the train and is counting them into a bag.