Suddenly . . .

After months of low key nagging we suddenly have a date for our family vacation.  We leave in 6 days.  All of sudden summer is over in a rush of preparation and travel.  Between now and Monday, the following must occur. 

• Grocery shopping.
• My yearly gynnie appointment that due to my complications takes 1/2 a day. Following this I will need to  . . .
• Pick up prescriptions.
• Laundry.
• A trip to the Boy Scout Council Store for updated uniform bits.
• Buy stamps, sunscreen and a half dozen other random items.
• 2 days of cub scout camp.
• 1 day of office wrangling to be ready to hit the ground running when we return.
• At least one visit to my grandmother who is in rehab care. (Two would be better.)
• Make hotel reservations.
• Pack for S and J’s scout camp trip.
• Pack for the whole family’s vacation
• Get the car to the garage for an oil change and to find out what the hissing sound is when the vent fan is turned off.
• Help J mow lawn.
• Arrange for someone to feed the cats.
• Water the house plants and the garden.
• See if my Mom can watch S during Aug. while I prep the Fall courses.

The schedule is kind of nuts.  J plans to leave at 7AM Monday after coming home from Scout Camp on Sunday afternoon.  We will drive 4 1/2 hours to a water park in VA, GO TO the water park that day and spend the night in the area.  Yikes!  I can see the meltdown already, and not just S, all of us.  When we get home from this hastily planned vacation we will leave again in four days for a three day camping trip with friends. A week and a half is all I have to spiff up my courses and design scenery for the first show. After that I start having scheduled activities on campus for the start of the Fall semester, another half week and 2nd grade starts for S.  Oh man, I’m tried just thinking about it all.

I have been so inactive for about a year and a half because I have walked away from almost all the work offered to me in the hopes that I would be caring for a baby girl.  That did not happen.  At first, it was torture, being idle was really hard for me.  It was about nine months before I started to adjust to my new (lack of) schedule.  Now, I’m so laid back I would describe myself as lazy.  It looks like that all ends tonight.  

I am fortunate though.  All the people who have offered me work in the past are still offering. This kind of lull in employment should’ve been career damaging.  But it wasn’t.  Two schools have basically given me the pick of their seasons and a more classes to teach than I can actually physically handle.  It will be easy to dive into all this work and never look back, or at least pretend I’m not looking.  I really do enjoy teaching; it is the only thing I’ve found that rivals parenting in the potential for satisfaction.   The next 40 days will fly by and then I will be up to my eyes in courses and shows and plans for two student trips and preparation for our new building and harvesting the garden and getting S off on the right foot in 2nd grade and J’s stepsister’s wedding and and and . . . . . I may drown.

I have not done the research on Taiwan; I don’t know if I am still actually holding onto hope for Vietnam or if I just want to have some time where I don’t feel like I’m teetering on the edge of bliss and disaster all the time.  There are days when I think it would be OK to have just S.  (Like yesterday when he entertained me by improvising an entire cable system of TV shows centered around slugs to my too loud protests of “GROSS” and “STOP” and my pantomime of a remote control.)  But, when I think about doing something, anything with the baby’s room, I am paralyzed.  The door is shut, I don’t go in there, I don’t look in there.  When I have to deal directly with the possibility of there not being a baby girl E ( yes, I have had a name picked out for about 5 years) I can’t do it.

So, all of a sudden we are down to 40 days.  I read on the DOS web site that they expect to have referrals for about half of the 1,700 pending dossiers prior to the Sept. 1st deadline. It all seems like such blatant fiction.  If they can do that why don’t we have a referral already?  Our dossier has been circulating orphanages since late January, nearly 6 months. How is it they expect to complete 850 referrals in little more than a month when some have been in the system for such a long time already?  

Maybe it will all happen very suddenly.

Time in the Garden

I spent some time in the garden yesterday. I had purchased a lot of plants to “decorate” the yard for our upcoming anniversary party and it was a beautiful day. It has been very rainy here, so much so that we haven’t planted the vegetable garden yet. I suppose I should’ve done that, but the flowers always go so quick and give instant gratification.

I also needed the activity to wear myself out enough to sleep that night. The idea that we wouldn’t travel until at least August is weighing heavily on me. What to do about work? I know now not to say anything until there is definite plans to act on. I can’t bear another semester of not working and waiting at the same time. This much is clear. The rest . . .ugh!

The main reason we had gone to Vietnam with the first adoption was because the children were able to come home so young. S arrived home just days beyond being four months old. Age of the child was/is really important to us. I have an adoptive brother who has attachment issues. It was not fun growing up in our household and I did not want deal with those things as an adult any more than I do as a sister. I have not seen or had any contact with my brother in more than ten years. Nor, do I know how to contact him or even if he is alive. My mother is very hurt by all this. She says “I can’t figure out what I ever did to deserve this treatment, all I ever gave was love.” She still doesn’t understand it is not her fault. The damage was already done prior to the adoption. In those days the rhetoric was ” Love them and all will be well”. Now we know there is a lot more to it than that.

I have taken so much time off work already that I am quite anxious to get back in the saddle. But, going to work will mean risking good attachment with my new daughter. I fear that attachment with this child is already at risk because it is unlikely that she will make it home before she is six months old. I hope that I can work something out that will fill both our needs. If I can’t, a lasting relationship with my daughter will be an easy choice. Following through with the choice will be more challenging.

A little bird . . .

I have a little bird from whom I occasionally get a bit of news.  Here is what the bird wrote.

“We were told last week that six families have received referrals (all for boys) and that another four referrals (2 boys and 2 girls) are in process. We were told that none of the referrals were for us (presumably we are third on the list for girls). For the six families that have received referrals, we were told that they just filed their USCIS forms in the past couple of weeks, which means it can be 60 days from there that they get approval. It looks like at best those families will be traveling in july, but that is just our guess.”

Presumably we are second on the list for girls.  But there is no need to get excited yet.  Earlier in the year, from a different bird, I found out that a child meant for us was hospitalized and later classified as unsuitable for international adoption due to the seriousness of the illness.  Part of me wishes that I had been consulted on what was “suitable”, but that is not part of the process.  

In the best of scenarios, the earliest we would travel is now August.  The good part is that we can go ahead and make plans and enjoy summer.  The bad part, if we don’t complete travel prior to the start of classes this Fall I may have to give up teaching for another semester.

A Slow Day

There is little to report today.  We are still waiting for our home study renewal package to come, it should arrive tomorrow.

 I spent most of the day in theatre storage packing props for the move.  This whole process promises to be exhausting.   Right now we are packing and moving all props and costumes to a lounge adjacent to the storage area.  The painters are right on our heels as we empty each room freshening everything up for the campus archivists to move in.  We can’t yet move our things into our temporary space because it is not yet ready.   This would only be half as frustrating if it weren’t for the fact that we will need to move everything again next summer.  Boy do I hope the new building is ready!

I picked S up from school and let him play briefly with his friend, but not for long.  Very chilly and damp today.  S is very excited about summer vacation and he asked about vacation as we walked home.  We looked on-line at Busch Gardens in Virginia since he said he was interested in the beach.  He was not really thrilled with what he saw and seemed much more interested in Colonial Williamsburg.  Fine by me, I’m more interested in Colonial Williamsburg too!  Well, one thing let to another (as on-line time frequently does) and next thing I know J is walking in the door and I haven’t even thought about dinner yet.  I had to work fast because S had his scout graduation tonight.  I grabbed some frozen quesadillas, tossed them in the oven.  In the fridge, plain left over white rice (I LOVE MY RICE COOKER!) and reheated it with a can of black beans from the pantry and a few seasonings.  Wow, what a good really fast meal it turned out to be.  It kind of blew my calorie count for the day (over by 300 ) but I did more physical work today than normal and cold damp weather always cranks up my appetite. It will probably even out just fine.  We finished up with enough time for homework and a little play time too.

Off to scout graduation.  Which was nice, not too organized, but under an hour!  Home, snack for S and bed!

Tomorrow, more mundane things, but hopefully I can get out to buy flowers for the yard.  The weather man says it will be a nice day.

but who’s counting

four.

I am.

While waiting for our referral I have begun counting other things too.  

Goodreads.com has become a almost constant companion.  I have 430 books on my list, read and to-read.  I have had a lot of time to read this year and have not had that pleasure in a long time.  I have had excellent luck finding things to read that suit my tastes.  The reviews and comments by real people seem to be far more useful than publisher provided information alsone.  I am also hooked on the never ending book quiz and have finally broken into the top 100 ranked players.  I don’t think I will ever make it onto the leader board which is determined by the most correct answers.   

I count my calories on Fitday.com.  So, far I have lost 10 pounds in about a month.  I should also add that my food hobby previous to fitday was binge eating, which caused me to gain 25 pounds.  I was at the diet or shop point. I could not even put on the vast majority of my clothes and the ones I could caused me to be very uncomfortable.  Yesterday my Fine Cooking Magazine came in the mail.  Wish me luck.

So, this blog is supposed to be about a busy working Mom.  How is it that I have all this free time on my hands?  NO BABY!  My employer did not want me to disrupt my teaching by leaving the country for two weeks.  So I have been on unpaid leave from my teaching duties this entire academic year while I wait.  Fortunately, I have been allowed to design a few shows, and had the time to take on some projects that I normally would’ve had to miss.  I did a small project for a large theatre company near where I live and was able to participate in an exhibit of theatre designers.  This has kept me from going completely bonkers.  Next fall, back to my normal schedule, I hope, but I wouldn’t count on it.