An Early Present

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas...

The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before October 31, 2006.

The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before December 14, 2005.

The True Meaning of Christmas

The presents have been bought, wrapped, and shipped off to their final destinations. The bags are starting to be packed to accompany us to the Lone Star state, where we'll spend the holidays with our families, with friends, and with the memories of those we've lost.

I read the most moving blog post I've seen in a long time today. I sat and read and cried for longer than I care to admit. This post is a beautiful tribute about the power of family - a love letter between father and daughter - a reminder to us all to treasure the here and now. I saw a little bit of my own father in her post - both of the man he was, and the grandfather he could have been to our little girl. What a touching and timely reminder to celebrate moments shared, rather than mourn things missed.

Delusion

I don't know whether to laugh, or to sob uncontrollably. I contacted an agency to ask about possibly switching programs recently, and got this as a response:

If I understand what you said correctly, you have a LID that is over one
year old. My understanding is that it is possible that you could get a
referral the end of 2008. Since the CCAA has a rule that the newest child
must be in the home for one year before you can receive a referral, it seems
that if you processed through the XXXXX program, you would need to put
the China program on hold.

I'm furious that there are still agencies out there selling the idea of quick referrals to clients. I'm even more furious that this is an agency with its own China program, so they should know better! I know there are financial considerations involved, but please - don't delude yourself or me that somehow the 43 weeks from now until October 27, 2006 are going to be referred out before the end of 2008. That would mean that the CCAA would have to start referring full months, which seems almost beyond the realm of possibility at this point.

I wish that the CCAA and our agencies understood one simple fact - all adoptive parents are looking for is the truth. If the wait is 1 year, 3 years, or 5 years, tell us that - we'll wrap our heads around it and make the appropriate decision for each of our families. It's the limbo that's changing us, binding us, hurting us. I turned to adoption partly to get off the "maybe someday, maybe never" train of infertility treatment. Ironically, I seem to have bought another ticket.

Book Meme

I ran across this book meme, and thought I'd give it a go. Sometimes reading adoption books when we are so far out from receiving a referral is less than inspiring, so I'm trying to catch up on some old classics I haven't yet read. Consider yourself tagged!

Bold the ones you've read, italicise the ones you might read, leave the ones you won't, and underline the ones on your book shelf!

The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
The Harry Potter Series - J. K. Rowling
Life of Pi - Yann Martel
Animal Farm - George Orwell
Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
1984 - George Orwell
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
Slaughterhouse 5 - Kurt Vonnegut
Angels and Demons - Dan Brown
Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk
Neuromancer - William Gibson
Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson
The Secret History - Donna Tartt
A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
Good Omens - Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman
Atonement - Ian McEwan
The Shadow Of The Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
Dune - Frank Herbert
The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand
Where the Red Fern Grows - Wilson Rawls
The Light in the Forest - Conrad Richter

How many books do you have?

Wow - I have no idea. More than I can count (but hopefully not more than I can read someday). At least three bookshelves full, and some stacked in piles here and there.

What's the last book you read?

My Friend Leonard by James Frey - a semi autobiographical tale of living with addiction. An interesting, albeit controversial, read. I found myself wondering if I enjoyed the book more when I thought it was non-fiction, or when I found out it wasn't entirely an accurate account.


What’s the last book you bought?

The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls - a non-fictional account of a woman who's parents were homeless by choice. I haven't read it yet, but I'm interested to understand what makes someone choose that kind of life for themselves and their families.

Five Meaningful Books

This is a tough one - narrowing my favorites down to five is nearly impossible. There are so many books I love in my ever-growing collection, but here's five that make me feel:

Into the Wild - I wish I were half as brave as Chris McCandless.
The Fountainhead - The imagery and detailed prose in the book are worth the inordinate amount of time it takes to read.
Where the Red Fern Grows - It makes me cry, every time.
Bridge to Terabithia - It reminds me that it's ok to believe in something you can't see.
Rebecca - Because I didn't see the twist coming....

Leave me a comment if you've got a favorite not on my list above - I'm always looking for a great read!