"'Remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.' That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it. 'Your father’s right,' she said. 'Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy . . . but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.'” -Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

The Past and I Love Daniel

Do you remember:
My prom theme:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=ORc5Td_T6og
When Axl Rose seemed so hot:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Ieouur9v8hk
When this was a a song to listen to over and over:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=yRYpd3_roHg&feature=related
I was going to put a Violent Femmes song here, but then I realized that even though I still dig the music, the message is not one I can condone as a teacher or a mom. I listened to them on my "Walkman" on a field trip to the symphony. (shame)
My first real concert (I was a late bloomer):
http://youtube.com/watch?v=T8NhJNpQlsY
When this song made me cry:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=8kpxNXZCLBg
This never seemed redundant:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=QQHrspjw4aA
And...
http://youtube.com/watch?v=KmBDgAcIt-0&feature=related
http://youtube.com/watch?v=pWW9RLnj4hg&feature=related
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Hvi4iA3PnKE
http://youtube.com/watch?v=BHRFZFmEq9o

That was fun.

Plus, I am not ignoring the news article or the DofS announcements. I think most of what is said has been said already except for the September 1 date for referrals. I cannot figure out how to comment about all of this yet except to say that I love Daniel. I am grateful to the friends I have made through this process, and I am so sad for those who are afraid, now, that their dossiers will not yield a referral in time to meet the deadline. I don't know what to say. This process has made me much more aware of the world. My rose colored glasses are permanently off, I am afraid. I think everyone is working for his own agenda, whatever that agenda may be. That is why there is fraud, and that is why people feel justified in defending unbelievably lengthy investigations (or non-investigations) for children who need homes. I am not blind to the problems in this world. All I have to do is go to work and see kids who are suffering at home, pregnant, in gangs, physically sick with problems they don't deserve. Kids are unfairly ostracized, and other kids are unable to see how their mistakes will affect their futures. Therefore, I am not one of those "things are meant to be" people because that would mean that a higher power meant for Daniel to spend his first year in an orphanage or that the same higher power means for some mothers to be unable to care for their children. I just do not believe that is the nature of our higher power; it is the nature of the world. This is a broken world. My loving Daniel does nothing to fix this broken world, but I think it does contribute to our lives being less broken, and love can never be wrong. I am very tired. My heart, my soul, my ability to cope are becoming broken with this broken world, except that I love Daniel. I want his investigation to take place, and I want an answer. I live in a powerful country with a government that is designed to help me as a citizen. I am not asking for an exemption from the process; I am asking that the process take place in an expedient and thorough manner. I am asking that this child, who I love, does not have to suffer any more because of this broken world.

All Tangled Up

Another weekend, sigh. I believe something positive is coming. Happy birthday to my little sis.

25 days past 60.

Thursday Night and No News, Really

Good old Bob wonders why I wake up a 3 AM every morning to check my e-mail. This is the look she gives me, and then she follows me downstairs and sits on my foot until I am ready to go back to bed. She is so sweet.

23 days Past Day 60

Thankful:
1) candles 2) old photographs 3) the way teenagers are funny without realizing that they are even though (and perhaps because) they are so self-conscious 4) how a kid will change and want to succeed if he knows you care about him, every single time...it just takes figuring out how to make him know you are sincere 5) This book I am teaching for the first time that my really tough class LOVES! They even read beyond what they are assigned, and I have actually heard them talking about it OUTSIDE of class: an English teacher's dream. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Book_in_the_Universe
6) Carowinds http://www.carowinds.com/#actions 7) Popcorn 9) To Kill a Mockingbird 10) safety pins 11) dental floss 12) a cooking stone 13) this story, even though it turns out to be an urban legend http://www.snopes.com/photos/animals/gratitude.asp 14) how I can still remember the very exciting night when my little sister was born (her birthday is Friday) 15) wildflowers 16) earthworms http://www.backyardnature.net/earthwrm.htm . While J's son has decided to be a singing vet http://vietkaz.wordpress.com/, Scotty has made the decision that he already IS an earthworm. He is obsessed with finding them; they are his friends. His earthworm name is Lucky Day. Lucky for Lucky Day, earthworm friends are readily accessible under just about every rock in the creek behind our house. Hours of entertainment. 17) that G cuts the grass 18) other PAPs who are working so much to bring our children home 19) looking at the bright side. For instance, our yard is full of clovers. In a drought, it stays green, and there are plenty of opportunities to find a lucky one! 20) Scotty makes up words like "celerybration". 21) glow in the dark stickers 22) hope 23) Maybe today will be our "Lucky Day".

We are so ready for you to come home to us baby Daniel.

Growing Up and So Easy to Love: Scotty

Tonight?

Still Hopeful

Thankful

We are now 12 days past 60. I am so thankful for these new pictures because I have been very concerned about Daniel's health, and he looks a little better; he is growing. I am thankful for
1) help from my stepfather 2) little tiny fingernails 3) Scotty's funny faces 4) baby S. finally with his mom and dad after waiting over 100 days for his I600 to be processed 5) no more runny nose for baby D. 6) Warm, breezy days 7) Hello Dolly cookies 8) HD Thoreau 9) Silva Plath 10) sandals 11) Will Farrell 12) The way Bob (my dog) follows me everywhere and then lies on my foot when I sit down.

New Pictures

A Love Letter to Daniel

I have never held you in my arms, but you live in my heart, and you will always live there. I don't know what you do with every minute of your day, but I dream of you at night. Yesterday, when I was almost asleep, I pictured you at the bottom of the stairs, looking mischievous, with one arm on the bottom stair, peeking around the corner.

Some day, when you are growing up and mad at me because I am so not cool, I hope you will know that there is no distance, no action, no obstacle so big that could take away my dreams for you. I will never stop loving you, no matter what. I love your life mother for her amazing courage. I love your smiling caregivers who clearly adore you. I love you, not just the part of you that will live with me soon, but the part of you that I can never know in first person, because that is what makes you you.

All of the waiting and wondering that I have talked about here, in this journal, does not define us as a family. What defines us is our devotion to each other and our courage.

Your daddy is dreaming of you, loving you every day, too. Your big brother thinks of gifts for you. He wants to get you a special blanket because he knows that it will make you feel safe.

I have never held you in my arms, but I am already blessed, beyond anything I could have ever imagined, by loving you. Thank you, Daniel.

You Know that You have Been Stressed for Way too Long When

I went back to work today after Spring Break, and it was SO nice to have something to do so I didn't mope and worry and obsess all day long. Now I am home (worrying and obsessing).

Quotations #2: Matthew Arnold

Here is one of my favorite poems of all time. It is so heart wrenching and beautiful. The sounds and pauses of the last line would work without even understanding the words.

"To Marguerite"

"Yes! in the sea of life enisled,
With echoing straits between us thrown,
Dotting the shoreless watery wild,
We mortal millions live alone.
The islands feel the enclasping flow,
And then their endless bounds they know.

But when the moon their hollows lights,
And they are swept by balms of spring,
And in their glens, on starry nights,
The nightingales divinely sing;
And lovely notes, from shore to shore,
Across the sounds and channels pour--

Oh! then a longing like despair
Is to their farthest caverns sent;
For surely once, they feel, we were
Parts of a single continent!
Now round us spreads the watery plain--
Oh, might our marges meet again!

Who ordered, that their longing's fire
Should be, as soon as kindled, cooled?
Who renders vain their deep desire?--
A god, a god their severance ruled!
And bade betwixt their shores to be
The unplumbed, salt, estranging sea."

Quotations from Writers I Like #1: Tom Robbins

“The bottom line is that (a) people are never perfect, but love can be, (b) that is the one and only way that the mediocre and vile can be transformed, and (c) ...We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.”

"Human beings were invented by water as a device for transporting itself from one place to another."

“Love is the ultimate outlaw.”

“As a child, I was an imaginary playmate.”

“Somewhere in the archives of crudest instinct is recorded the truth that it is better to be endangered and free than captive and comfortable.”

“The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is the more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious.”

“You don't have to be a genius to recognize one. If you did, Einstein would never have gotten invited to the White House.”

“Well, there's one thing to be said for money. It can make you rich.”

“Anybody who maintains absolute standards of good and evil is dangerous. As dangerous as a maniac with a loaded revolver. In fact, the person who maintains absolute standards of good and evil usually is the maniac with the revolver.”

And finally, sigh,
“Reality is subjective, and there's an unenlightened tendency in this culture to regard something as 'important' only if it's sober and severe. Your Cheerful Dumb are not so much happy as lobotomized. But your Gloomy Smart are just as ridiculous. When you're unhappy, you get to pay a lot of attention to yourself. And you get to take yourself oh so very seriously. Your truly happy people, which is to say, your people who truly LIKE themselves, they don't think about themselves very much. Your unhappy person resents it when you try to cheer him up, because that means he has to stop dwelling on himself and start paying attention to the universe. Unhappiness is the ultimate form of self-indulgence.”

So, it's back to life tomorrow. I have to choose not to shut down. Hopefully, we will have good news soon.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=eTql8gEZWM8