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*Tulip is all "Bish, please, it's 5:30am. Why are we awake?"

My Experience

I'm knee deep in a training schedule for the Austin marathon. Running—always with the dog, often with the Pops next to me pushing our Cheerio-gobbler—has proven to be a terrific head-clearer. It's fall now in Texas, which means crisp perfection with just enough of a cozy early morning chill. It's so strange not being hot anymore. Stranger still seeing Ava in hoodies and little pairs of jeans with butterflies on the pockets. I counted up the days since we first met. Five months, six days. I realize that Ava has now been with us longer than she was with her family at home, and then with her patchwork family at the Gladney Care Center. I wonder if somewhere in her subconscious she is able to let out a soft exhale that perhap she will not go on and on and on finding herself in the care of new people.

When I run I listen to the same mix of songs. This is the first song.



Every time I hear it I'm brought to tears. For me it captures the build and urgency of our adoption process—from the mournful beginning to the steady summoning of breath and strength to the heart-pounding moment of referral to the cymbal crashing trip to Ethiopia. There's even a little lullaby whistle at the end, when we laid her down for her first sleep in her new home. Sometimes I imagine in hazy fashion what this same time period might have looked and felt like for my little girl and my heart feels clotheslined. There I am with my family, gasping to myself, and wondering how it is we all found ourselves running towards and then finally alongside each other.

The Kid Rules

We met 10 weeks ago this Monday. 

The first 8 weeks together were pretty hard. I was flabbergasted by her, and she by me. We had good times but no rhythm. She was off, I was off—though everyone kept saying we were doing great, which somehow made it a lonelier experience. Didn't feel great. Didn't feel bad or wrong. Just felt overwhelming and very, very new.

Time did its thing. My girl now sleeps from 7 to 6:40. She has started babbling little stories to her stuffed bunny and cat and bear and puppy and pig. She loves shoes—her sandals, Mama's sandals, Daddy's sneakers. She wants all of them on her feet. She loves blueberries! She loves a good pratfall! She loves jumping off the side of the pool into her Daddy's arms! My girl laughs like you wouldn't believe. I dare say she's funny too. She doesn't walk; she scampers. When we are at a friend's house she plays and plays but checks in every 10 minutes or so with me. She does this by scampering over and flouncing down on my legs with a giggle and then—my heart!— gives me a big baby bear hug. 

I like her, I love her.

A Perfect Mess, A Glorious Hurt

What a melodramatic title for a blog post. Such are the peaks and valleys of my emotional life now.

Ava Bear. What do you need? Who will you be? Who are you now? 

Here are a few of the things I know about her. She loves her animals. She is breathtakingly sharp and alert, always absorbing and putting bits of information together and locking it all away. She gets easily bored. She's funny. She's fussy. She loves the water. She loves biscuits and peas and cheese and mangoes. She loves clapping and high-fiving and riding around in the grocery cart. She does not like baby gates or Mommy's laptop.

She eats.

She sleeps. (Putting her to sleep is hard though. Sometimes she wails and wails and what feel like essential pieces of me shrivel as tears shoot at the same time out of both of her big eyes. Papa Dog has taken to wearing his industrial-strength sound engineer headphones when he rocks and coos and eventually soothes her resistant little self to sleep.)

She poops (especially during family photos).

She splashes.

She walks. (Like a tiny drunken zombie at the end of a bender.)

She grows. On Monday she celebrated her first birthday with her first cupcake.

Ava's Mother. What do I need? Who will I be? Who am I now?

I am tired. I am suddenly aware of my limited reserves of patience and energy and imagination. I like to think of these as muscles that are being worked for the first time by a merciless trainer—who not only yells, but spits and vomits and craps on me. I'm working on my strength and endurance. I am sometimes struck with moments of great loneliness. I think I am lonely for the life I used to have that allowed for some alone time. I really miss Ethiopia, and the emotional intensity of that week. I am shaky from being hit again and again with overwhelming waves of tenderness and concern for the little person who now sleeps down the hall. I am still mystified by the realization that I have a daughter. I haven't seemed to regain my balance since we've met. 

It was two weeks and five days after we returned home when I was struck—again with the force of a rogue wave—with the sudden realization that I loved this little girl. 

I'm not yet the mother I'd like to be—but I have to think I'll get there one day.

Hello World

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Honse

The bunny rabbit is asleep. The Papa is off to the drug store to fetch her giardia prescription. The cats are sunning on the back stoop and Tulip is asleep at the foot of Ava's crib. Grandma Dog is making tortellini soup. (And the night before it was chicken cacciatore, and the night before tilapia, and the night before spaghetti and MEATBALLS. And every meal comes with chilled water and wine and a salad and folded napkins. I sit there and shove food in my mouth and drool and fall asleep in my plate and when I wake up the table is clear. I love this woman.)

Well, we're back but the world is different. That's all I have to say for now. We've seen so much. Meeting our daughter was one thing—overwhelming, happy, scary, heartbreaking, heartmaking, easy, hard. But that was all part of our lucky little life. The bigger part of the trip was meeting Ethiopia, and hearing and seeing and holding and saying goodbye to the children in the government orphanages. That was world-cracking. 

Meeting Ava's uncle Honse. That was a real whammy of beauty and pain. As soon as we pulled up he ran out to her, murmuring her name. He was handsome and elegant and calm. We sat for an hour with the social worker and two translators (from Sidamo to Amharic to English). We found out how her parents met and that she is beautiful like her mother and funny like her Dad. Honse is a farmer and he spoke a few words about that life. He and his wife have five children, plus Ava's four older siblings. His great wish, if God wills it, is for his niece to be well-educated, to grow up and be a famous doctor. His great wish, if God wills it, is that we will come back to Ethiopia so she can meet her siblings. 

Tim promised him that the next time we all meet he will be proud of the girl she has grown into. I promised him that we will love her always and infinitely, and that we will love and honor her Ethiopian family. I like to think he seemed relieved to have met us. By the end I dare say we were all relaxed a little and having a laugh here and there. Ava fell asleep in his arms and so we moved into the waiting room so she could finish her nap. Honse pulled a side of his blazer over her head so she would not be cold. My chair broke and I splatted to the floor and we all laughed some more, even the beautiful and sad young girl who was waiting to meet her son's new parents. Oh dammit, I'm always crying now.

Blurblefuzz

Me feel goofy-brained.

We leave tomorrow. 

I just cleaned out the refrigerator. I went atomic on that fridge. Motherfuh sparkles. I should probably be doing actual things on my checklist instead. 

We took Tulip to Red Bud this morning and she swam farther than she's ever swum (swum? swammed? swimmied?). She's like a little dinghy in the water, with her slow motor hanging low. How I love this little animal. I told Papa Dog—let's stop with that charade already!—I told Tim that I didn't have it in me to ride with them to the dog camp in the morning. Don't worry Tulip! We'll come get you and there will be special fancy ridiculously expensive organic bacon chews for you to slobber over when we get home and we hereby promise that you will always get to go to Red Bud and take long walks at Turkey Creek and that it is as important to us that this baby be nice to you as it is for you to be nice to the baby. Tulip! You're my best friend!

I'll meet Ava Lende in about 65 hours, by my calculations. Not to sound like Keanu Reeves here, but all I gots to say about that is "Whoaaaa." Be patient with Mommy and Daddy. Forgive us when we end up covered in powdered rice cereal and poo and inside out onesies and you look over and see Mommy rocking in the corner nubbling a too-small diaper. We know not how it will feel to love so hard so fast so we may only speak in monosyllables the first couple days as we stare googly-eyed at you. Ava! You're my daughter! 

Filoli. Rooney. Julie. Mama Sweet Potato. Coffee Mom. Odom! Jaynes in the house. Little Ethiopians, pudgy Ethiopians, baby Ethiopians, adoptive Moms to Ethiopians and beyond. People! You're my community!

Onwards!