Good Aunties

So, the sisters have come and gone. They were good Aunties – handing out Castro hats and mini-volcanoes to Spike and helping me do some painting in Fang Fang’s room (pictures of the room soon to follow, I swear. It’s still not totally, totally, totally done yet). What I love about having sisters is that, at some point, they grow up, – and suddenly – they’re totally fun to be around. I mean, they were fun when they were kids, too – but one day you wake up and realize that you’re all peers – and then you’re all sitting around the table drinking wine and giggling and making gross off color jokes about booty juice. And that’s a good day. Plus you don’t even have to worry about being a good hostess for them (I did clean up a little before they showed - but the house really needed it anyway) and you can feed them Madelines for lunch and they won’t complain.

We saw The Namesake on Friday, which, unfortunately, wasn’t as good as I thought it was going to be. (Though Ren and I agreed that the actor who played the dad was pretty attractive). Spike had three birthday parties to attend (I love the kids in Spike’s class. I generally love their parents, too – but I really don’t love children’s birthday parties). The good news is that I was able to just drop him off for two of them and Ryan took on the third (a bowling party – which, I just don’t have words for how I really, really don’t care for bowling parties). On Monday we bought a changing table and some luggage (holy cow. That means we’ll be traveling soon, right?) which, because of really bad planning, meant that we had to drive in and out of town six times and swap our car for our truck and back again twice. Don’t even ask. So, it was a rather busy, but fun, weekend.

In Fang Fang news – we received her Finding Ad in the mail on Saturday. It was emotional. It’s the earliest picture I have seen of her (and probably will ever see) and it was pre-lip repair, and she was so beautiful – her eyes are really just incredibly stunning – and she looked so very somber in this photograph. There were some small details about what she was wearing and where and when she was found – and they created a little more of a picture in my mind (although who knows how accurate) about that day. After we finished putting her room together (we put up the crib this weekend, people. We’re getting serious) I laid out all the photos I have of her montage style on the floor of her bedroom and just sat and looked at them for the longest time. The longing that is involved in this wait is really just indescribable. I know that everyone who adopts goes through it on some level – that I’m not the first person to feel these feelings – or certainly the last -but that doesn’t make them any less real or difficult. I feel overwhelmed by it sometimes - like I’m grieving – but it’s always grief tinged with hope and excitement – and I know that those feelings – hope and excitement- will be the relevant ones soon enough. Adoption leads you to some strange new places, that’s for sure. And I know I’m only at the beginning of it all.

It’s quiet and sunny today. Slow and cold. Ryan is working out in the pumpkin house and Spike is still at school. I have a list of things to tend to – packing and ordering for the trip, doing some work on the script, making phone calls, catching up on emails… So I suppose I better stir myself and get busy. One cannot wallow in a paralysis of longing forever.