Karen's Journey

The summer after we lost Blackjack -- a cat I will always consider to be one of the best friends I could  ever have hoped for -- I planted a garden to memorialize him. Ornamental grass because his favorite past time was to escape out a door far enough to hit a patch of grass where he would hunker down and start grazing. Catnip because, well, he was a cat. Black-eyed Susans because they are the color of his golden yellow eyes. And I wanted tulips. Black tulips.  There is no such thing as a black tulip, but if you research them, you will be directed to the variety known as the Queen of Sheba. They are supposedly so purple as to be almost black. When they are not in direct sunlight, I suppose that's somewhat true. To me, they still look purple. But they are still special to me. I call them "Blackjack's tulips," and I look forward to them blooming every year. It's a nice way to remember him by. He was One. Special. Cat.  And in this journey where the road...

...to punch them in the nose. The people who, when you say you cannot get pregnant, suggest "Why don't you just adopt?" As if. Note that all that is written below applies to adoption of older children -- which is defined as adopting a child who is not a newborn at the time of the adoption. As if domestically there are enough infants available for adoption to fill all the broken-hearted parents-to-be waiting for their own baby. As if domestic adoption plans never fall through and people don't get their hearts broken all over again. As if international adoption means you get an infant. Maybe, the young, with years to wait, will come home with a non-toddler baby. But not a newborn. More likely several months old at referral and closing in on a year by the time they come home. As if international adoption isn't fraught with uncertainties. Little to no knowledge of the child's heritage. The mother's health. The child's medical history. Countries...

I knew we were going to be OK after the first two months of struggling when my little boy got so excited to see the fee-lauers poking up through the ground and finally bursting forth in color. His original language doesn't have  blended consonants, so we got words like 'suh-no' (snow) and 'e-top' (stop) and 'fee-lauers' (flowers). You cannot find joy in beautiful flowers and want to share your discoveries with your mommy without being reachable. Somewhere in those angry depths was a child who could find joy. I don't think the purple irises bloomed that year, but this year they did. And now I am sharing them with you. Because it makes my heart sing to see the fee-lauers blooming too! This year he has planted sunflower seeds on his own, and he is carefully tending to them without any help or direction from me. I hope they grow, and I hope the squirrels and bunnies leave them alone!

Friends who I met through the Ethiopian adoption community, and whose first child -- just the cutest little thing -- joined their family from Ethiopia via adoption, recently announced that they are expecting their next bundle of joy in about six months. Via the non-adoption route. She is pregnant. They posted a photo of the ultrasound. I was instantaneously and simultaneously thrilled for someone else and wanting to bawl my eyes out in profound sorrow for what I will never have.