The Adoption Triad

Jane Jeong Trenka wrote this amazing piece "What Adoption Means to Me" from the point of view of her Korean mother. It is powerful. This piece of reading can't/shouldn't/won't leave you - and don't let it.

Blueberrie's first mom didn't "give" her son to me. I know my previous post simplified her actions when I used the term "giving." In an effort to talk about a homily of 'giving', I used the word itself to express that the only person I could think about during the homily was Blueberry's mother. I didn't intend to portray her as having absolute agency in that moment - because I think she was coerced by the conditions of her life - her powerlessness - her poverty - her social status- and too many other things I just don't know about. I've often imgainged what were the combination of factors that really did 'force her hand.' 
I can't get it right in words. Go and read the piece by Trenka.

A giving homily

Today Blueberry, Mr. Silly Pants, and I continued to inquire about places of worship in our community. We're searching for a Lutheran Church here in our home town - the search is made difficult because we are not finding Lutheran places of worship with a diverse membership. But, we continue to search.
There are parts of this search that I enjoy - I like to visit these different communities of worship. I like to hear different pastors speak to their congregations. I like the exposure to different Lutheran communities of worship. I was not raised Lutheran, and my comittment to attend a Lutheran church is really part of my comittment to my husband, who has a long family history of Lutheran faith (both father and paternal grandfather were Pastors).

Today we heard a homily about giving.  It was a good homily. It hit me just exactly where I am and it has stuck with me all day. There was one profound sentence in response to a reading from Mark: "what about the woman who gave everything she had?"  All I could think of - the ONE AND ONLY woman who came to my mind - is Blueberry's first mom. She, SHE gave ME everything she had. She gave me her son. HER SON.

And then I read this today. Third Mom says,
     "No action is moral if it ignores the bad fruits (think Matthew 7 16) that result from it. This happens in adoption; this good thing that so many promote has led to some appallingly rotten fruit from people who know how to game the system for personal, institutional or governmental profit. Even when an individual adoption is done ethically, if the adopter never gives a backward glance to the families left behind or forward glance to the rights of the adopted, the fruit is just as rotten.
    Promoting material and social justice for surrendering parents and equal access to identity for adopted people has to be the starting point for any discussion of adoption. Promoting adoption without equally addressing these, and not just paying them lip service, creates a lie by omission, an untruth. This seems so incredibly clear to me, I honestly don't understand why people don't see it." 
 
She's right. She's so right on. I have to be careful about being arrogant. I have to be cautious about feeling somehow clearer or more enlightened than others on this same complicated journey in IA. I have to be wary of my own "knowing" and "certainty" about my own giving - even if I see it as inspired and right. Social justice is not clear as day in all cases. And yet, HIS first mom gave me everything. She gave me her SON. I won't participate in a lie by omission. I won't pay just lip service to her, the one who gave me everything.
 
I'll muddle through, as awkward and difficult as it feels sometimes. I'm totally on it - right now - on it.
 
How do you do it - you know, make sense of having been given everything?

Sunday Snapshot

Lalibela, Ethiopia: funeral

Wordless Wednesday

Build a Well

I'm just sitting here awe struck by this project. The video is powerful. The project is inspired. My own personal need to change something BIG in my life is burning a hole in my being - it's BIG, I tell you, it's big.

Watch it. Make it happen. Build a WELL! Then help build a school and a medical clinic.

Powerful stuff. Food. Water. Medical Care. Basics. Human Rights. Human Dignity.
How is it a little boy has caused such a stirring in my heart?

The Heaviness of Having

I have had enough life experience, enough travel experience, enough intimate experience to understand how deeply privileged my life is. Although I grew up in the home of a single mom who struggled (and I remember needing to contribute my newspaper route earnings to keep the heat on), I am also well aware that my family had a net - a net mom never activated, but a net that kept our dreams intact and our family expectations high.

I also remember being at the grocery store with my mom one evening when I had babies who were small and mom's company was a treat.  I was complaining about something or other - perhaps student loans - perhaps the slow pace of moving from student life to professional life - but it was some sort of 'complaint' a daughter might share with her mom. I was complaining as I was mindlessly loading my grocery cart with milk, ice cream, cream cheese, bagels, bread, good coffee (never Folger's for me), brown rice, tofu, fresh fruit and vegetables....My mom stopped me. She said, "look at what you are doing." I looked into my cart. I remembered eating oatmeal for dinner with her. I remembered the many many times she bounced checks for groceries, or insisted that EVEN if we couldn't afford standing rib roast for the holiday we were having it! I swallowed and looked at her. Mom. Sage. Straight Talker. Hard Worker. Victor.

DAMN I MISS HER. She'd tire of my intellectualizing about this - but she'd also kick my butt into action instead of all the head talk.

The heaviness of having is haunting me. And, it's stretching me. I have commited my life to recognizing and acting on my privilege. The privilege of my color. The privilege of my class. I've been married twice - both times to doctors. My husband is the son of a Lutheran pastor. Both of us have had the privilege of upward mobility. Our color, his gender, our education all add to our privilege. I get this. I wear it every single day. I live it every single day.

Have you seen this? http://www.globalrichlist.com/

Are you suprised? I am - even when I put in my income from being a public school teacher (notoriously underpaid - plug for fairer pay for public school teachers!).

Heavy with Having - I'm thinking about access to clean water today. I'm thinking about food today. I'm thinking about access to medicine today. Here, there, and everywhere.

Sunday Snapshot

Outskirts of Hosanna, Ethiopia

These boys meet the CHSF bus, I think, for nearly every travel group. The false banana grove is impressive, and a great location for photos. This photo was taken by a travel mate in adoption - he's a marvelous photographer - thanks Mike!

*I'm not doing the noboploboproblemo thing that so many of you are doing for 30 days!