Category Archives: Alaska

introducing grace

Posted on by September 4, 2013

It’s a fleeting spring day. We will have snow several more times, probably at least one more cold spell, and the weather will hem and haw its muddy way through the next couple of slushy months until we are dried out and blooming again.

 

But for today, we had sun. We ran errands in forty degrees and felt free without hats and mittens. Vin took most of the kids shopping while I took two of the girls to a local ice cream joint because Iree had earned a special treat. For just over $6, we ate mint chocolate chip and fireweed honey and chatted with tourists.

They asked if I recommended the ice cream, what fireweed jam tastes like, and what the heck a lingonberry is. They asked if I lived here. They asked if I was born here. They did not (amazingly enough) ask if I personally knew any political figures from here (wow!) which is probably the saving grace that kept me from pointing out the bumper sticker on the nearby rack that said, “Alaska is FULL. I hear the Yukon is lovely, though.”

Really, they were nice. Then they mentioned that they were sad to be leaving because it looked like it was almost spring here. “Actually,” I tried to tell her, “our spring is not really ‘spring.’ It’s muddy and messy and gross. It smells bad and looks terrible.”

She nodded with condescending expertise. “Oh, I know. It’s just like that at home, in Pennsylvania.”

Oh. Of course. Yes, I’m sure…it’s just like that. Pardon me.

Smile, wave bye-bye, and leave. Just like that, easy.

Everyone wants to be an expert. Everyone wants a little respect for knowing something. We’re all guilty. Usually it’s harmless.

Sometimes it’s not.

Our kids go swimming once a week, and next door is a place I’ve been curious about for a while. Our social worker mentioned it for our adoption and I thought I’d stop in just to check it out.

{have you ever done that, and left wishing that you had made an appointment to have all your teeth removed instead?}

I had Chamberlain and Reagan with me. We walked in and were greeted by the receptionist.

“Hi,” I said. Smile. “We finalized our adoption six months ago and I just wanted to look around here. Is that okay?”

“Are you having any problems?”

Um. Well. That’s a loaded question and I had no idea how to answer. So I fumbled with, “No…not really…well, just the normal stuff. Whatever normal is, anyway…” and I smiled again, hoping she understood.

She didn’t…but it was worse than not understanding. Instead, she knew all about us, and there was no correcting her.

“Six months home? Oh, you’re just fine. You’re still in the honeymoon. Let me show you the library we have here.”

“Actually, our honeymoon was over after three days with one of them, and we never had a honeymoon with the other,” I said.

She is looking at Chamberlain and doesn’t try very hard to hide the fact that she’s rolling her eyes at what I just said. “No, you’re still in it. Trust me. Just wait, it’ll get worse.”

Oh. Thank you so much.

Then she talked to me about books for adopting toddlers. And adopting from Russia. She never once asked how old the children were, where we adopted from, or how many other children we have. She obviously assumed that the children I had with me were both adopted and both toddlers, and since they were both white we had probably adopted from Russia.

Ohhhh. Of course.

I smiled. I really tried, at least…I think I was smiling. And I asked her, “Have you adopted?”

She straightened up a little. “Um, no. No, I haven’t…but I’ve done guardianship. Yep, I’ve been through it allll with attachment.”

Yes. Yes, of course you have. Except you haven’t, I thought, and left. Smile, wave bye-bye, and leave.

I felt like I’d been puked on by someone who was supposed to be there as a resource and instead was there only to inflate her own ego. It’s not the first time we’ve seen this in the adoption process...or the medical field…or anywhere.

We assume so much, and often know so little.

A while back, in an extremely rare situation, Vin was scheduled to work until the wee hours of the morning. I knew I was going to bed alone, locking up alone, turning off lights and tucking in kids by myself. I know that many married women do this often for a variety of reasons but I am not one of them. I made the best of it and thought I’d get some writing done, some primping done, and go to bed at a reasonable hour…say, 1 am. Maybe two.

Ha.

I’m obviously not responsible enough to put myself to bed at a reasonable hour. So after procrastinating for two hours, I stayed up until 3 am blogging, writing, and eating ridiculous amounts of ice cream. I felt safe, really. I can imagine few things more terrifying for an intruder than to be met with an Alaskan woman wearing an avocado mask, on a sugar high, with a .44 in one hand and her knitting needles in the other.

We had a situation over the last year that kept us on our toes, tightly sealed, and on the alert for months. We were on the lookout and on our knees for someone who had demanded more grace than most of us had left.

There are people that are presumptuous and intrusive and insincere, lacking boundaries and wanting camaraderie. Instead they are met with grace. People who willfully put themselves in a corrupt situation that hurts others, seeking acceptance and even hoping for approval. What they are getting is grace.

Maybe they don’t even know the difference.

My heart knows the difference, though. And my heart feels better when I am giving grace instead of giving in…or getting even.

 

“Oh, Mrs. Clennam, Mrs. Clennam,” said Little Dorrit, “angry feelings and unforgiving deeds are no comfort and no guide to you and me. My life has been passed in this poor prison, and my teaching has been very defective; but, let me implore you to remember later and better days. Be guided only by the healer of the sick, the raiser of the dead, the friend of all who were afflicted and forlorn, the patient Master who shed tears of compassion for our infirmities. We cannot but be right if we put all the rest away, and do everything in remembrance of Him. There is no vengeance and no infliction of suffering in his life, I am sure. There can be no confusion in following him, and seeking for no other footsteps, I am certain!”

– Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit


I’m learning that grace looks different in different circumstances. For example, in some cases we can smile and nod…and that’s grace.

In other cases, we can forgive…and also decide ahead of time that if a certain situation occurs, we will make every effort to aim judiciously and…and…only shoot the intruder in the leg, instead of a more vital area.

And that’s grace, too.

2 am breather

Posted on by February 8, 2018

In the middle of the night, in the middle of a cold, I am awake and not breathing.

I love to breathe. It’s probably my most favorite thing in the world…I love it even more than sleeping. But I really love them both so much that I really enjoy doing them at the same time. Every night, for hours on end…

But at 2am, not breathing puts a kink in the works and I finally stop tossing and turning and waiting for gravity to clear sinuses and give up. Out of bed, finding tissues, filling the humidifier, and going to the kitchen to grab a fresh glass of water…and on the way down the stairs something catches the corner of my eye, through the window, and stops me.

photo source

The sky is green, and moving. And He says, Go to the window and sit down with Me. I want to talk to you.

I briefly protest – Don’t You know it’s 2am and I have six kids and I’ve been sick for five days? And He says, Yes. Go sit down and rest with Me. Catch your breath.

So we sit down, and we rest. I look out the window, watching the sky move, and start to breathe again. He listens to me rattle on about all the overwhelming-ness, all the family stuff, the internal issues with kids and adjusting, and the external stuff with family and friends and ministry, oh my. We are in a season of tumult and uproar and we’ve had more than one life-changing phone call in the past few weeks, and there is heartache and chaos outside.

I tell Him, Wave to me if You’re still listening, and the sky lights up. He’s right there. And He talks to me, and there is peace inside, and I know I’m only getting a few hours of sleep but there is a deeper kind of rest that is happening and it heals me, too.

He says, That person you love, that you thought felt badly toward you, that disparaged you? He doesn’t feel badly toward you. He feels badly about himself, and he needs your prayer desperately.

He says, That person who accused you…give that to me. It’s okay. You are not thinking too highly of yourself, You are thinking highly of Me. Someday they will understand that.

He says, Those days that feel messy and off-track, with cat puke and poopy diapers and broken dishes and temper tantrums – those are days that remind you that you are in a war. You chose obedience over sterility. Wars are messy, and must only be entered into with a great mission in focus. Remember your great mission.

After a while, I went to bed and woke up tired and tackled a new day anyway. There were messes and multiple bodily fluids, and there was one day last week when Reagan broke three dishes before we got one of those phone calls.

who stills the roaring of the seas, 

the roaring of their waves,
the tumult of the peoples,
so that those who dwell at the ends of the earth 
are in awe of Your signs. 
You make the going out of the morning
 and the evening to shout with joy.

 

 Psalm 65:7-8
 

 

Today, we’ve been home for six weeks. We’ve noticed that most people don’t really understand what’s really going on here, and I’ve had a hard time keeping track of who we’ve explained certain things to. But we are slowly coming out of our hermitage and finally (!) had friends over for the first time last week. Twelve at the table, and moms and dads and a baby in the living room.

Yes, that makes thirteen kids altogether. Yes, this is only two families. Yes, we have our own football team; No, it’s none of your business if any of us are “done,” and Yes, we know how this happens:Paperwork, and lots of it. Although the, um, *cough* organic way is more fun and usually much quicker.


 Today was the first time we went as a family to another friends’ house. We are watching our kids closely to see how they do with other people – how they interact with them, how they approach them, and how they look for attention from them. We are not allowing them to hug other adults (would you allow your kids to hug people who are perfect strangers to them?) and we are asking our friends not to pick them up, snuggle them, hold their hands, etc.

I know, it’s counter-intuitive; we all want to love them and make up for lost time. But they need to understand that love and affection comes from Mama and Daddy and not from every random adult they come into contact with. Boundaries are hard and fast. Mama and Daddy are not replaceable, we are here to stay, and you are stuck with us. For good, forever.

Because of this, we are not having babysitters or childcare for months to come, and we’re missing out on some big events that we would normally go to. Banquets and fundraisers are out, weekly classes or small groups will have to wait for next year, and I’m pretty sure that seeing The Hobbit in theater is out of the question (sob!).

Loved ones, well-meaning ones, tell us how glad they are that we are home and all together and done with this process. Somehow we have this impression that adoption ends at the airport and everything after is rosy and romantic and enchanting. Yes, and they come with a free unicorn, too, remember?

It is hard. It is not like having a baby, having twins, or adding two of your friends’ kids to your family.It is like adding thirty kids to your family, and constantly trying to figure out which two are showing up at any given time. It is like feeding eight new kids. It is learning to give a consistent love to someone who returns it with a finicky love. It is the battle to protect everyone and still allow freedom to grow and move. It is a war zone, and some days it really looks like it, too.

It’s messy stuff…but He is the first one to enter the battle, and He already won. What a deal.

 He breathes on us to do things all the time – big things like adoption, small things like sitting down with Him at 2am. He breathes on us to do things that are understood by some and misunderstood by others. The civilian details are not so important. If He is breathing on you to do something, go. Sit down and talk to Him. He has incredible things to say. And if you ask Him to wave…I think He will.

a path through clouds

Posted on by September 6, 2013

Good morning from Spaghettia. It’s six am and I’ve been up since four, and I’m on my second cup of coffee…but they’re little cups. I really don’t know how these Europeans properly caffeinate themselves with these little cups.

It is familiar and still different. As I tried to catch up on sleep, I was roused several times by the noise of the street – trolleys, brakes screeching, horns honking, people swearing and yelling – and every time I thought, “Oh, we’re in Sofia again. As long as no one drives into the hotel, it’s okay…” and fell right back to sleep.

We had a wonderful weekend with our kids at home before we left. We planned to go to one of our favorite places and spent the day tromping through the magic up there, but when we arrived we were surprised by all of this misty cloudiness. We drove through the clouds thinking that maybe we’d get above them and it would be hot and sunny higher up, but no…we were just in the clouds. It was beautiful.

 

This place is for dreaming. Every time I come here I learn something new about Him, about me, about this life.

 

As we walked, we could only see a little way up the path. We’ve been here before, though…we knew that an amazing view was waiting for us at the top.
It was His allegory for our trip over here…we’ve been here before, but we really don’t know entirely what to expect. We can only see a little way along the path here, too.
We had three flights and two layovers and 28 traveling hours. In between watching movies on the plane and trying to catch a little sleep, we read the books we brought in our carry on bags. Vin is reading South by Earnest Shackleton, I’m still months into Little Dorrit. We just finished A Horse and His Boy with the kids before we left, and I’ve also been reading Genesis and leaning hard into the Psalms.
A Horse and His Boy is my very favorite in the Narnia series. A boy named Shasta is on a journey, and he is walking in the mountains through thick fog, and Someone is beside him. He can’t see because of the fog, but he hears breathing to his left, right at his side. He finally he asks, “Who are you?” and the answer comes from that most-loved of all lions: “One who has waited long for you to speak.”

 

 

Through the conversation, the boy discovers that his life has been a series of divine encounters that he knew nothing about. He learns that he was protected, and loved, and watched over.

 

 

The next day, Shasta comes back through the same path he had walked in the fog with the Lion. We read this part with the kids a few days ago:
The hillside path they were following became narrower all the time and the drop on their right hand became steeper. At last they were going in single file along the edge of a precipice and Shasta shuddered to think that he had done the same thing last night without knowing it.
                                    
“But of course,” he thought, “I was quite safe. That is why the Lion kept on my left. He was between me and the edge all the time.”

 

 

We made it through the fog to the lake at the top of the trail. This is Gold Cord Lake at Hatcher’s Pass.
Here’s what we saw:

The fog started to clear a little, and we could see the view that we knew was there all along.

When the fog clears and you can see things closely, the details are marvelous.

As we flew through clouds from Anchorage to Seattle, I read this:

And now the day arrived
when he and his family were to leave the prison forever,
and when the stones of its much trodden pavement
were to know them no more.
– Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit

 

 

and this:
You make known to me the path of life;
in Your presence there is fullness of joy;
at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Psalm 16:11

 

And as we risked the ocean on the flight from Seattle to Frankfurt, I read this:

Up here in the clouds, everything was seen through cloud, though their voices and all other sounds were surprisingly clear.
– Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit

and this:

 So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her,
“You are a God of seeing,” for she said,
“Truly I have seen him who looks after me.”
Genesis 17:13

…and this:

My steps have held fast to Your paths;
my feet have not slipped.
Psalm 17:5

 

 

This afternoon we will drive to the town where Reagan is. We’ll have our kids tomorrow. We will take them out of their orphanages, and the stones of their much trodden pavement will know them no more.