It’s always the small details that startle you and bring the reality of a life-defining situation home in a way that the huge and obvious details don’t.
Per and I have discussed and talked over so many ways in which our lives will change tomorrow, after the meeting in court, when we can finally bring William back to the hotel with us, when we can safely answer “yes” instead of “no” to the people we have met here who ask us if we have children, when we have him with us all the time as opposed to two hours a day on week days. Even with all this imagining and discussing though, I am pretty sure that reality still hasn’t quite sunk in as evidenced over dinner tonight, when I leaned back in my chair and said “So just think, tomorrow, we have the court date...but then Friday at least we can sleep in as long as we want...that will be sooo good.”
I just hope William gets the memo. ;)
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Wednesday, 4 November 2009
Monday, 2 November 2009
Where In The World Is...
Everybody in my crazy family!:) Per and I are sitting in a hotel room in Mount Lavinia, Colombo, Sri Lanka waiting for our room service and listening to the sounds of the tropical monsoon that’s whipping the palm trees on the beach below us back and forth. My brother Kelly, (who shares my birthday but is three years younger than I am), is studying at a seminary in Edmonton, Alberta and I am assuming that after his first night of sleeping on a bench outside the seminary because he was locked out, he has never had to do it again. I say assuming but I should really say hoping...Edmonton is cold. Really cold. And at some point, it has probably had the dubious honor of being the murder capital of Canada, but hey, really, what big city hasn’t? ;) My adventurous and strong brother Michael, (who appreciates words, lyrics, and random humor the way I do), is on security duty in Thompson, Manitoba probably at this very moment, stomping through the snow banks of that chilly northern town twirling his baton and keeping the uneasy peace. (Do you have a baton Michael? If so, do you twirl it or is that cheerleading I’m thinking of? I’m just working with my limited imagination of what you do here so please correct me if I’ve got it wrong...:) My youngest brother Sean lives and breathes the balmy air of Nebraska, USA. He also is in seminary and full to the brim of zeal and passion for a staggering number of different enthusiasms and interests. My beautiful 19 year old sister is in Madugorje, Croatia right now with a friend and they are backpacking their way up to...ME! My parents are in Gimli, Manitoba and are celebrating their 30th anniversary very soon and it’s been so long since I’ve seen them. I miss them. I have one other sister as well, Shona, who was born after I was and who passed away from SIDS nine days later. I mention her because she is with God but she is also always with us. She is still my sister and death changes nothing except the tangible.
Norway, Canada, Croatia, USA. How far apart we all are. How far some of us travel to find our own path in life. How far God chooses to take us from home and family sometimes.
But not really. The distance is not in our hearts where it would truly matter but in miles made up of land and sea. Through travel and communication the world has become so small. It is no longer so daunting as perhaps it was for my great grandmother Rannveig, who at 18, boarded a ship in Iceland that was heading to North America and knew she would never see her family again. I have never been able to imagine what she must have felt standing alone on the deck knowing then that the world was very large, distances were very great and good byes were mostly final. But she kept photographs, (rare and precious in that time), of her brothers and sister with her until she died many years later, a gentle, kind old woman in the Betel Home in Gimli, who thought in her last days of life that she was a healthy young girl again, happy and secure with her family in Iceland.
Who’s to say she wasn’t?
Norway, Canada, Croatia, USA. How far apart we all are. How far some of us travel to find our own path in life. How far God chooses to take us from home and family sometimes.
But not really. The distance is not in our hearts where it would truly matter but in miles made up of land and sea. Through travel and communication the world has become so small. It is no longer so daunting as perhaps it was for my great grandmother Rannveig, who at 18, boarded a ship in Iceland that was heading to North America and knew she would never see her family again. I have never been able to imagine what she must have felt standing alone on the deck knowing then that the world was very large, distances were very great and good byes were mostly final. But she kept photographs, (rare and precious in that time), of her brothers and sister with her until she died many years later, a gentle, kind old woman in the Betel Home in Gimli, who thought in her last days of life that she was a healthy young girl again, happy and secure with her family in Iceland.
Who’s to say she wasn’t?
Sunday, 1 November 2009
The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows
Can you imagine me in court?!
For example, once while driving on country lanes at night with a friend back home, not wearing my seatbelt, I noticed with alarm the flashing lights of a cop car coming up behind us signaling that we pull over. Assuming incorrectly that everything in the world is about me I began to frantically fumble with my belt, unable in my agitation to do it up in the few seconds it took the officer to stride over to our car. In those seconds my life pretty much passed before my eyes, I began to envision all sorts of scenarios, a night in jail...well actually, why stop there...even a life in jail! I started to mumble incoherently to my friend that I would just tell the officer everything, admit to not wearing a seatbelt and take the punishment (which in Canada would amount to a fine, if even that, not jail time just so we’re clear.;). Luckily my friend being more clear headed than I, advised me to shut up and not say a word about the seatbelt which the officer wouldn’t have been able to see on a dark road anyway. I took her advice, beamed charmingly up at the officer and was very much relieved to hear that it wasn’t about my seatbelt at all! In fact, he just wanted to warn us that some criminal had just escaped custody and so to be careful while driving in this area in the dark. *Shakes head* And to think I was worried! ;)
Anyway, yes, me in court. With my quick thinking and collected nature, it’s what I was born to do. We have our court date on Thursday November 5th and though it may not exactly be what I was born to do, I actually do believe it will go smoothly and well. So long as I can remember that we are not actually being accused of anything and thus to try not to break down and confess to any transgressions or crimes. We just have to answer a question or two and hold out our arms and accept the gift of a small boy being given into our care by his mother.
In that moment we become parents. It’s a triumphant day for us. We don’t have to witness the tearing grief of a mother who has just given up her baby, who may, as the nuns told us, many of these brave women do, go back to the convent and weep until they are sick with the sorrow of it all.
November 5th 2009.
Try to imagine us all in court.
For example, once while driving on country lanes at night with a friend back home, not wearing my seatbelt, I noticed with alarm the flashing lights of a cop car coming up behind us signaling that we pull over. Assuming incorrectly that everything in the world is about me I began to frantically fumble with my belt, unable in my agitation to do it up in the few seconds it took the officer to stride over to our car. In those seconds my life pretty much passed before my eyes, I began to envision all sorts of scenarios, a night in jail...well actually, why stop there...even a life in jail! I started to mumble incoherently to my friend that I would just tell the officer everything, admit to not wearing a seatbelt and take the punishment (which in Canada would amount to a fine, if even that, not jail time just so we’re clear.;). Luckily my friend being more clear headed than I, advised me to shut up and not say a word about the seatbelt which the officer wouldn’t have been able to see on a dark road anyway. I took her advice, beamed charmingly up at the officer and was very much relieved to hear that it wasn’t about my seatbelt at all! In fact, he just wanted to warn us that some criminal had just escaped custody and so to be careful while driving in this area in the dark. *Shakes head* And to think I was worried! ;)
Anyway, yes, me in court. With my quick thinking and collected nature, it’s what I was born to do. We have our court date on Thursday November 5th and though it may not exactly be what I was born to do, I actually do believe it will go smoothly and well. So long as I can remember that we are not actually being accused of anything and thus to try not to break down and confess to any transgressions or crimes. We just have to answer a question or two and hold out our arms and accept the gift of a small boy being given into our care by his mother.
In that moment we become parents. It’s a triumphant day for us. We don’t have to witness the tearing grief of a mother who has just given up her baby, who may, as the nuns told us, many of these brave women do, go back to the convent and weep until they are sick with the sorrow of it all.
November 5th 2009.
Try to imagine us all in court.
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