A Brain Bender, Ya'll

Weird weird weird. Let me tell you what happened to me today.

Some of you may know that I've been keeping a photo blog for a few weeks now. A couple of days ago, I got a comment on a photo but didn't actually find until today. It was just a general, "nice job on the photos" comment from some guy in the Netherlands. So I looked at his blog and found that he takes some really gorgeous photos and that I should get a better camera.

I found on his blog that he'd chosen a while back to give awards to some of his favorite photograph bloggers, so I started looking at who he deemed an award-worthy amateur photographer. There was this one lady from Kansas he mentioned, so as I was scrolling through her photos, I came upon a photo that those of you from Jackson, Mississippi might recognize. This slide is the exact one (or exact replica) that used to be at Riverside Park. As a kid, I loved this slide for how it made trips to the moon so easy, with lots of scary, shaking reentry into Earth's atmosphere...and not even mentioning the aliens we met while up there.

I sat there for a few moments reminiscing about that wonderful slide and then decided to post my own comment about it. Well, lo and behold, a fellow Jacksonian had beat me to it! She'd commented on the exact slide I was remembering. So I wanted to know who this person was out there in Internet-Land who knew about my beloved slide.

Now this is where the story gets really weird. I clicked on this commenter's name and found out that she has a blog herself, one of them mentioning "PDX" in the title. Why isn't that the symbol for Portland? Yes it is.

It turns out that this cool woman is from Jackson but has recently moved to Portland with her 81-year-old mother. And not only that, but she blogs about the experience and comes out with sentences like this:

"Mama's wearing my Dale Earnhardt Jr. red hat--she felt her perm was too far gone to foist her hair on the public."

I could never in a thousand years write a worthy description of how entertaining this woman's blog is. After reading it for about ten minutes, I realized how I need to get up off my hiney and go do some living. These two women are fierce, I say, fierce. I want to be just like them.

Go take a look here, and be sure to check out the pictures of her mom walking her dog, Duncan, wearing said Dale hat.

So I find out about a fellow Jacksonian living in Portland through a woman in Kansas who posted a photo of the same slide I played on as a child which won her an award from a Dutch photographer who somehow found my photo blog. Got it? And if the story couldn't get any more convoluted, it turns out that my friend Neola actually knows these two women. Lots of bewildered head-shaking going on in the Rooney house this afternoon, let me tell ya'.

*

Besides all the head-shaking, it's been a pretty low-key weekend, mostly boring. I got the new Ben Lee CD in the mail, and I'm not too crazy about it. Sigh.

Despite thinking they're kind of pretty and even taking pictures of them, I got bitten on the face a couple of nights ago by a spider. I woke up with a big welt on my forehead which is not a zit. Believe me, I know what zits are like and this thing refuses to pop and is like a small anthill. Gross.

Ted's currently in the basement rocking out to the Indigo Girls.

The morning after we did yoga, I woke up in severe pain. I asked Ted if his upper arms hurt as much as mine. He nodded yeah but said that was about it for him as far as soreness went. I said, "But what about your abs?" He nodded yeah. Then, "And what about your thighs?" Yeah. "And here?" pointing to my hiney. Yeah. "Oh, and your sides?" Ok, that too...

We also hosted a couple of Ukrainians last night. The formality and insisting they sit down and have tea and sharing the bar of chocolate they brought from the Ukraine and hearing them talk about trying to visit Tatry...it all felt so comfortable for me, like the good ole days in Slovakia. Then we got home from church this morning (we had to go really early) and found this in the kitchen:
They'd washed not just their own dishes but ours as well, despite there being a dishwasher right there. And these dishes were spotless. It reminded me of how my Slovak friends, even guys, would fight over who got to wash the dishes at my place.

It's been a weekend of spider bites, rain, worse-than mediocre Ben Lee, Ukrainian visitors, Indigo Girls, Portland-love from Jackson, hot tea, sparkly wine, and clean dishes. See? Even the most boring weekend can have its bright spots (well, excluding the spider bite that is not a zit).

Of Interest, At Random

A few things rattling around in my head the last couple of days:

1. This first thing rattling around is more in my heart--warm fuzzies of happiness at all the well wishes we've received upon being place on the official Waiting list. Thank you. Each notification of a new comment made me genuinely happy.

Since being approved, I'm finally allowing myself to think of this person tangibly, which means lingering over the parenting section at the bookstore and coming home with these (both cheap, used copies! Yay, Value Village!):
Any of you read either of these? The Idiot's Guide was more of a joke for Ted (the man has never once changed a diaper in his life, despite having two younger siblings and thousands of nieces and nephews). The Baby Whisperer book looked interesting and turns out a good-Momma friend from college recommended it to me too. The author is English, so I enjoy all the mums and nappies.

None of the rest of these are in any way important, or even relating to adoption, so no worries if you don't feel like bothering to read them.

2. How is it that Target can sell for one measly dollar a little sticky note pad with all the characters from The Office on it? This little thing pleases me to bits.

3. How many of you have listened to Sufjan Stevens? I just discovered him a few days ago and promptly fell in love. Then our Scottish cross-country cycling friend John who was staying with us for a few days told me that he's one of his favorites. Then our Mississippian recently married friend Rusty referred to Mr. Stevens on his blog as being post-hipster or something. Despite being so behind the times, I urge the two of you out there who've never listened to his music to go get some Sufjan Stevens. Look him up on Myspace or download "For the Widows" and be prepared to feel all warm and tingly inside from sadness and longing and joy all at once. It's beautiful, I tell you, beautiful.

4. Last night on Kid Nation, I was happy to see them all eating grits for breakfast one morning. I think one of the kids even said, "These grits are good." Well, of course they are! They're grits, what did you think they'd be? If I were a kid on that show, I'd be more motivated by a winning a star worth its weight in grits than of gold.

5. The other day on myspace, an Oregon friend sent out a bulletin listing all the great things about this state. One of the positives was "We have no accent." Tell me, why would this be a good thing? I see it as something the state lacks.

6. Today in my first yoga class in more than a year, the teacher was having us do the challenging pose of the day, Flying Dolphin. Amidst lots of huffing, scrambling, slipping of mats, I heard a loud thump. The teacher laughed and said, "Or you can just do Falling Dolphin too."

7. If you find yourself with a couple of minutes to spare, go look at the new video up on that Pippystyle blog linked on my page to see a truly remarkable cat. Your kids will love it. This is the same creature that begs for objects like staplers and bananas.

8. Why does it get under my skin so much when people refer to inanimate objects as "these guys"? In the five minutes I've seen of Rachel Ray, she referred to her mini-pizzas as "these guys" and I knew I couldn't watch anymore. In a local kitchen store a few days ago, the lady showing me their offerings of teapots kept pointing to them Vanna White-style and saying, "Now these guys are all stainless steel...." I walked out of the store without buying any of their stinkin' $50 pots, instead making my way home with this guy for $4.99 from Value Village where there were plenty of potentially crazy self-talkers walking the aisles listening to the used tupperware but no one calling anything guys :
9. What do these graffiti stencils mean and why do they entrance me so?

This one was found on Hawthorne Blvd, SE Portland:

Verona, around the corner from where we were staying:

Verona:

My favorite one, closing time in Venice:

Glimmers of Excitement

We got two emails today. One subject line says, "DOSSIER COMPLETED!!!!" The next says, "You are on waitlist!" with the four exclamation points and then the one. So after all the false starts, we're now officially 100% Waiting, capital W. Weird. Happy. As I just told my sister, "It's sort of like being in the third trimester now, just without the swollen ankles and stretch marks." Time now to paint the empty bedroom and set the little onesies out?

We're putting in a request for one who laughs like this:

Happy Birthday, Ted!

From who you were:
To the first time I saw you:
Even to the second and third:
I knew: Ted is someone special.

For the way you root for the underdog:

And the gillions of ways you've made my life pretty interesting:
Happy Birthday. So glad that you're the future Baby Daddy. I wubbu.

This Blogging Community

This couldn't have been a more perfect September morning. I still haven't gotten over jet-lag, but I'm actually pretty happy about that, as it means that I'm asleep most nights by 10:00 and awake at 6:00 or 7:00. For those who know about my difficulties sleeping, this sleeping such regular hours is a big deal. I'm very thankful.

This morning I woke up having slept like a normal person and saw that it's going to be one of those gorgeous, sunny, crisp days. I came down and ground my favorite "smooth and mellow" TJ's coffeebeans and ended up not long after at the computer, going through my daily check of blogs.

Then...lo and behold...I'm crying. Drew and Carey got their referral of the itsiest bitsiest most gorgeous 10 week old baby girl who they've named Zoe.

We had the chance to meet Drew and Carey a couple of months ago while we were both down in Southern California, so happy to have another Gladney couple relatively close by. We talked about how envious we'd been of all you Midwesterners and Texans who have lots and lots of other Gladney families in the vicinity to meet up with. We went to our requisite Ethiopian dinner and had the best time sitting around talking about the whole process and finding out that we share a lot of the same opinions about lots of things. And it'll be so fun one of these days to have our kids meet and maybe play at the beach.

So as I read their blog and looked at that pretty Zoe face, I kept getting choked up. Of course, it's because I'm so happy for them, but I also felt so thankful for this blogging community. Right after reading their wonderful news, I came upon this artwork by a fellow blogger and gasped at how beautiful and brave her work is. I can't get over how giving and generous it is that all of you bloggers are putting your lives out there for others to be encouraged and challenged by.

Yesterday while having breakfast with a friend-in-the-flesh here in Portland, I realized how often I was bringing up different bloggers whenever she'd ask me about the adoption process. On one hand, it feels a little embarrassing to know that I'm talking about you guys like we're life-long friends while in reality I've only met Drew and Carey in person. But on the other hand, this is the 21st century after all and I guess it's time to accept that the World Wide Web just might be our modern day town hall/living room.

So, thanks to all you adoption bloggers who have been such an inspiration to me and to so many others. I know that this process would be so much harder without all the insider tips, cheerleading, humor, and yes even friendship that you offer.

*

We got this brief email today from Kate:

I received the CIS document today and have sent it off for processing. I will let you know when it’s back and everything is ready to go to DC.

That was faster than we thought, always a nice surprise in this process. When everything goes to DC, we are officially on the waiting list. Whew. This may well be when I start to finally get excited.

Change of Season

Fall makes a lot of people introspective. It gets them thinking about how everything dies, which makes them wonder about what comes next, which makes them moody. The days for lounging about in the sun are over. No more carefree frolicking around at the beach, drinking cold daiquiris with umbrellas. The Beach Boys days are over in the fall. It's all seriousness and back to work by September, so they say.

I say good riddance. I've never liked summer, even when I was a student and it meant not having to go to school. I always liked school and sort of missed it when I wasn't there. Growing up in Mississippi, summer meant days on end spent indoors in the air conditioning as much as possible. We'd only go out after dark to play so as to avoid heat stroke.

Granted, I do have some good memories about summers, but those are all centered in some way around finally, by the grace of the Good Lord, getting a break from the g-d*mned heat. Like when my sister and I would finally arrive red-faced and sweaty to Granny's house, after walking the mile to get there, and immediately go lay face-down on the central air conditioning vents in the floor. We'd go to separate rooms and try to talk to each other through the vents while we cooled off. Or like when we'd jump into the freezing cold swimming pool of my best friend Bethany's grandparents and build forts in the water out of the thousands of floating loungers they had lying around. But then I'd have to take the abuse by Bethany's brothers about how fat I was, listening to them yell at me not to splash all the water out of the pool when we'd jump in over and over while playing 'shark'.

So even my good summer memories were never untainted by something sweaty or mean.

I guess that's why I feel the opposite of what a lot of people feel at the onset of fall, or autumn, if you're feeling fancy. Fall feels so much like a relief from the torment of heat, sweat, and ridicule about my piggy 10-year-old body squeezed into a bathing suit. It means the start of something new, like a brand spankin' new school year, complete with, oh joy of all joys, new school supplies with that delicious new paper smell.

When I became a teacher myself, I always really liked the first week of school. Where I taught in Slovakia, it meant getting to meet these new, unique, interesting people wearing funky scarves and with off-kilter dyed hair (including boys). The first week of school, they'd all stare at me dumbfounded, especially the first-years (freshmen), and I'd most times have to console one or two after class, pleading with them not to give up and move to the math class, that they will start to understand lessons taught 100% in English.

Since there was always a wacky schedule that first week of school, it also meant sitting for hours in the English 'kabinet' (office) with my colleagues, drinking instant coffee and catching up with each other, then going out after work, walking to the city center where I was constantly running into people I knew. Lovely.

I love how the air feels so clean in the fall, and as my friend Melissa said yesterday, there's even a different smell to the fires that people burn. It's not like the fire-pit smoky smell of summer, but more of a crisper and warmer smell with fall fires. And pretty soon, we're going to start getting the crunchy sidewalk leaves and the rain, which lets us bring out our cozy sweaters and hats.

Then Halloween comes, and with all the pumpkins, scarecrows, and tiny bags of skittles, I could nearly puke of giddy eupthoria.

So I guess it makes sense cosmically that with this turning of the season, we finish our adoption paperwork. This morning, we gathered up the papers from Immigration (the 171 form), took them to the bank and got them notarized. Here we are with our favorite notary, who notarized countless documents for us, never once asking if we're actually bank customers (we are). He's been really sweet through the whole thing, and even played along as we commemorated the event:


He's one of the special agents who, in his way, is helping us get through this adoption. I look forward to taking the kiddo in there one of these days to say hi. And I hope his bosses read this blog and give him a big, hefty raise, or at the least, a chunky Christmas bonus, just for being a good guy.

Now, go get thee all with pumpkin.

Prodigal

When we landed in New York, I turned on my phone and listened to a message from a neighbor I'd never met calling to ask if we own a cat named Buddy. My heart sank, fearing the worst. What with the traumatic life that cat has had, I couldn't help wondering what was coming next.

It turns out that from the day we left, he'd started hanging out at this neighbor's house nonstop. A year ago when we moved in, he discovered her yard, but as she has cats of her own (all indoor), she'd glare at him from the window, hoping to scare him away. At first, it worked, and he'd skitter away back home to us.

But when we left for this last trip, I guess he started to think (yes, I believe cats can think) that we weren't coming home, and he started going there for affection, coming home to our basement for food. Our neighbor said that he'd even started sleeping on their back porch at night and that he was letting them pick him up and snuggle. He rarely does this with new people, so he must have been especially starved for affection. Our neighbor kept commenting on how sweet and cute he is and how sad they felt that he wasn't getting proper love at home.

It made me sad to think that he'd given up on us ever coming home, but as Ted said, "At least we know that at least one of our cats actually misses us."

So when I got home around midnight, I went around the corner to his neighbor's house, poked my head over their wooden fence and said his name once. He came running, fussily meeowing at me nonstop. He'll normally go days without meeowing even once, so hearing this barrage of complaints was pretty funny and cute. He was trying to figure out a way over the high fence, which he usually doesn't do since he manages to get their yard some mysterious cat-way via our backyard.

He finally made the big jump up and let me carry him home, purring like a madman the whole time. He then slept by my side, on my chest, or next to my head all night, several times putting his nose right on mine. So very cute. There's the proof for all you non-cat people out there who don't think cats are affectionate or loyal. Here's the view I'd find every time I'd open my eyes that first night home:


Adoption news: I saw the infamous Immigration letter with my own eyes, but alas, we can't do anything with it until Ted gets home. He's down in Southern California for a few days finishing up that house project, so as soon as he gets back, we'll finally get to notarize the thing and fedex it to Kate. This is the last paper needed for our dossier to be finished. We hope to send it Wednesday, at which point we can officially sit back and wait. Weird to think that this one notarization will be the absolute last paper to complete...