Coming of Age Rites

In the past, cultures all over the world had special things that boys did to become men ; killing their first lion or bear, depending on the continent, going on vision quests, etc. I think the cultural equivalent for American techno-nerd boys is waiting in line for more than 24 hours for the newest game sytems to come out. Pictured is my son, Raymond (second from right on bottom) with friends at about 1 am or so on the 30th hour of their quest to be the first in America to own the prize. When Raymond first mentioned the idea,I protested that my child was not going to be one of those idiots planted outside of Walmart for a toy. As time went on, however I realized that this wasn't really about getting a toy or being first, it was a cultural event, a statement about your identity. These were not your average teenage boys. These were boys that had read Lord of the Rings more than once, that had plans of exactly what games they would play while in line, and talked of the glory of sleeping on the sidewalk in the freezing cold. These kids were wierd, and my son was one of them. I had never seen him so excited or pumped up. No indian brave or swahili warrior could have been any more elated than Raymond was the following morning, not just about getting a cool game system but about the experience itself. He told me that it was something he would recount to his grandchildren, that he would always keep the box to show them and tell the story of the 30 hours that he and his friends waited to get the newest and most inovative video game system ever made. He told me how they would look at it like it was an arrowhead or something. I'll never forget how excited he was .The times, they are a changin' and at least this didn't involve killing anything but some time.

Giving Thanks

I don't know how some of the people whose blogs I read regularly can keep up. Their thoughts must flow out through their fingers. I think of what I want to put in my entries and either can't get to the computer or am too exhausted to post what I can remember. This has been a long and emotional week. Tuesday we spent all day preparing for the boys scout trip to the Okefenokee Swamp and making food to take to Lincolnton, Ga. to visit with Wallaces family. We were happy that they decided to get together the day before Thanksgiving so that we could spend time with both sides of the family.
It was an emotional trip driving down there in the rain for the first time since Wallace died. I was used to just looking out the window at the scenery while he drove. We drove to the reunion last year and this year without him but not to Papa Bill's and Granny Grace's house. I dreaded it and looked forward to it at the same time. We did have a great time laughing and talking with everyone. The boys went fishing and Mandy and the babies dug around in the grass for pecans. It was so good to see the Barrs women in the kitchen teasing each other about the biscuits.
Thanksgiving day we went to Waypoint in Dawsonville where Cori and Nick work and live at the ministry there. It was so nice to have the use of their kitchen and dining hall and to be with some of the men in the program. There was too much food and everyone had a great time riding Honda toys and fishing. We finished off the day singing with the guitar for about 2 hours. We left with plans to go back and sing again for Christmas. I should have said some people finished with the singing. My day didn't end until midnight as I still had to go home and finish getting ready for the swamp trip.
The older I get the more I want to stop time. It goes too fast to take everything in. I want to go back and spend one more minute with this person , to enjoy this plate of food for a few more minutes, to play with this baby for a few more hours.

Monday Racing

I was running all day yesterday, tutoring, staffings at school, doctors appointments, swimmimg practice and we didn't even make the cub scout meeting. As I lay in bed last night I looked over at the book beside the bed; Margins by Richard Swinson, a book about slowing down and giving yourself margins to live life at a livable pace, to have time for God and family. "What is going on in my life?" I thought. Then the phone began to ring, over and over, M's number on the caller id. I just turned off the phone, too exhausted to deal with anyone elses problems. I thought back over the conversations at the SST meeting for two of my children. One long time friend who was there knew my other girls said, "It must be really hard to deal with this after having Cori and Aimee."They had a reputation for excellence that anyone who knew them had not forgotten. I had just been told the test results for the battery of tests that they had given to the little girls and it was grim. It's like being told you have something wrong but continuing to believe it's a mistake until you've gone to the 4th doctor who confirms it. I knew that there was probably alcohol damage to my childrens brains, but I kept hoping it was developmental delay or my impatient teaching methods or something else. Now I was hearing from an ESOL teacher, a testing expert, a speech and language specialist and a classroom teacher that had all been working with my children for 4 months and saw the same things that I did, documented on paper, retested several times to make sure. On one, 2% score on the language assesment, no understanding of abstract concepts, very little progress in spelling or reading or math above a k-1 level, overall 72 IQ. The other slightly higher but with much of the same results and a more profound deficit in understanding sound-symbol connections. They had never seen anything like it and were mystified as to how to write an IEP.
I have read so much about FAS that I'm afraid for them. I don't know what the ultimate outcome will be for my children but I do know what it could be. I know what they probably won't be able to do. I know that they are real people with strenghths of character, loving hearts and the desire to live "normal" like everyone else. And I know that I have an enormous task ahead to keep them from the fate of so many children with FAS/FAE.
I thought about why my life is so busy now compared to when my birth children were small and how I could simplify my life now. I know that I can streamline things and make it better but basically I am going to be running hard because I'm trying to give these kids every opportunity to succeed at being good people that will love God with all their hearts and will have every advantage I can offer them to succeed at finding their place in the Kingdom of God. It's not going to just happen. The truth is, though, that I'm not in control of their lives, I've given them to God and I'm just a tool that He can use. I need to keep that focus and not make myself or FAS or anything else, more important than His power and what he can do.

After 48 years, I have found out at least what I am not good at and one of those things is cooking. In spite of cooking in a restaurant for 10 years my homecooking that is edible is limited to coleslaw and mexican food. Fortunately, this bunch of kids could live on anything if you give them sour cream, hot sauce, jalapenos and tortillas (pictured) to eat with it. Pinto beans are hard to mess up so they get about 8 or 10 lbs. of those a week. I had one crisis this week when I had the big pot of pintos on the wood heater to cook. I had lots of errands to run and assumed that someone would keep the fire going. After running errands all day, I came home to find the tortillas heated and table set but the beans were raw. Picture 4 hungry, angry teenage boys acting like 4 grouchy husbands and you see I wasn't happy. Found 2 cans of beans and heated up twice as many tortillas and we made it through. The ones pictured are licking up the scraps, the rest having been excused. The poor potbellied pig doesn't get people food very often.

I talked to a very dear friend the other night. She has more kids than I do and is an inspiration to me. We have the same heart and, for whatever reason, God has put it in our hearts to be 'Mom to the motherless'. We compared amounts of pinto beans we cook and how our kids are always hungry; for food, for attention, for stimulation, for trouble. It seems that they are bottomless pits and we are not bottomless wells. There is always at least one of them that has our stomach in knots and our times of peaceful existence are usually measured in minutes and not hours. It is so nice to talk to someone else that can understand where you're coming from. I am so thankful for her. I'm also thanful for the other moms and parents who blog about their lives with adopted children, epecially the ones who are doing it for the Kingdom of God. I have had a kind of wakeup call lately that has opened my eyes to a lot of things, things I should be thankful for, frienships that I shouldn't take for granted, time that I can't bring back that I should enjoy while my kids are still with me, hugs that I should enjoy while some of them are still willing to give them. As I wallowed in the sunshine of my two sweet grandsons yesterday and the companionship of my grown daughters, I kept humming that country song called 'Live like you were dying'. It says something like"I went sky diving, I went Rocky Mountain climbing, I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named______, I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter and I gave forgiveness_______, and I hope that someday you will get the chance to live like you were dying". I couldn't remember all the words. The point is, it is easier for me to hide and live like I'm dead than it is to live like I was dying. It's risky to live like today might be your last day but I think that is exactly how The Father wants us to live. So I'm going to try it.

Dating

I went out on a date today-with my 13 year old. We have a weekly date to go get hay at the feed store. If Sergey doesn't go to jail some day I will attribute it mostly to the power of the Almighty and our dates to the feed store. For both of us it is more than an errand for necessities, it is a time to be together and laugh and talk. For me it's to enjoy the smell of hay and corn with molasses, the hardware and tack, I could live in a feed store. For Sergey it's his time to show off his strength as he loads the bales and bags on the truck, to load up on packs of salted sunflower seeds and a weekly softdrink. Today they were short on help. The new help that they have is short on brains according to me and Sergey. We have been packing this stuff on this small truck for a year now and know how to do it so we were glad that mr. new guy was busy. Sergey laughed at me as I tried to hoist the 80 lbs. bales up to him and I reminded him that there were probably cows in the bales of this particular batch of hay, that they hadn't noticed the cows sleeping in the field and had just baled them up with the hay. We listened to country music on the way home and he told me about a couple of things he wants for Christmas. Some days I am tempted to get rid of all the hay burners around here and save some money but I'm afraid I couldn't find better therapy for the both of us for the price.

The yo-yo family

I was back to these 2 as the only preschoolers at home today. As soon as I arrived home from taking H to school for the second day, M called to say she wanted both of the kids back. It turns out that it all was ,more or less ,a feud between M and her mother over a boyfriend. M talked to the probation officer and they extended her probation so there is no danger of jail right now. Up and down again, the usual yo-yo of not knowing what is going to happen next with this family. It had been mentioned at school that DFACS might get involved with H because of so many absences so we cleaned all day on Monday thinking they might show up. At least I have a cleaner house now. With the house straightened out a little and only two toddlers and 5 teenagers at home, we worked on schoolwork a little and I gave the teenagers some free time to watch the extended DVD of the making of The Lord of the Rings. It is very interesting and I guess it could be under the headings of science, social studies, art, some kind of school subject anyway. I've been told that I'm strange when it comes to what I let my children watch on TV and maybe I am. The Lord of the Rings is a little scary and violent but my older kids are so much more focused and willing to do things they don't want to after they watch it again. It brings out a nobleness of spirit in them. They know that my movie criteria doesn't have anything to do with "if there's cussin' in it". It must be something that makes them think or inspires them to be a better person. I can even tolerate a cuss word or 2 if the overall content will make a difference in their lives. They only watch 2 shows off the airways; The Amazing Race and Survivor. Both of the shows have some objectionable content and we turn it to a blank channel during the commercials but the insights we gain into human behavior (and geography from the Amazing race) are worth it, I think. Everyday someone will say "You are acting like____" on Survivor and it will ring home to that person that they don't want to be like that. With this crowd of teenagers, I think sometimes it helps them see that they are part of this Tribe and part of the Tribe of the Kingdom of God as well trying to survive against the enemy of our family and our souls.

Sun AND clouds

I hit the ground running today as I had gotten behind over the weekend and remembered paperwork I had't done last week and Mondays are hectic anyway with two different trips to town for tutoring, Anya's swimming practice and Salvadors Cub Scout meeting. I got up at 6:30 to check my e-mail, put some wood in the heater, woke up the kids that go to school, cranked the van to warm it up and tried to keep everybody moving. Fats had his usual am breakdown screaming and insisting on putting on his own car seat straps. The donkey joined in and I realized that it's no wonder the neighbors want me to move. Came home and got the rest moving, morning chores done; same old "you don't eat til the animals do"speech. I can't blame it on FAS memory damage because they don't ALL have that. Got through the boys Bible lesson and saw that it was time to get Igor to tutoring with Mrs. Byers. I have discovered that she is the horse whisperer of reading instruction for at least my two that go to her. I would send them all if I could afford it. I'm using half my grocery money as it is now and we're eating lots of beans but it's worth every penny. It is the only thing that I have found that has made any difference in their reading ability. It's a combination of tactile and visual instruction with speech thrown in. I stopped by the store since some of the kids were panicing because there was nothing in the 'fridge but condiments and nothing in the cabinets but my canned tomatoes and beans and rice. Not even peanut butter. I told them it was an experiment to see how long I could go without shopping (Richard Swinson's idea in his book 'Margins'), but it didn't fly with them. Raced back home to feed the, by then, ravenous teenagers who had finished their math and were panting from practicing unicycling. Thats when the phone began to ring over and over. It was M and I had just taken J and H (my part time children) back to her the day before so I didn't answer. After the 20th time I could take it anymore. She sounded very upset and wanted me to come and get the babies (4 and 5). It has finally come down to her going to jail and there's no way around it. She didn't want the kids to see them come and get her. I couldn't blame her and after wanting for so long to see her get her life together it made me sick to think of her sitting in a jail cell. I dropped everything and went to get them. As I drove away with H sobbing (her mom had told her what was happening) and M standing forlornly on the sidewalk with tears streaming down her face I prayed that this would somehow work out for all of their good and not just be another sad chapter in an already sad story. I had to stop and get gas, run in Walmart for a change of clothes for them since they didn't bring a thing then off to school to retrieve the three schoolers. Gathered them up and back to the house literally pouring them out except for Alyona as we were already 5 minutes late for her tutoring. By the time I got home Anya had forgotten about her swimming practice and Salvador his cub scout meeting so I let sleeping dogs lie. Supper, forget the baths, find extra pillows for J and H. Alina screamed and whined for an hour. She always screams and whines, but not usually an hour. Too much stress today I guess. I am tempted to give her Risperidol to help her sleep. Seems that all FAS kids take it in order to sleep. I hate to see her writhing around crying"I'm tired, I'm tired". She just can not relax. And people think FAS is just some facial features. If peoplecould see what these children go through, it should be mandatory in every high school class to see what alcohol does to unborn babies. They're all quiet now. A few hours of peace then start over again. Lord, give me the sense to do this right.

breaking through the clouds

Every now and then I get a day when the gloom of problems is lifted for a while and I see the joy in doing what I do. Today was one of those days. Yesterday I had the joy of rocking my sweet, fat 5 month grandson to sleep but also faced the stark reality that it is very difficult to visit with family or friends with 10 to 12 children with the background that mine have. I left a ketchup covered kitchen, toys everywhere, at least 2 or 3 broken items and one very upset dog. I'm sure my family is always relieved when we drive away. Thanksgiving plans are becoming almost dreaded as my brood has increased in size and capacity for damage year by year. Today, however, all of those things seemed like nothing compared to the firsts: The relief of seeing a spark I haven't seen since Raymond lost his dad as he tried to master his latest hobby, a unicycle. Seeing Andrey behind the wheel of the van as he took it on himself to turn it around and have it ready when I came out of the house. The smile on his face when after five years in America he did what most Russian boys dream of doing; bought his first pair of Nikes. For the very first time in 5 years I saw Anya and Alyona play with their dolls and pretend to talk for them, etc., something they have never been able to do and Alina, four and a half but who can't remember how to count to five, sitting in her carseat singing "We fall down and lay our crowns at the feet of Jesus We cry Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lamb." It just doesn't get better than this.