Gifts

I have been cruising through blogs based on infertility lately. Don't really know why. I post occasionally and share our adoption story. Infertility has been an issue with us but not a deeply rooted one. We were older than most when we were married. He had two biological daughters from another marriage so it wasn't a real issue with him to have another. I had been curiously interested in adoption from a very young age. Probably because - when I was 10 - one of my favorite books to read and reread was one called 'The Family Nobody Wanted' by Helen Doss. It's the inspiring story of a minister and his wife who adopted twelve children of different races and varying shades into one family. And then there was 'They Came to Stay' by Marjorie Margolies. This her adoption story - Lee Heh from Korea and Holly from Viet Nam - as a single parent. Interesting that it wasn't difficult - after all these years - to remember their names. I could probably still reel off most of the Doss kids as well.

Thanks to the internet, I have been in contact with both authors in the past several years. I let them know how their stories came to play in my own life. Adoption? No biggie. Lots of paperwork. Lots of curious questions from people who have not done it. Different? Don't really think so....in the long run. We have our differences and similarities based on the fact that we are males and females who share the same house...the same experiences....the same arguments.....same laughs. I wasn't really sure if my kids really felt the same. Are the lines between biological and adoption as blurred for them as it is for me? Maybe.

I went to my daughter's educational planning meeting the other day. Her Study Skills teacher told me that she'd given her students a paragraph to write in class and was very impressed with my daughter's work. She had a little conference with her to discuss how thoughtful the piece was...how varied the language...how well written it was. She said my daughter just smiled and leaned in close - conspiratorially - and whispered, "Yeah.....and I get that from my Mom."