Racial Identity: Unknown

This is a post which I have been trying to write, or to give up on writing for a year.

Every now and then someone will ask me what, meaning what race, Carl is. Usually the questions come from the side. Once someone asked where he got that amazing skin tone. I have been asked several times about his hair. It grows out and starts falling in Shirley Temple curls -- except of course for the color. I tell them that his mother had naturally curly hair. They are uncomfortable, because that wasn't really what they wanted. They already know that his mother was white. They want to know "what his father is."

But I side-step the question. I tell people that is father is from Belize and that the people in Belize are generally multi-racial. I change the subject.

Of course, I do so because none of us should care, right? It isn't supposed to matter.

And it doesn't. It doesn't have anything to do with our relationship. He is Carl, dear to my heart in ways no one else could be. He is the boy who changed my life. The gift I did not seek. I can bring myself to tears just thinking about how easily I could have missed him. What if I hadn't been in church that day? What if I hadn't followed through on that insane impulse to call a social worker and become a foster parent so that I could parent him?

And then again, it does matter. I know it matters to him. I know he would like to know. Everyone else can tell their story. Though it may be impolite to ask, we expect that people do know the answer. Barak Obama knows. So does Tiger Woods.

Everywhere I turn I see articles about race. In The New York Times I read about new discussion about what it is to be multi-racial. I read an interesting column in which a mother tries to explain to her daughter that she is Puerto Rican and Filipino all the time; she is not one first and the other second. Everyone knows "what" they are. The discussion is about what it means.

What does it mean to be a transracial adoptee? Harlow's Monkey can help you get thinking about that. Her posts are all about being a Korean adopted by a white family. She does not know her family tree, didn't even eat Korean foods until she was 30. Recently she wrote about parents responsibility to educate children about race.

But Carl does not have even that. He cannot ask what it means to have his heritage, because he doesn't really know what his heritage is. Not in terms that makes sense to us, anyway.

His father is from Belize which in turn is home to several distinct ethnic groups. There are Creole/Kriols; Garifunas; Mestizos; Mayans; people from Eastern India, Mennonites, and more. His mother told him that his father was an east Indian. She might have meant "from Eastern Indian," but she probably meant "from the East Indies." If the later, does that mean that his father migrated to Belize from the Caribbean, or was Garifuna, or did she just think of Belize as being part of the Caribbean? The photograph of his father is not much help. Perhaps the people in Belize could hazard a guess as to his father's ethnicity from his photograph, but I cannot. I imagine that most people in the United States would have the same reaction to his father that they have to Carl: how did he get that skin and that hair? It's unusual. Maybe Carl really did get his curls from his mother.

Things get more confusing when you look at other photographs. Carl's half sister appears to be unquestionably of African descent, as do his father's band-mates. Does that mean anything about Carl's dad? Probably not. In the US he had a child with a white woman. In Belize he had a child with a woman we would classify as Black, although she probably identified as Kriol or Garifuna.

When he first moved in I wanted to help him learn about and celebrate his heritage. Then I found out how complicated it was. I let it go and concentrated on helping him find his identity as a gay man while finding my own identity as the mother of a gay man.

What is race anyway? It is nothing. It is a social construct. Carl did not seem to worry about it, not much anyway. He was sixteen then and twenty-four now. It is not my job to figure this out for him. It is just my job to love him. He will have to construct his own identity, as he has always done. But I am surrounded by talk about race it makes me want to help him again. I want to find out for him. I want to give him the information as a present. I can't imagine it does not matter to him.

Because though it is rude to ask someone about their racial identity, everyone knows, right?

Update on Brian

He's great!

It occurs to me that I only write about him when he is having trouble. I write that he is having anxiety attacks, then nothing for months and months, then another chunk of time when he is having trouble with anxiety.

He really is doing well. He is sad that Andrew is going to go away, but he is not broken up over the thought like he was a few years ago. It used to be that we couldn't talk about it without him crying. Even one year ago Roland and I thought it would best if we got a new kid in the house before Andrew left so as to help ease the transition for him. Having someone in the house to be quarreling with would provide a distraction, if nothing else.

Now however Brian can think about his brother leaving without doing more than feeling sad. I promised to add unlimited Text and Pictures to our cell phone plan and I think that will help. Brian doesn't chat on the phone terribly well. He gets lonely, but he doesn't always have a lot to say. However if he can send and receive pictures via phone he will feel more in contact with his brother. They also both have headsets for World of Warcraft and will play together periodically. Andrew promises to schedule some times when they can play on-line together when he is gone.

The play rehearsals at his school still go one. Brian is having a difficult time memorizing all the lines in Harvey. Elwood, the main character, does have an awful lot of lines. A good bit of it is essentially a monologue. Elwood may be talking to Harvey, but since Harvey doesn't actually speak, it's a monologue. He has been unwilling to have us help him, which is too bad. The play go pushed back a full month because so many people missed rehearsal when that killer virus was going around. The performance now is only a few weeks away. I am trying to resist getting anxious over whether he has learned his lines.

He very much wants contacts. He will be fourteen in June and I have told him for several years that as soon as I see him getting up on his own early enough to shower and be ready, I will let him have the contacts. He is quite convinced he can do that, although so far he has not. He decided that he would not get new glasses so that the insurance money would be there to buy the contacts as soon as he convinces me he is ready. We will see what happens when school starts.

So...that is the rather boring Brian report. He is doing well.

Treating the Kids the Same?

As Andrew's graduation is coming up I've been thinking about the ways I am treating his graduation differently than I did Carl's and Evan's.

When Carl graduated we were all very excited. We went to the ceremony. The social workers also went. We went out to a nice restaurant and we gave him a pretty good gift.

Evan did not have a graduation ceremony. He did not have a ceremony at all. He finished high school by taking the last few classes through the alternative high program and was done mid-semester. I imagine there would have been a ceremony sometime during the next year that he could have participated in, but it did not seem all that important to him. The social worker took the family out to a restaurant he chose, more expensive than we would normally take the family too, but not "fancy." We gave him a really nice present, but then it was also his early Christmas present. We did not invite David and we certainly did not invite Carl to any of the celebrations.

Now that Andrew is graduating it feels different. Not the graduation itself. Andrew has a close relationship with all three boys, much closer than they have to each other. He wants everyone to be together. I want everyone to be together.

So I we bought Carl a plane ticket to come for a long weekend.

I also told Andrew that I really, really wanted to take everyone out to this particular restaurant. It is expensive, but fun, and we are likely to spend hours over the food. I've told you about it before, I think. There is cheese fondue, then meats and veggies you grill yourself at the table, then chocolate fondue. It is good, and it is fun. It also takes a couple of hours, and the activity itself provides something to talk about.

Now Andrew would be happy going someplace much less expensive.

Really.

I mean you should have seen his poor little face when I told him that he shouldn't expect a graduation present. The ticket for Carl and the meal out added up to a significant amount of money and if he got anything to unwrap it would be very much a token present. He is a good sport and when I said later that he could take my barely-used iPod radio clock since I gave my iPod to his dad who doesn't want it, Andrew said that that could be his graduation present.

So Andrew understands that I am using the occasion of his graduation to do something I very badly want to do: have all five of my boys together at one time doing something fun. It isn't what he asked for. It isn't even what he would have picked. His friends are getting whatever cool things they are getting. He is getting an hand-me-down clock radio and a dinner out with his brothers. He is happy to see Carl, and he knows he will have fun at the restaurant, but he also knows this is what his mother wants, not what he wants.

But I worry that the other boys will feel slighted. I hope they don't feel that my treatment of them was less. I did not take them to a restaurant this expensive. I did, however, buy them actual presents.

So who is slighted? Did Carl and Evan get the short straw because they did not get such a fuss? Or is Andrew being slighted because I am using his special occasion to do what I want? Personally, I think Andrew can make a better case, but who knows what they think.

I find myself often making these sorts of comparisons, and worrying or wondering about how the boys would react. I might have been wiser to have a regular sort of meal out for Andrew along with a present and do the flying Carl in and taking everyone out for some other occasion -- like my birthday.

Of course I only just now thought of that option. It really is much less expensive to do it this way.

Poor Andrew. Totally co-opting his graduation to have the party I want to have.

It is all about me, isn't it?


__
I've been saving honoraria checks I get from the agency to use for the meal out. I just found one I mislaid that was for the project in December that made me cry. It was significantly higher than the checks normally are. That combined with the honorarium I got for the going to the day of training is going to pay for the meal out! Whoo Hoo! Everyone will have to purchase ordinary beverages that come with free refills. There will be no wine or Italian Sodas, but we are going. Roland agrees. Let the veterinarians and oral surgeons send their bills. If I want to spend my honoraria on a dinner out I can. So there.

Advice from my children

Dawn has a post in which she says she deleted something after her son advised her, "You know, when you get mad you can say, ‘I need to go work’ and just take a break in the cottage." In the next post she says that it sounds a lot like what she tells him when he is upset.

It made me think of all the times my kids have echoed me to me. Like my all-time favorite:

----
Resting on the sofa I pull off my glasses and let them fall to the floor. Four-year-old Andrew runs over to show me something and I stop him before he steps on them.

"Oh Mama, you should not have left your glasses on the floor."

"I know Andrew."

He looks at me with sympathy, sighs and says, "Well, you learned something, didn't you?"

----
What are yours?

Still Here

Andrew is recovering well. Feeling better all the time.

I've been busy. I am once again very glad that my colleague was able to take over the horrible department self-study document because I got an email last week calling me to another duty. I'm a member of one of those committees that doesn't even meet for years and when it does everything is marked CONFIDENTIAL in large letters.

Most of my colleagues of course would vastly prefer to write a dozen self-study documents. This for me feels more familiar somehow. Or maybe it is just that I know it is important. It is difficult and stressful but it is NOT a waste of time.

This job will either take ten days or two months, depending upon what happens in the next ten days.

Don't worry, I won't ever give you the details. Ever.

Recovery

Dinner last night: steak, Snickers, popcorn
Dinner tonight: Raviolli, pumpkin custard

Such is the reality of wisdom tooth extraction. Andrew seems to be doing pretty well. He is a bit grump which catches me off guard because he is usually so easy going.

The Cattle Dog's teeth are okay. None of them are broken, just worn down. She was due for shots so it was good that we took her. Next the froo froo dog has to go for his shots.

Teeth, teeth, teeth

Andrew is home, feeling miserable, after his wisdom teeth extraction.

The Cattle Dog is going to the vet this afternoon because she has a broken tooth that is may be bleeding. It is a canine (the tooth that is, although the dog is too) and there is definitely a reddish spot in the middle of it.

And I am an evil person because we just spent $250 for her swollen foot (which is now better) and I am resenting having to spend however much more money now. I mean, one budgets for yearly visits and shots, but not for things like this. Terrible thoughts go through my head -- like how much I would be willing to pay for her if I was buying her and how I don't really like having two dogs anyway. I like each dog, but the thing where the Cattle Dog has to keep proving that she is the dominant one is annoying. Although the thing where the Cattle Dog uses her natural herding skills to keep the Shih Tzu in one place while the brain damaged cat that can't run or jump gets away is pretty cute.

I've been putting every cent of money I can identify as "extra" into the fund to take all seven of us out to dinner at a nice restaurant to celebrate Andrew's graduation. I'd like to take them to the fondue restaurant because I know they would all love it and because a meal there takes at least two hours. Carl and Evan barely know each other and I really want everyone in one place for that long. I want to enjoy the "big happy family" thing. Roland suggests that I just cook spaghetti and pay everyone $10 to sit at the table. He's joking of course. At the fondue restaurant there is something you must DO. It is an experience. I want it, and it ain't cheap.

Why is that relevant? Well, I found myself looking at the poor, sweet, obedient, GOOD dog and thinking, "If your medical bills cost me my dinner out with the boys I will never forgive you."

I am a bad, bad woman.

No really. When we took her to the weekend-emergency vet for her swollen foot they had to give her anesthesia in order to examine her -- the fact that she was snapping when you tried to touch her foot was the reason I brought her in. She never snaps. When I had to fill out the form giving permission for the anesthesia I had to check a box indicating if I wanted her resuscitated if she had a really bad reaction. Roland saw me hesitating and said, "Check it." I looked at him and said, "Well, if G-d WANTS to take her, should we really get in the way?" He gave me "the look" and I checked the box.

Roland, pet lovers everywhere will be happy to know, will take her to the vet today. He is much more willing to spend money; always confident that it will work out somehow.

I do hope the dog will be fine. I just also hope it isn't going to cost an arm and a leg.

Another Blogger

I know, you already have too many blogs to read, but it is my solemn, self-appointed duty to inform you of all new foster-related blogs that come to my attention (typically by the blogger in question commenting here).

You may have noticed our new commenter Eos. Her Blog is The Bumpy Road to Motherhood.

She just had an anxiety dream so you may want to run over and share your pre-placement nightmares with her.

By the way, I found something odd about the blog. When I tried to add it to Reader the usual way it didn't work (first time for that). I had to go to the bottom of the blog (main page!) and find the button for subscribing to the posts (atom). I used the url of the page that popped up and it worked fine.

Medical Updates

Today the boys and I went to the eye doctor. There is a new optometrist at the practice who seems very young. He graduated from the college where I teach. He was there when I was teaching although he didn't take a class from me. The boys got back to the exam room a few minutes before I did and he and Andrew were sharing stories about their favorite teachers at the high school. He tries a little too hard to be hip. He flips the settings on the machine and says to the boys, "So dude, do you like one better, or are you digging two?"

Brian told me to tell him about the nightmare I had a couple of days ago. So I told him about how I had a dream in which I got angry and was yelling at him and calling him "Dr. Dude." He got a kick out of that and said that he wouldn't mind being called "Dr. Dude." I confessed that we really do refer to him as "Dr. Dude" at our house. His last name is a little difficult to pronounce.

Everyone's eyes are a little worse. Andrew got new boxes of contacts. Brian got his glasses adjusted to fit his growing head and is planning on getting up on time without being reminded (starting as soon as spring break is over) so that he can have contacts. I am debating whether to get new glasses myself. I probably won't, it is only my need for prisms that has changed.

I see double without glasses, but everything is so out of focus that the two images sort of merge into each other. One optometrist accidentally had my glasses made without prisms and it was bizarre. Every time I blinked the world sort of jumped as my brain integrated two images of the world. Anything that isolates each eye (like a microscope) is hopeless. I just have to shut one eye or look at two slides. With my current glasses I am mostly fine. Dr. Dude says that with new glasses I would really only notice the difference when I was tired. I would be able to read a little later at night before the words started jumping and separating.

Dr. Dude is not sure if it would make a difference with the quarter moon phenomenon. When the moon is full the images apparently come to my brain slightly over-lapped and they get integrated -- I see one full moon. As the visible part of the moon gets smaller there is less overlap. By the time it gets to quarter there is none and the part of my brain that does the integrating work just doesn't think it's wrong. So I typically see two quarter moons. Sort of feel sorry for the rest you -- only having just one moon all month.

Brian's cold has spread to Andrew, but so far Roland and I are staying healthy. Brian also seems to be recovering quickly so I think this is just a normally head cold -- not the killer virus we all had such a hard time getting over.

It's really too bad though that Andrew is sick because he is getting his wisdom teeth out tomorrow morning (best spring break EVER). We went to the grocery store today and bought food. We bought food for after the surgery: yogurt, ice cream, mac & cheese, and ingredients for pumpkin pie. And we bought food for tonight. Dinner is steak (unusual at our house), salad and baked potatoes. We have Snickers for dessert and will be eating popcorn for a snack later.

Dr. Dude warned Andrew about anesthesia. Apparently when Dr. Dude had his wisdom teeth out years ago his mother interrogated him during the waking-up period. She found about the party he had when they were gone -- everything.

No to respite

The supervisor of case workers from my agency just called and asked if we would give respite to a boy. She said, "I think you had him before. His brother visited him."

Yeah. I called this particular boy "X" on my list of respite kids. I told her that I remembered him, "He and his brother stole Andrew's Nintendo DS and a bunch of games. I think the older brother was the real thief, but still Andrew and Brian would have a fit if I let him come back. So sorry."

She understood. Then she said, "Were you ever reimbursed for that?"

I told her that I hadn't been, that I had asked about it and never heard anything, and that I no longer had a copy of the police report or the receipts from my replacement purchases.

She said she would see what she could do about that, "Because that is just not right."

It would be nice.

Book Review

I wrote a book review for Three Little Words for Open Adoption Support. Take a look.

Colleges and Viruses

Andrew applied to three colleges. He used the on-line common application so all three schools saw exactly the same application. Well, his first-pick did have an extra page, but the essay and basic info was the same for all three.

One is the college where I teach. Princeton College Review ranks it as the most selective. Andrew was accepted very quickly. Being my kid is not supposed to make a difference, though I suppose it could have. Still he was accepted very quickly and without conditions. Even if he is mine, if they had any concerns about him, his application would have gone to the committee.

The one he most wanted to go to accepted him and gave him a scholarship. Yipee!

He decided that he should apply somewhere else, so he picked out another school and added it. They wait-listed him.

Humf!

For those who don't know being wait-listed means that you may get accepted after the first-round people make their decision. Sadly colleges don't give you any idea how long the wait-list is or where you are on it. I understand that ranking is fluid. They want to accept the best bunch of students they can, which also means the students who are most likely to stay and graduate. Still, it is hard on the students not to have any idea at all how far from admission they are.

But of course it makes life simple for Andrew. He just doesn't return the letter accepting the wait-list. He never wanted to go to that school anyway.

Still, I just can't believe that piddling school wait-listed my kid.

We actually wonder if his essay hurt him there. It did demonstrate that he was an excellent "fit" for his first-choice school. It's all about social justice.

Oh...and everyone here is getting sick again. Brian is down: stuffy; cranky; miserable. I feel wrung out, but I am hoping that is just because Brian woke me up early with coughing and generally being miserable.

Moving Frankie

Well, his stuff anyway.

It is Spring Break for everyone but me. Roland is today taking the rest of Frankie's boxes, which have been sitting quietly in the spare room since he left, down to our agency. The book he wanted is in there somewhere. Roland will tell them which book it is and let them decide whether to go through his boxes.

I suspect that the phone call the other day was really about the book. All the rest of it was, I am guessing, about using up his allotted phone time. When he asked me what I would think if he got me on the approved visitor's list it sounded more like he was offering me a present, than requesting a visit. And when he asks if Brian is still afraid of him I am not sure if it is about wanting be able to visit here or just about not liking the idea that someone out there is afraid of him.

It is difficult for me to talk to him because I genuinely do not know what would be helpful to him. All the times he has made contact with us it has been in part about wanting something that belongs to him. The most cowardly part of me hopes that if I do not have his things he will not call me.

GirlSpeaks asks, "Which kids?"

GirlSpeaks Asks:

1) Would you take an FTM vs a MTF?
2) Would you accept a lesbian placement.
3) If yes to either, what would the stipulations be, and how would
they be different from the boys you've taken on. If not, why not?

I'm going to handle the questions all in one swoop. I was distressed a year or so ago when a social worker at our agency asked me if we would take a lesbian. It is frustrating because I keep saying, "GLBT" and people keep hearing "gay boys."

Our position is that we are willing to take any kid who needs a place that is safe with respect to sexuality. Years ago we were asked to consider a young man who first mother had come out as a lesbian. They had just begun to re-establish contact and they wanted him to be some place where he could talk sort out his feelings about that. He came to visit and we decided he wasn't a match, but it wasn't because he was straight.

And what stipulations do we have?

Roland is very clear that he cannot come home to the same sort of behaviors that he has to deal with in his special education classroom all day. So that means no hyperactive kids and no kids who need constant behavior management/redirection.

We've promised the bioboys that we won't take any kids who have a history of violence or psychosis.

I tell people that we are good with depression, manipulation, deceit, and passive-aggressive behaviors. We just need for them to be able to sit still.

Frankie Called Again

I haven't written him for a while. The last time I was debating about it I did write. I did not hear back. I hadn't expected to, but it seemed a good way to let go. I would write the last letter.

But he called today. He wants me to look for a book in one of his boxes that is still here. I really don't know if the reason he called was that he wanted the book and all the rest was filler, or if he wanted to talk to us and the book was just an excuse to call. I will be taking all of his boxes back to the agency though. It is long past the time those boxes should have left.

His calls are not like when Ann's. At least not for me. I am always thrilled to hear from her. She knows she can't live here and that I love her. I want to stay in touch. With Frankie I don't feel that way. I don't know what to say to him. He doesn't understand why he can't live here again, and I can't explain it to him.

He just turned 16, did I know that? Some people who help kids get adopted came by to talk to him, but he doesn't remember where they are from. He is studying in the school at the treatment center. He is learning, "slowly but surely." He's decided he wants to be an interpreter. He is going to learn lots of languages and travel all around the world and interpret for people. You know, like a mercenary.

Is Brian still afraid of him? He's really sorry he frightened Brian that time. Did I tell Brian that he wouldn't ever hurt him? And what would I think if he got me on the visitor list? Oh, I'm on speaker phone, can I tell? They always make him have his phone conversations on speaker phone.

I don't know what to do or say. I really don't.

I have competing narratives I tell myself about Frankie's time here. In one we did basically a good thing. Frankie had spent several years living in group homes and treatment centers. He needed to try to live "on the outside" and we were the best place for him to try. While he was with us he came out about wanting to be a girl and learned that it wasn't something to be ashamed of. It turned out that he wasn't ready for ordinary family life, but it was good that we gave him the chance.

In the other narrative I realize that he is the only kid I ever took saying that it might not make it. I never made a commitment to him. We took him on a test drive and then sent him back. We shouldn't have done that. We should not have taken him in the first place. We will not do that again. We will be careful. We won't take a kid unless we can make a commitment. If we make a commitment we will stick to it.

And I suppose both stories are true. Both are stories that Frankie may tell someday. We may be the family where he first came out and felt safe. We may one of the families who made promises and then sent him back like a defective toaster. We may be both.

But he doesn't understand why he can't come back.

I went back and re-read the posts from his last week. (If you want to put yourself through that experience start here.) We can't go back there. I spent days trying to get him into the adolescent psych unit and trying to keep him calm so that we wouldn't have to call the police or take him to the emergency room. Brian packed a suitcase so that he could leave to go to a friend's if Frankie went into a rage. And we lied to him. We lied because we thought he would rage if we told him the truth. We lied because we did not think he would believe the truth.

He thought he was in control. He thought he was leaving because he hated the school he had to attend. He liked us and all, but he would do whatever he had to do to get out of that school, even if it meant moving. And it turned out that it did. He was angry about where he had to go, but he saw it as the result of his own demands.

So what does he think now? He think he left because he wanted to shift schools and he can't come back to visit because he scared Brian.

And I hate this. I don't know how to talk to him. I don't know what to tell him.

I don't have an explanation for him that is true and will make sense to him. He will promise not to scare Brian again, or tell me that he doesn't go into rages anymore. He is better now. I won't have to call the police. He won't make knives and stab his stuffed animals or slash his clothes again. But I don't want him to think that he is such a bad person that he can't live here. He is not a bad person, but he is a very sick boy.

Maybe being nice to him just makes it worse. He stays attached and wants to know what he has to do to come back.

I really don't know what to do. I really don't.

And the irony? He called as I was writing a post about wanting the agency to call about another kid.

Jumping into Politics

A few months ago I was excited. The Democratic party had several very good candidates. All we had to do was pick the best and go forward. Yeah us!

Two weeks ago I did the math and concluded that it was going to be Obama. I would have been happy either way. Obama and Clinton both are people I can support and I would be happy with either of them. Okay, it was theoretically possible that there would be do-over primaries and it was possible that the superdelegates would over-turn the results of the state primaries and caucuses, but surely they wouldn't. Surely our own party would not do to us what was done to us in the national elections some eight years ago. Unthinkable. It was time for Clinton, whom I admire, to realize that would be bad for us and to step down.

How I would love her for doing that, for saying, "I think I could win even should win, but the cost to the party and nation would be too great. The most important thing for this nation is for our party to take back the White House. Obama will be a good president and I support him."

I allowed myself to imagine her making that speech and in my imagination I adored her, knew that any time in the future that she ran for office I would vote for her. She would have my loyalty forever. But I really couldn't imagine her doing it. Still, I thought, the superdelegates can put an end to this. They can see, surely, that there are only two options: we rally around around Obama or we tear each other apart. In my heart I prayed that the superdelegates would save us.

And then I learned how far out of the mainstream I am when clips of the Rev. Wright's sermons started appearing and I thought, okay, rhetorically over the top for a public address, but it wasn't a public address. I thought about papers read at feminist conferences where women feel free to express their anger uncensored. Things get expressed in strong language. I know how people who love their country, and love justice speak. I have read the language in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. Sometimes it is disturbing. I got ahold of as much of Wright's sermon as I could find and thought well, I might say, "Here in America there is always enough money to build a bomb or fight a war, but never enough to care properly for children who have been starved, beaten and raped; enough for prisons, but not enough for schools. Does G-d look down upon us and say, 'well done, good and faithful servant?' No. G-d looks at us and weeps."

And I did not see that what I wanted to say about the country I love too much not to criticize was in substance all that different from what the Rev. Wright had to say.

And as the videos played over and over I said to my family, "See, they were afraid that Obama was a secret Muslim, but truth is that he is secretly a black man." Someone asked me if I wasn't upset that Obama was associated with someone who expressed himself with such extremism and I said no, that if it wasn't his pastor it would have been someone else. Somewhere the would have found a relative, an in-law, a room-mate, a co-worker who said something "scary black." Obama would be asked to disown someone he loved; he would be asked to prove to us that he wasn't the sort of black man that makes white people nervous. You know, one of those people who is angry about injustice.

I waited. Obama wrote a good speech, a speech that I could not get as excited about as some others because I hated that he had to write it. I hated that someone I admired so much had to distance himself from someone I found admirable. Republicans can make nice with evangelicals who scream that my children will destroy America and go to hell, but Obama must save his skin by distancing himself from someone who is angry about injustice.

There are only two paths. We can unite around a candidate who is articulate, smart, inspiring, and possibly able to help our country move forward in ways it badly needs to, or we can rip each other apart and pave the way for McCain to win.

Please, please superdelegates, save us.

Happy News!

Okay, so Andrew doesn't actually want me to go crazy "telling everyone" so I will just say that we got the letter from his first-choice school detailing his financial award and we are all very happy over here.

Really, really happy.

Guilt

In some ways parenting foster kids is easier than parenting biokids.

Oh, mostly it is more difficult. Kids who are or have been in foster care have suffered trauma and they present challenges. They can wear you out emotionally. Most of them are professionals at finding your emotional weaknesses and exploiting them.

It is difficult, exhausting, and frustrating.

But sometimes, when you are parenting children whom you have given birth to and raised from that birth, you miss the foster kids.

See...with foster kids I never felt any guilt for the existence of their problems.

I'm just saying.

Updates

Hi, I'm still here.

My mom is doing well. Sis is visiting with her. I'm not jealous that Sis is there and I am not. Really. And if I repeat that enough I will start to believe it.

The Cattle Dog's foot is getting better, although telling a Cattle Dog she is not allowed to run is torture. Didn't I tell you about the foot? Oh, well, no big deal. She hurt it. She limped. The vet gave her pills and said not to let her run for five days.

Evan is working out his situation. He is moving to "sunrise" shift, aka NIGHTS. It is the only way he could work full-time and go to classes. No comment.

I keep trying to find the full text of the the Rev. Wright's sermons. I found the full text of the Audacity of Hope sermon. I loved it. I see why Obama was inspired by it and why he will not disown the man who gave it.

Brian has decided to keep going to the Arts Charter School. I think it will be good for him, and I am trying to reconcile to the whole car pool thing. It really isn't so bad now that I have refused to do more than two afternoons a week. Roland does one, and sometimes two monings a week. We will figure it out.

Roland is learning to sleep with his CPAP machine. The machine is very QUIET, and that is not sarcasm. It really doesn't make hardly any noise at all. The pressure builds very slowly so that it is not very difficult for him to fall asleep with it. He does wake up in the middle of the night though, feeling like he just can't tolerate the machine. He doesn't always fall back to sleep easily. However even with half a night's sleep he is doing better than he did with 9 hours before.

I feel further removed from foster care. Wondering if they will call. Wondering if I should just move with my life. Oh, I'll keep my license, but I find I am beginning to think of myself not as someone who is "between placements" but as someone who used to do care. I'd like to do it again, but it doesn't seem like it is happening.

Consequences

There's this post I want to write that I can't really write because Evan reads the blog.

It is a fun story. It involves me giving really good advice and offers of assistance and then Evan deciding to do it all on his own in his own way. Later in the story it turns out that Evan valiant attempts to do it his way don't work out so well and he needs our help. This part of the story is painful because we really don't like either of our options. We can do the genuine love and logic thing and refuse to help, or we can do the magnanimous parental thing and rescue him. Doing either well would mean acting with love and confidence, not being resentful or trying to make him feel guilty.

If you are putting the puzzle pieces together you will know that we did do it and with only a little bit of guilt-tripping. And in doing it, we accepting a promotion to being Evan's parents. We also decided that Evan would be thrilled if we took the money I had from selling his never-used microwave and spent it on a thank-you fast-food dinner for the family.

Anyway, there is more to this story I can't quite tell you. After we did the magnanimous thing, Evan's plans still went awry and did so completely without us. And that is a good thing. When kids perceive that the consequences that are happening to them are happening as a result of parental action or inaction, they tend not to learn from them. What they remember is that their mean parents didn't help them or punished them, or some such thing. They don't tend to connect the consequences to the action. The most successful consequences are the ones that happen without us.

Not that those always work, of course, but those are the ones that are most likely to work.

And that is what is happening to Evan right now.

And I have all these emotions. I am very proud of him, because I know he can and will figure this out. I am relieved knowing that there really and truly is nothing that I can do but be sympathetic and supportive. This is not something I can fix. No guilt, no pressure, no debating what I should do. I just need to keep telling him that I know it is stressful and I am proud at how well he is handling it.

And deep inside, and evil little voice is giggling and saying, "If you had just followed my advice in the first place, none of this would have happened."

Of course, I am far too good of a parent to say that to him.

But I am petty enough to publish it on the blog.