September 7, 2016
I don’t remember where I left off, so I will just start in.
The summer went as fast as I was afraid it would. While I was a bit relieved to have the boys all going back to school this week, I also really didn’t want summer to end. And though it has only been two days of school so far, between school and soccer, it seems like I hardly see the boys at all now, and it is really too quiet here during the day. We had a pretty wonderful last few weeks of summer. We had a visit from one of Ghani and Hedayat’s good friends from the shelter who lives in a foster home in Rochester NY. He is a sweet guy, and he and Ghani are great friends. We picked him up in NYC and walked and walked all over. We went to Dorney together and to a drive in movie and he and Ghani got to go go-cart racing. This friend is quite lonely in his foster home and missed the camaraderie of the shelter boys. He enjoyed being here and we enjoyed having him and we invited him back for Christmas. I think he helped the other guys appreciate a bit more how good they have it here. J
We had several fantastic parties – Ghani’s ice-skating and picnic birthday, our annual big McCready family shindig at the cabin, and a wild and crazy party for Hedayat’s birthday. The boys got to meet cousin Joy’s (and Dave’s) two teenage boys from Ukraine, and of course, they hit it off. And to end the summer vacation, the Great Allentown Fair – it really is fantastic to live so close to it. Hedayat went several days and ran into our Ukrainian cousins, and they hung out together and had a great time.
Ghani passed his driving test and bought a car. That is turning into a bit of a long story, so I will save it for another time. Isa has his driving permit and Roshan is ready to take the test for his permit. Yikes! Fortunately, the organization pays for some professional driving lessons for the kids as long as they are 18, and we found a great small company that actually has a special policy for foster children. Now that Hedayat is 16, he is asking about getting his license – we are doing our best to encourage him to wait until he is 18. Three teenage drivers in the house is way more than enough!
And as stressful as that sounds, all that stressed out stuff that I was feeling for a while (thinking that maybe I actually had taken on too much and that we really couldn’t handle it) has gone away ( I am sure it will come and visit me again on occasion, but I am happy that it is just an occasional guest and not a permanent fixture. Whether that makes me insane or not, I don’t really care!). Not that I don’t still feel overwhelmed, (my to-do list is ridiculous and I am so far behind on pottery production!) it is just that I feel also overwhelmingly grateful for being here in this time and place. This Friday it will be one year since the boys arrived. And the following week it will be 6 months since the next two arrived, and all in all, it’s pretty wonderful.
My friend Jessie asked me what it is that I get out of this, why do I find it rewarding. That is a good question and a hard one to answer. My answer was something like – it gives us great joy and pleasure to be able to share all the things that we have learned with these boys… We have both been so amazingly fortunate to have wonderful families and so many advantages… and we both have also learned a few really hard lessons. Because he works there, Isa can go to Dorney Park any time he wants when he isn’t working. So one afternoon, he went by himself. When he came back, I asked him, how was it and he said that it wasn’t much fun by himself. I smiled and agreed that most things are so much better when shared. And that is pretty much the thing for us about having these kids… sharing with them makes the experiences more vivid, more fun, more important. It challenges us to be better people. The first time the four of us walked into Giant together I almost lost it. I was thinking – we are a family. We are grocery shopping as a family. People look at us and they see a family. Thinking about it now makes it hard not to cry. It’s a big deal. And Nolan and I are so incredibly fortunate. It’s hard, don’t get me wrong. The hardest part is discipline. That just sucks. I know it’s important – and it still sucks.
I am probably a bit more sentimental at the moment because we are coming up on our anniversary and I can’t help thinking about how different things are now and I am so glad that we did this crazy thing. Both our families have been amazing, and our friends and we have met lots of wonderful new people too. We are so lucky. Thank you!
In case anyone is wondering, I do miss fostering dogs and will get back to that sometime. In the meantime, I have 4 health forms to fill out for the school and a ton of pottery to make for the Celtic Classic and the Apple Harvest Festival and I promised the dogs a walk tonight and want to get to see at least a few minutes of the boys’ soccer game. J
More again soon!