Yes indeedy, the joke’s on me!
Today we got a message saying that we were approved as a foster/adopt placement for 5 year-old “J”. I am happy for us, sad for birth mom, and have terribly mixed feelings for “J”, who gets to bear the brunt of all the decisions made by grown-ups on her behalf.
So why do I say the joke’s on me? Well, it’s like this. I have noticed, over the years, that major events in my life seem to follow a particular pattern. It kind of makes me feel that God has my life well in hand–which is a good thing, because I certainly do not. You see, I am only allowed to feel confident, competent, and in control for a couple of weeks at a stretch. As soon as I start feeling like my head has broken the surface of the life-is-too-overwhelming pond in which I swim, and I’ve had a chance to catch one big breath and look around for the shore–just look for it, mind you, not actually identify its location, or figure out a vague direction in which to paddle, that is when the next big thing hits. So I have to stay light on my feet, grab those two-week long breathers of calm confidence on those rare occasions on which they occur, and just keep swimming. It always comes out right in the end–just in time for the next big thing, of course, but it does always come together eventually. For example, this spring, just as I had started feeling truly confident about teaching Cricket, that I might actually be able to pull this teaching gig off on a long-term, probably through high school kind of basis, that is when Sunshine started really floundering at school and was diagnosed with ADHD–leading to much angst about what to do about her education and an eventual decision to homeschool them both.
This past summer I have been somewhat in a panic about homeschooling two raging ragamuffins. My biggest concern was just how we were going to get through our days and have everyone accomplish a reasonable amount of educational progress in the process. Both of my kids learn best in a fairly intense one-on-one tutoring kind of set up. In fact, sometimes they seem to think they are incapable of doing anything unless I am sitting there at least watching them do it, if not talking them through or helping them along. I have been trying to gradually convince them otherwise–with some success, too–but I was very concerned that bringing Sunshine home for her schooling would result in both of them regressing in their independence, each of them demanding that I work only with that child, and whichever one I was not with at the time either wandering absentmindedly off to do something else, or having a full-blown fit and refusing to even try without me breathing down their neck. So I spent a good amount of time and mental energy over the summer working out systems, choosing materials, and making plans. As the school year approached, I became ever increasingly nervous because while I thought I’d worked up a pretty good structure that would keep us all moving in the right direction academically, meet each child’s individual special needs, support their growing independence, and maintain a reasonably peaceful, productive flow to our days, there was no way to know whether I’d gotten it “right” until we actually tried it.
Which brings us to the “joke’s on me” part. During the early parts of August, several friends and family members spoke with me about our plans and my feelings about teaching both children. I remember explaining to them that I was incredibly nervous about it, but I knew my plan was a good one, and I was pretty sure that two or three weeks into the project things would be going smoothly, we’d have worked out any kinks, and I’d get over my nerves, and all would be well. Woo hoo! I also distinctly remember telling at least two or three people amongst my concerned relations and acquaintances something very similar to this: “And just you watch. Right about then, just when things are going smoothly and I start to feel like I actually do have things more or less under control and I’m starting to feel like this really is going to work out after all, THAT is when DCFS will call up and say, ‘Hey, we have a child for you,’ and it’ll be the real thing that time. After a year and a half of waiting, THAT’s when it’s going to happen. And it’ll throw our whole schedule off because we’ll have to suddenly work in public school attendance for one child while homeschooling the rest, and therapy appointments, and visitations, and court dates and all that, and then I’ll feel all frantic and overwhelmed again.”
And….here we ARE!
(I truly am excited about having J join our family, and I know that although it will cause some upheaval in the beginning, it will all be worth it in the end. I am also laughing hysterically, inside my own head, about the timing. And I am a little nervous about one more thing too…I seem to remember adding a codicil to the above ‘prediction’….something along the lines of a notion that just when our new child was starting to really feel like a part of the family and the judge said it was all permanenty and all, that that’s when we’d find out I was pregnant….)