A Narrow Fellow on the Walkway

“A narrow Fellow in the Grass” by Emily Dickinson

A narrow Fellow in the Grass

Occasionally rides –

You may have met Him – Did you not

His notice sudden is –

The Grass divides as with a Comb –

A spotted Shaft is seen,

And then it closes at your Feet

And opens further on –

He likes a Boggy Acre

A Floor too cool for Corn –

But when a Boy, and Barefoot

I more than once at Noon

Have passed, I thought, a Whip lash

Unbraiding in the Sun

When stooping to secure it

It wrinkled, and was gone –

Several of Nature’s People

I know and they know me –

I feel for them a transport

Of Cordiality –

But never met this Fellow

Attended or alone

Without a tighter Breathing

And Zero at the Bone.

************************************

And may I present  . . . “A Narrow Fellow on the Walkway” by Edgar Farias:

Bravo

“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.” –Aristotle

This afternoon during one of our soon-to-be famous Latin lessons, our instructor mentioned briefly Newport Children’s Theater, a place where budding thespians can begin honing their acting chops as young as eight years old.  I turned to Oscar; and though I knew the answer before I even asked, I asked:  “Oscar, is that something you’d be interested in doing?”  I barely had a chance to utter the last syllable of my inquiry before his emphatic “NO!” hit the airwaves. 

Oscar, the consummate showman at home (we could sell tickets to his performance when we run out of Cheez-Its), has yet to be bitten by the acting bug.  He’s had plenty of opportunities–starting in preschool; and, very recently I thought a friend at school, who performed in a NCT production, might inspire him.  But, alas, no. 

Photo Credit: Deanna DiMarzio

As we walked out of the library today after our lesson,  I mentioned it one more time–just to check in and possibly delve into his rationale a bit more deeply.“Oscar, are you absolutely sure you wouldn’t be interested in Newport Children’s Theater?”

“I’m sure.”

“It’s fine with me.  I was just curious as to why.”

“Well, I love going to plays and seeing other people perform.  It’s just not for me.  I get stage fright.”

And just as I was about to bring up the fact that he regularly hits the stage with his violin in tow, he said:  “I know what you’re thinking.  But the violin is different.  When I’m on stage with my violin, it’s the violin that does the talking.  Not me.  So, that I can do.”

A soon-to-be eight-year-old who knows his limits, who feels comfortable and safe expressing them, who knows himself. 

Take a bow, Oscar.  You’re on your way.

A Family Complete

Some time ago, I was asked to write a five-part series for our adoption agency, Children’s Friend and Service, entitled “A True Tale of Adoption.”  The idea is that the first installment would be about life before children, then an installment about each of our sons, and the final installment about our life as a complete family.

Part I appears here.  Part II is here.  And Part III is here.

And here, with permission of Children’s Friend and Service, is Part IV of the series . . .

I remember in late 2007 when I broached with a colleague the subject of adding a third child to our family.  An ever-practical soul, she remarked, “You know, kids are expensive.  Maybe you should just stick with two.”

She was right about one thing, of course . . . kids are expensive.  But every parent or parent-to-be has his or her “magic number”—the number of children that for one reason or another seems right.  And for us it was three.

By the end of 2007, Oscar was three years old and Edgar two.  It was not lost on us how lucky we were to have two beautiful, healthy boys; but in our hearts, we knew that we were meant to be a family of five.

So, we updated our home study—a fairly easy task as we were moving into veteran status as adoptive parents.  And we waited for the call.  And in the meantime we watched our boys grow—Oscar starting preschool and learning to play the violin, Edgar growing and learning and making his needs to move and explore the world around him known to all.

Life went along blissfully for some time—and then the call.  We thought at the time it was the call, the call that would lead us to our third child.  There was a birthmother who was due in late January 2009.  She made an adoption plan; she selected our profile.  She wanted the adoptive mother in the delivery room.

Driving up to Children’s Friend and Service on President Obama’s Inauguration Day, I recall feelings of hope and renewal.  It had taken us some time to get to this point—much more time than it had with Oscar and Edgar.  The symbolism of its being Inauguration Day was not lost on us.

We met the birthmother–she seemed resolute, intelligent, determined.   Her delivery was scheduled.  We arrived at the hospital.  The anesthesiologist asked who I was; and when the birthmother explained, the doctor said to her, “You are doing a very good thing.”

The delivery was peaceful, and I cut the baby’s umbilical cord.  I was the first to hold him, but not the first to fall in love with him.  Because just 48 hours after she delivered, the birthmother changed her mind.  Not a long time in the grand scheme of things, but long enough that all our friends and family—including our two young and impressionable sons—had come to believe he was coming home.

After our experience with our foster son all those years ago, people having the proverbial “change of heart” was nothing new to us.  But what was different now was that we were parents.  This experience impacted not just our hearts but those of a three- and a four-year-old.  We left this scene with equal parts heartbreak and caution.

Then a month later.  Another call.  This time a baby girl for whom an adoption plan needed to be made.  The details were complicated, but the ending appeared to be fated.  Her birthparents were not in a position to care for her; and though they were seeking some degree of openness, her being available for adoption seemed all-but-guaranteed.

With full speed we jumped back in—this time surrounding ourselves in a sea of pink.  A girl.  Though we had never stated a preference, after two little boys, the idea of a girl was novel, exciting.  Friends with older daughters happily sent tiny skirts and tights and accessories our way.  We shopped—and fast—in the other department at Babies R Us and Baby Gap.

And with everything washed, folded, set up and ready to go, we let go and gave in.  If this were our daughter, we needed to do what we needed to bring her home.

But she wasn’t our daughter.  The night before we were scheduled to meet to sign necessary paperwork, we received a call.  For reasons that had nothing to do with us or Children’s Friend and Service and everything to do with an overworked, overburdened system, there was a change made in this little girl’s foster placement.

And with that caution turned to hardness and distrust and anger.  We came to the conclusion that we were really meant to be a family of four; and for our own self-preservation and the preservation of our family, we needed to accept that fact, to embrace it.

We took a vacation to visit good friends in Virginia; and on the ride home, we repeatedly glanced at the sweet boys in the backseat.  We were perfect—just as we were.  And we were lucky.  We had an appointment with Lisa Granda on the calendar.  We decided that at that appointment we would let her know that we were going to withdraw our home study and move on—the very fortunate parents of two perfect boys.

This was at the end of April 2009.  And before we had a chance to call Lisa, she called us.  She needed to reschedule our appointment.  And not wanting to discuss our change of heart over the phone, we agreed to meet her at a later date.

When we did meet—in May 2009, we were prepared to divulge our latest decision—one borne of our recent experiences but one with which we were coming to terms.  But before we could, Lisa had one last situation she wanted to discuss.  And we found ourselves open to hearing about it.  And if we didn’t already know that there were forces at work that were much, much bigger than we were and are, we knew it then.  There was a young birthmother who needed to make an adoption plan.  She wanted to meet us, and she wanted to make a plan for openness, too.

Photo Credit: Terri Traeger

Don and I discussed this and decided this was it—in every sense of the word—and threw ourselves and our fate into this final situation.  We met the birthmother—this time without even a modicum of nervousness.  We had been hurt, we had nothing to lose, and we were resigned if not jaded.

And it was exactly this attitude that sealed the decision of our third son’s birthmother.  She said after meeting us that we “were real.”  High praise from a teenager—and a very accurate reading of us on that day.  No one was more “real” than we were at that first meeting.   Our egos were gone, our need to impress nonexistent.  We were more ourselves than at any other time in our lives.  And she noticed.

Photo Credit: Terri Traeger

We introduced our third son—in idea and being–slowly to our friends, our family, our children.  He came home when we knew—as much as we knew anything—that he was coming home to stay.

“August” means “revered; inspiring respect; noble.”  And August is all of that and more.  August Farias renewed our optimism, our ability to hope, and he completed our family—the family we always knew we were meant to be.

Table for Four

Some time ago, I was asked to write a five-part series for our adoption agency, Children’s Friend and Service, entitled “A True Tale of Adoption.”  The idea is that the first installment would be about life before children, then an installment about each of our sons, and the final installment about our life as a complete family.

Part I appears here.  And Part II is here.

And here, with permission of Children’s Friend and Service, is Part III of the series . . .

Photo Credit: Stephanie Beaty

I remember the afternoon light fading to twilight as our social worker, Lisa Granda, sat across from us in our living room one chilly day in October 2005.

Don and I had been parents for a full year, and it was obvious, to ourselves and everyone else, that we wanted to add another child to our family.  A brother, a sister for Oscar, another son or daughter for us—it mattered not.  We were ready to embrace whatever the future had in store for us.

Thinking that it would take a year—maybe more—before our son or daughter would come home, we, making use of our inimitable mathematical skills, figured we’d get the proverbial ball rolling when Oscar was a year.  This way there’d be at least a couple years between him and his sibling.

We updated our home study, talked about our dreams, then Lisa got a look on her face I don’t think I’ll ever forget.  It was sly, yes, but not in the pejorative sense of the word.  She had been holding onto something during the last hour we had been chatting and couldn’t wait to finally say something.

She reached into her bag and simultaneously asked if she could talk to us about a “particular situation.”  There was a baby boy who had been born in August.  He wasn’t even yet eight weeks old and had been living with a foster family who worked for Children’s Friend and Service.  He was available for adoption.

Then she handed us his picture—his hospital picture.  It was a photocopy and blurry, but one look and we knew this was our son.

We scheduled a time early the next week to meet our beautiful boy and the kind family who had been providing him with a loving home during his first weeks of life.

As we ascended the elevator to the visiting room, a 13-month-old Oscar in our arms, my heart was racing.  The magnitude of this moment was not lost on us.

Lisa led us to the room where the sweet blue-eyed baby who would become our son Edgar waited.  I picked him up and held him in my arms and knew that I could never let him go.  My husband later said to me, “When I saw you hold Edgar for the first time, it seemed as though you two had always known each other.”  Six years later, I can tell you that he was quite right.

Edgar visited our home two times prior to coming home to stay in early November 2005; and while friends and family members came over to gush during these visits, his social worker, Carey Finnerty, sat unobtrusively in an adjoining room, ostensibly catching up on paperwork, but I suspect basking in the joy that was unfolding.

And so began “The Oscar and Edgar Show”!  A year apart almost to the day, they were often mistaken for twins in the early months of their fraternal relationship.  Two in diapers, two drinking from bottles, a fuzzy and fascinating sleep schedule, and a giant double stroller, they were inseparable.  They were each other’s first best friend.

When we were out and about, people would often ask us, upon learning of their adoptions, if they were “real” brothers.  And I can tell you that though biology may not have made them brothers, destiny surely did.

The Times They Are A-Changin’

Today I had the opportunity to chaperone a field trip to the theater at my alma mater, the University of Rhode Island.  Walking through the Fine Arts building, which holds oh-so-many memories for me, was pure nostalgia tinted with a hint of surrealism.  It felt simultaneously familiar yet strangely new.   I thought I saw my 20-year-old self as I negotiated the wide hallways–studying in a corner, reading an assigned novel curled up on a comfortable chair.

But as soon as I stepped off memory lane and looked at the actual students on campus, I noticed something quite new–study groups using laptops (with said laptops open to Facebook), not even looking at or talking to each other; cell phones everywhere, their owners furiously texting instead of reading the copious notes on which they’re about to be tested; students reading on tablets with all of the accompanying distractions.

And I thought about how just 23 short years ago, these distractions did not exist.  Believe me, I’m grateful.  I have no doubt that had Facebook, texting, and Netflix been part of my young-adult reality, I would have gotten substantially less done, and I truly don’t know where that would have led (or not led).

And this made me think about what the life of a college student is going to look like for my sons–who will enter college in 2022, 2024, and 2027.  What will exist to distract them?

I can’t even begin to imagine.

But what I do know is that starting now I need to teach them how to tune out the distracting technology, to focus on the single task at hand, to prioritize academics over social networking, and to exhibit self-control amidst the chaos.

Oscar will land on a college campus in just ten years–and I find myself wondering if I’m going to have enough time to impart all of this.

Let Him Have This

Several weeks ago when I told Edgar about my trip to England, he asked for only one thing:  a wand.  Convinced I was going to the land of Harry Potter where wands are readily available on every street corner and in every back alley, he felt his request would be easily fulfilled.  And, in fact, on the Friday morning of departure, the only thing that quelled his tears was my reminding him that I was going to get a wand–and possibly an application for him for admission to Hogwarts.

When I got to work that morning, one of my very creative students volunteered to create an application to Hogwarts for him–complete on wrinkled brown paper and written out painstakingly in perfect calligraphy.  The plan was that I would put the application in my suitcase and “bring it back”–as if it had come from England.  The potential magic, I knew, would be beyond compare.

Later that day another student asked how I would handle it if, when Edgar is eleven (the official age at which one can be admitted to Hogwarts), he tries to send in his application.  I looked rather quizzically in response to the question, never having contemplated the notion that Edgar would still believe Hogwarts was real at age eleven and quite sure that by then he would understand the difference between reality and fiction.

My student indicated (based on personal experience, I suspect) that Edgar may very well believe Hogwarts is real for a long, long time.

And as I thought about the possibility (and difficulty) of having to lift the proverbial curtain in five years, I realized that it would be worth it.  For the same reason we allow our children to believe in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny, I am going to let him have this.

There is something to be said for magic and even more for the ability to believe in it.

And Then There Were Three

Some time ago, I was asked to write a five-part series for our adoption agency, Children’s Friend and Service, entitled “A True Tale of Adoption.”  The idea is that the first installment would be about life before children, then an installment about each of our sons, and the final installment about our life as a complete family.

Part I appears here.

And here, with permission of Children’s Friend and Service, is Part II of the series . . .

Life looked a little different from that moment on.

We, two people who believed unequivocally that we were not “cut out” for parenthood, found ourselves thinking about it—a lot.

But we both worked full time; we both had myriad and time-consuming interests. We both loved to nap!  How would we ever “do” parenthood?

In our extended family and circle of friends, we knew of several people who had embarked on the foster care journey. Sitting over leisurely lunches at our favorite Indian restaurant, we mulled and talked for hours about how that would look for us. It was clear we had a desire to parent; but we also had a strong desire to make a positive difference in the life of a child.

Thumbing through the phone book, we found an agency that trained potential foster parents. After an initial consultation with them, they referred us to Children’s Friend and Service, mainly because our desire was to provide foster care for a young child.

And so what we now know will be a lifelong relationship was born.

We walked through the welcoming doors of Children’s Friend and Service and proceeded to the conference room for the first night of our training—and what was to be the first step of our journey to our children. The knowledgeable, friendly, and approachable staff made our weekly sessions something to which we looked forward.  We hung on their every word, took copious notes (both mental and written), and felt prepared, in our naïveté, for what awaited us.

A foster care placement was imminent. A little boy, just two years old, who had been in eleven different homes in his 26 months of life, needed care. He came through our front door on a chilly November night with his belongings in a trash bag and a Diet Coke in his hand. He was as beautiful and curious as he was skittish and fearful, and we took our time getting to know one another.

In three weeks’ time, his social worker broached the subject of adoption with us. Though we had never considered it, the minute the word was uttered, we began to see things (and him) differently. We saw him as our son, not as someone for whom we were caring temporarily, someone for whom we were attempting to make a positive difference.

Fate had something else in store for us, however, and after a very symbolic nine months with us, a member of his biological family offered to care for him. And we never saw or heard about him again.

When you’re lucky, I think, deep insight can come from brutal pain; and what Don and I learned after months of reflection was that we wanted to adopt. We wanted to be parents—not foster parents, not temporary parents, but parents who were in it for life.

We went back to Children’s Friend and back to training, this time with a focus on adoption in Rhode Island. And eight months after we completed our work, the phone rang. It was Lisa Granda, our social worker, who said, “I have a potential situation I want to talk to you about . . .”

Several weeks later we found ourselves in the Family Room at Children’s Friend, sitting across from the woman who was to be our oldest son’s birthmother. She said to us, “I know how to take care of babies when they’re inside me. I just don’t know what do once they’re here.” And with that guileless and hauntingly brave declaration, Don and I knew our son’s birthmother loved him enough to make this plan for him.

Lisa called again on the morning of August 17, 2004, and said, “Your son has just been born. Do you want to meet him?”

Two days later we brought home Oscar Farias, the name we saw in the movie credits so many years before, the name that started it all for the gorgeous, gentle, and fiercely intelligent boy who started it all, for the boy who made us the parents we longed to be.

Are You Getting Excited Yet?

The short answer to this titular question is “Yes.”  In exactly 24 hours I will be on a bus which will take me to the airport where I will board a plane to London.  I am traveling with two fun-loving, hardworking, supportive colleagues and 18 high school students with personality-plus.   The trip will be exciting, it will be educational and eye-opening.  I adore traveling–but this trip comes at a cost.

Nine days away from my family.

And I would be lying if I didn’t say this makes me wistful–even sad.

Three months ago, I didn’t even think I’d be able to go.  Edgar was having active seizures–every day, many times a day; and I knew that if that were the case come April, there would be no way I could leave town let alone the country.  But his seizures have subsided, and I can leave.  My husband is here, and there is a strong network of family and friends who will care for my sons while I’m away and their father is at work.

Photo Credit: Deanna DiMarzio

But it’s hard.  Oscar just got his glasses this week; and every time I look at him he appears less like a boy and more like a young man–and I am reminded how fast time is flying.  Edgar, though seizure-free since January 28th, is continually adjusting to changes (albeit reductions) in his medications; and August has been coming up with new words and expressions every day that belie his two-year-old self and give me pause.

I’m going to miss them, I’m going to miss these nine days with them–a lot.

And, yes, I know it’s good for them to see their mother go and come back, to hear about people’s travels as they dream of their own future adventures, to be with caregivers different from those they’re used to. And I know it’s good for me and good for my students.  And I know how lucky I am–for so many reasons–that I can go.

But today I have a pit in my stomach–and a significant one at that.

And something tells me–whether I am the chaperone leaving behind three very young children or the parent who is sending their teenager overseas for the first time–that that pit will be my constant companion.

But as long as these three are my constant companions as well, it’s a price I’m willing to pay.

Just the Two of Us

Some time ago, I was asked to write a five-part series for our adoption agency, Children’s Friend and Service, entitled “A True Tale of Adoption.”  The idea is that the first installment would be about life before children, then an installment about each of our sons, and the final installment about our life as a complete family.

Here, with permission of Children’s Friend and Service, is Part I of the series . . .

I suppose we have Hurricane Gloria to thank. In September 1985, when I was a senior in high school, I had applied for two part-time jobs to supplement my nonexistent income. Wind damage had knocked out the power at one of the businesses to which I had applied—a local grocery store around the corner from my home—and they needed immediate help to retrieve the items from their freezers and save their stock. They called and told me I was hired and asked if I’d be willing to help out. With motives more financial than magnanimous, I eagerly accepted the job and skipped on down to lend a hand. And that’s when and where I met my future husband—though he didn’t know it at the time.

He was 24 years old, so definitely (to my 17-year-old self ) fascinating by virtue of his advanced years, and he was handsome and a guitarist in a band. Enough said. I was in love. We worked together and became friends until that fateful night in November 1986 when my appearance and corresponding nasal sound effects revealed I had a bad cold. Don came through my line at the store with water, cough drops, and a small orange juice. I rang up the items, not thinking a whole lot about them, until he said, “Here. These are for you. Feel better.” Now, of course, it was clear to me that he too was in love.

Photo Credit: Jan Armor

On December 13, 1986, this grocery store held its annual Christmas party—and both Don and I decided we would attend . . . well, we’d meet there. It wasn’t a date or anything. Except by the end of that evening, which we count as our “first date,” it was clear that this was one love story that was meant to be. Eight years to the day, on Tuesday (yes, a Tuesday), December 13, 1994, we were married.

Both Don and I were deeply entrenched in our education for a very long time—he pursuing his Master’s in Musicology at Tufts and I, a full-time public high school English teacher, a Master’s in English at the University of Rhode Island. We both started our Ph. D. programs—he at Brandeis and I continuing at URI. We also traveled—a lot: London, Paris, Budapest, Vienna, Helsinki, Prague and destinations throughout the United States. The world was our classroom, and we were avid readers and explorers.

The idea that we would ever even want to have children didn’t really pass through our shared consciousness. We saw ourselves as one of those “sophisticated couples” who would spend our luxurious days taking classes, eating exotic meals, traveling to distant locales, seeing independent films, and strolling through museums.

Then one afternoon in 1995, Don and I were out on one of our sophisticated dates—a movie . . . Babe . . . yes, the movie about a talking pig. We sat through the credits (mostly, I’m sure, to consume the last vestiges of our exotic bucket of popcorn) when the name Oscar Farias, a production assistant on the film, appeared. That’s when Don—Don Farias—turned to me and said, “If we ever have a son, can we name him Oscar?”

If we ever have a son . . .

Down, Down, Down

When this is your six-year-old’s daily regimen (times two), any opportunity to reduce it is welcome.

Very welcome–but also very scary.

Because it is precisely this regimen in this exact combination that has allowed Edgar to remain seizure-free for over two months.

But after his EEG came back about as perfect as any EEG could, his neurologist made the decision that it was time to start scaling things back–milliliter by milliliter.

So that’s what we’re doing–every Wednesday, in fact . . . reducing one of his medications by one milliliter in the morning and one in the evening.  It is a very reasonable, very “slow and steady” kind of approach, and it may not even sound like much.

But it is–from both a medical perspective and a very superstitious mother’s perspective.

So, when you see us on Wednesdays and we seem as though we might be holding our breath a bit, that’s because we are.