I have been suffering with a degenerative disk for about five months now. I kept thinking it was just a flare up and would settle down after a while. I finally went to the Herrings who have kept me going with similar problems in the past. This time was the exception. After a month it was worse, much worse. On Tuesday I went in hoping to talk to the MD but he was booked and I came home crying.He did call me later and faxed in some prescriptions. They helped some but buy the next day it was unbearable again. My friend Lisa Smith told me she was coming over here first thing the next morning to take me the ER. I agreed, I couldn't get any worse and I certainly was not getting better. So we went. I have to say the ER is a much more fun place with someone who is as zany as I am. We talked about out impossible "mommy" schedules and the fact we've been planning on getting together to just go somewhere for coffee for over a year and haven't done anything of the kind...so, instead of coffee we went to Target and she went in and got us popcorn and coke...I loved it. Who needs fancy pastries and $5 coffee?
I love my friends, Lisa isn't an old fri(yet) but she's valued beyond measure and since I'm speaking of friends.

Kelly Cox brought us a wonderful meal last night. I had gotten up stumbling around in the kitchen trying to focus enough to check out the frig. Micah(darling)told me not to worry, Kelly Cox was due any minute with Lasagna, salad and the works, which included one of the best pies ever put on a fork. I haven't checked but I'm sure there's nary a drop of any of it left.
Of course Ellen has been here everyday, bringing food, treats, helping out with the girls. And I don't know what I would have done without Micah. She has just been the little mama. Everything from dressing the girls for school, cooking hamburger meat (which no pregnant woman wants to do), to grocery shopping, tutoring, keeping the house from turning into a real pit She even laid down the Queen's law with the big boys about picking up after themselves and not being noisy in the house, (they just took the electric instruments outside but it was helpful) I am so thankful that she's here.
Then there are the silent warriors,my "dogs of peace" who are out there doing their day to day stuff and see someone rubbing their backs in a grocery line of watches someone struggle to get out of a chair and think of me and say a prayer...I so appreciate each and every one of them more than they can know.
I am blessed with so many friends. I treasure you all.

Legacy-Nichole Nordeman

I have been invited to lead a women's Bible study on Wednesday nights at the church I grew up in. It is very special to get to do this since I've started writing alot and hope to maybe some day soon publish some of my stories in a book. I have been really overwhelmed by the responses by so many women about my little stories. I am such a simple person. My friend LeAnn refers to me a "low maintance". I like that as a description of me and my husband likes that I buy all my clothing either at a thrift store, consignment shop or Walmart. I color my own hair, have been known to take a whack at it with scissors too, I no longer pay for fingernails although if I ever do have a few extra bucks would like to go back to getting that little luxury occasionally. I admit my guilty pleasure is paying a sweet lady one day a week to vacumn my house and do a few loads of laundry....with five kids at home that's just called investing in a little sanity. I am a plain Jane, even like the name Jane, should have been given that one maybe. In saying all this I don't mean to sound like I am lacking in any way. I have been blessed beyond measure. I have every need provided and there is nothing I really want that I don't have. I have a wonderful husband and two teenage boys who teach me that love and prayer are the two main ingredients to parenting and God has to do the "handling of life" no amount of talking to or about them makes change like talking to the Father on their behalf.
God blessed me with two beautiful daughters 25 and 23 years ago and HE turned them out so well that he loaned me three more to love on for a while. I believe He has given me the ability to call out gifts in people...maybe not the kind of gifts you've necessarily heard of before referred to a "spiritual", sometimes they are. What I want to get across to all the women in my life is you are a person who influences others whether you realize it or not. The way you greet people at your job or the words you say as you drop your children off at school, everything you do as a woman influences others.
It's not about what you are capable of really. In the scheme of things we aren't capable of much, but when we get out of God's way and let him BE the influence things happen. I write and talk a lot about my youngest three children. They have taught me more about God's adoptive, accepting love than anything or anyone else ever could have. I share my story of how we got started in foster care. It was a dog. I was crying because she didn't have a home. God asked me why I would cry about a dog when there are 500,000 children in foster care who are considered homeless in our country. I didn't think I could love someone else's children like my own. God said..."No, but I can do anything in you....it says so in my word. Phil 4:13 says it loud and clear, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me". I have had to believe that over the past three years more than any time in my life. It has taken time but God is good and these girls are blessings to me.
I want to encourage you as women to get in touch with how God the Father sees you. I want you to realize your influence on others. We are not super heros but our Jesus most definitely is. We will trust him to show us how we can influence our families, friends and the world for his good pleasure.

Now, about the "Theme Song" for our study together...I was holding one of my little ones in the kitchen when it came on the radio and I danced her around listening to it...I had heard it many times before but it had never spoken to me the way it did that day. I was holding a Legacy in my arms.....I want to make sure she knows my heart for God and my commitment to her before I leave this world. Tears started pouring down my face....she looked at me as if I had lost it.....maybe in that moment I did, I lost the fear that everything would be alright.
Now, this is a song that comes to mind every time somebody says what a "good thing" we are doing taking in these children...I'm not interested in anyone's opinion of me really, although like the song says "I don't mind if you have something nice to say about me..." I really love the way Nichole put my feelings into words so I'm just going to share hers with you....

Legacy

I don't mind if you've got something nice to say about me
And I enjoy an accolade like the rest
And you can take my picture and hang it in a gallery
Of all the Who's Who's and So-and-So's
That used to be the best at such-and-such
It wouldn't matter much

I won't lie, it feels all right to see your name in lights
We all need an "atta-boy" or "atta-girl"
But in the end I'd like to hang my hat on more besides
The temporary trappings of this world

I want to leave a legacy
How will they remember me?
Did I choose to love?
Did I point to You enough
To make a mark on things
I want to leave an offering
A child of mercy and grace
Who blessed Your name unapologetically
And leave that kind of legacy

I don't have to look too far or too long a while
To make a lengthy list of all that I enjoy
It's an accumulating trinket and a treasure pile
Where moth and rust, thieves and such
Will soon enough destroy

I want to leave a legacy
How will they remember me?
Did I choose to love?
Did I point to You enough
To make a mark on things
I want to leave an offering
A child of mercy and grace
Who blessed Your name unapologetically
And leave that kind of legacy

Not well-traveled, not well-read
Not well-to-do or well-bred
Just want to hear instead
Well done, good and faithful one

I want to leave a legacy
How will they remember me?
Did I choose to love?
Did I point to You enough
To make a mark on things
I want to leave an offering
A child of mercy and grace
Who blessed Your name unapologetically
And leave that kind of legacy

I don't mind if you've got something nice to say about me


(if you've never heard the song Youtube it.)

Observations on Fostering

Questions……so many questions. Like, what makes a person a parent? Is it “being there” at conception? Well, according to the laws of our country today the moment of conception is not considered the beginning of a child’s life, it’s considered cell math or after a little time a fetus but the jury seems to still be out as far as when life occurs (clearly not in my mind but in the mind of some who would dare look at the ultrasounds and still deny humanity). So, say this collision of cells actually makes it to birth, be it a couple of months early due to mama’s alcohol, tobacco, pot or worse consumptions, and it’s a little girl, perfect in every way. Wow, for that to even happen should be considered a miracle. She is tiny, has seizures every now and then and has trouble learning to suck a bottle but she’s alive and the doctors have every confidence she’s going to make it. Mama doesn’t care that the people from DHR are coming to take her, she names her something ridiculous like “Snow White” and laughs, everyone knows why…snow, an old street name for cocaine (she’d name her that but she’s sure it wouldn’t fly with the authorities). The social worker tells her there is a treatment center she can go to free of charge. Mama says she’ll think about it. Right now she’s in pain and just wants someone to bring her some clothes and a joint or a rock and a pipe, any damn thing would be better than this stupid Tylenol they keep trying to shove on her. She’s not thinking of the future, she’s not thinking of her baby, she’s thinking about what she’s been thinking about for the last five years…..getting high, feeling free for a minute, one beautiful minute. She’s not going to get that here so she starts to peel the tape from her IV. She’ll make a run for it as soon as the late shift comes on.
At this very moment there is a woman sitting in her bedroom window praying. She has cried every month since her twenty-eighth birthday from the reminder of her inability to have a child of her own. She’s lost hope but she keeps praying. The phone rings. It startles her out of a fog , the voice on the other end is saying something about an infant that will be released from the neonatal unit in a couple of weeks and a foster home is being sought for her. Everything else becomes static, she just heard baby and foster home, could this be the child she’s prayed for? Of course the caseworker wants to warn that human resources is working with the young mother, it is always the hopes of the agency and court system to help work it out to reunite the children with the birth parents. It is not an adoption agency. The young woman doesn’t care, she’ll take the baby and see what happens….oh foolish woman.
I want to step into this scenario and scream! You will have your heart ripped out of your chest if you aren’t very careful!!!!! Didn’t you hear what the social worker said? They will take this baby away from you! They could give her to a grandparent who out of a sense of duty will take her, or after a couple of years there will be a man show up at the agency and say he wants custody of some kid his ex-girlfriend told him was his, or it may be a distant relative, an aunt or uncle or cousin. Just when you think it’s all over…..it’s never over. You’ll have taken little Snow White home from the hospital, bathed her, fed her, changed her, shown her off at church, spent ten times the money the state provides for her, and fallen deeply in love with her. You couldn’t imagine loving a biological child more than her, she’s the center of the universe as far as you are concerned. BUT, you are simply a surrogate. You have no rights to her at all. You’ll notice your caseworker calls and gives you doctor’s appointment times, signs all legal papers, and requests that you be a good girl and bring the baby to visit her mama, sometimes she can visit…sometimes she can’t because she’s been on a binge and either doesn’t show up or has drugs in her urine. This is the life you will live….indefinitely. You may have been told that this can only go on for twelve months, this is a lie. Birth parents can do one thing right…show up for visits clean twice in a row, or get a trailer, or start working on a GED or keep a job for a month and proceedings will start in their direction….they are making great progress! Then, you’ll notice you don’t hear from them for a while…my hunch is the process has started over, they’ll be given more time to get it together. They learn how to work the system. And then there are always the appeals. What a lovely smack in the face to the judges. Sometimes I’m sure appeals work to return children to the place they belong, but I’d be willing to guess at least 95% of the time they are simply a stall tactic and stall they do. One case I am very familiar with drug out over four years because the mother could (and did) appeal. Each time an appeal is filed there is a two to six month wait. This ties everyone’s hands. The birth parents don’t have to do anything during this time…they can just rest easy, they don’t have to make any attempts to “do better” while waiting on appeals, they know they aren’t getting the decision overturned, they just want to hang up the system and ultimately keep their children living “homeless”. This is especially damaging to the child if they want to be adopted and they are with the family who wants to keep them. You will be tempted to just not talk to your child about it. She knows she belongs to you and that lady down in that little room in the big office building who’s always referring to herself as her mama is not her mama, you are. She doesn’t like to go there, you don’t like to take her but you HAVE to. And you do because foster parents tend to follow the rules, we actually have a lot at stake.
Whether a couple or individual fosters because they want to adopt or not they are looking to protect children from harm, and to teach them how to get along in the world. All children need these things. They have a desperate need to belong, to be somebody’s baby. When a case drags on it damages their ability to trust. How many times can a child ask, “Mom, is this my forever home?’ and have you answer, “Honey, I wish I could tell you yes but I’m not the one who makes that decision .” How do you explain that to a six year old? An eight year old? You are the only trustworthy person in their lives and if you can’t answer the question they have nowhere else to turn.
So back to my original question…What makes a person a parent? Should someone automatically get to take a child home after three or more years just because there is a biological connection? If that is the truth I curse the day we discovered paternity tests! My heart goes out to men who aren’t told they are fathers as soon as the mother knows she’s pregnant but perhaps a dose of fidelity would be good here. And I know some awesome single fathers! But, if a child has been placed in a loving home and has established bonds, have family and friends and parents who adore him why would anyone see DNA as a trump card? We are a country of mixed families, blended families, families by choice. Why can’t we do the best thing for our children and let them live where they are most safe and loved.
If you really have an answer for me, respond….

.I have no intentions of arguing with anyone about rights of fathers. They should have every right mothers have but if you’ve gotten someone pregnant and found out years later the child is yours, make sure he or she is in a good loving home and visit occasionally. Don’t think for a minute they will be better off with you unless you’ve witnessed their current family situation. All children benefit from having extra people to love them…don’t rip them away from the only security they have. Add to it!

Nobody Likes Me When I'm Sad

Let's face it, nobody wants to be around someone who's depressed...unless they are getting paid a chunk of change to listen to the dribble. It's no fun to share silence when it's the product of not being "able" to talk. I'd be the first to admit I don't understand depression. I've sure seen my share of it. I have fought so hard most of my life not to give in to it....but sometimes it's just too hard. I want to go into my closet, close the door and just stay there. I don't want to call on any of my friends, I don't want to pray (which I know is what I should do). I just want to disappear for a little while. Is that so much to ask? Well, in my case I guess it is. Funny, how guilty I'd feel if I shrugged off my responsibilities for a day...or heaven forbid two. It would be most insensitive to my husband who, if truth was told is probably in a deeper hole emotionally than I am right now.We have a lot going on. What else is new? LOL....no not really, I am not laughing at all.
I heard today that some foster parents lost their kids, they'd had them three years. Apparently, the sperm donor showed up and said he'd wondered where they were and "presto" he gets them...that's enough to make you cry right there. I wonder if the powers that be would take our girls if they discovered I suffer from a "mental illness". It would surely be a good enough reason...and never mind that they keep me out of the closet or bathroom when I feel this way. I can't not take care of them...I can understand how they feel when they get in their moods, like tonight when the four year old had a meltdown in the bathtub. She just got mad, no real reason. She said she wanted to wash the kitty cat makeup off her face, when I went to help her she got mad and turned away from me. I didn't get upset with her....I felt the same way. I don't know what I want either. She stayed in the bathtub after I finished bathing her, she wouldn't budge....just sat there crying. She didn't want to talk about it. She just wanted to be left alone, then she didn't, then she did, that's exactly how depression is. You want to be rescued, but you don't want anyone to touch you, or speak a comforting word. You want to be squeezed tight but your skin hurts if someone gets too close so you turn into a human porcupine. It's a paradox, a contradiction of human nature. I feel like a paradox. I love nothing better than to laugh and to be with people but the dark cool quiet calls me and I want to curl up and dissolve into a sad soup. One thing is pretty evident to me by now, I will be back. I'll sleep it off, or someone will throw up during the night and I'll snap back to reality. I'll start over tomorrow like nothing ever bothered me at all. At least that's my plan.

Poem

Ever feel useless?.........
I do…..today.
So many things I can do nothing about…..so many.
Things I can do don’t seem to matter
Things that matter are out of my reach.
Worry doesn’t help
Striving doesn’t change anything.
The lilies of the field don’t have mortgages.
The birds of the air bring home food to their babies without grocery money.
I’m just tired of the struggle….
I give up the worry
…. but I still sleep next to it.
I turn to it in the morning and stroke it’s face
It looks through me
I’m not really there
I’m nothing….no one….useless.

Church Kid

Today I got to attend Homecoming at the church I grew up in. I always love to visit there. I was baptized there, married there in 1982 and then brought all four of my babies almost straight from the hospital to Sunday morning service. It was the family at Airview Baptist that sent Michael and me off to work at the children's home, the same family welcomed us back after a year. Michael was called into the ministry there under the guidance of Gerald Sykes, they ordained him and prayed "us" through seminary. That place holds very special memories for me...they go back far and deep.

I was probably four or five, still a baby really, but once you could sit up without assistance you were booted out of the nursery back then. Church was a part of life, a part most children endured unhappily but tolerated just the same. I really didn't mind. I loved the preacher, he rarely yelled or pounded his fist like some I'd seen on TV, and he was always working in the neighborhood, visiting people, rolling up his sleeves and helping out. Once, my mama backed over one of my kittens. If that wasn't traumatic enough for her she had to bare me screaming at her like she had done it on purpose, our preacher was driving by and undoubtedly heard the commotion , he stopped, carried me into the house (probably praying all the time) then disposed of the dearly departed. I felt comforted later that my kitty had gone to Heaven in the back of my preacher's truck, my dog Trixie (who loved the cat) never forgave him though. From that day on every time he even drove past our house Trixie would chase his truck and if he even attempted to get out at our house she would nip at his cowboy boots...he seemed to understand though, he never held a grudge against her.
Our church was pine paneling on the inside of the sanctuary. There was a river Jordan scene painted in the baptismal "pool" that I thought was really beautiful, I don't remember who painted it but I do remember the fight that broke out when someone paid my aunt to make heavy green velvet drapes to go over it. The drapes were to remain closed behind the choir until the time we needed the river Jordan to appear for a baptism, this made some people in the church upset, I suppose they wanted to always feel as if they were gazing at the river Jordan, I think the thought of it there made other little kids like me remember that they didn't go to the bathroom after Sunday School and to avoid constant disruption somebody decided it would be best to cover up the distraction. Either way, it really didn't matter to me, I was a child and I thought it was really neat when the lights would go down and someone from behind the choir loft would pull the cord that opened the drapes to the beautiful river scene. Then "Billy Bob" or "Betty Lou" would get dunked and we'd all clap....something rarely done in our church back then.
Most Sunday nights I got to stay home with my daddy to watch "The Wonderful World of Disney" and "Bonanza" on TV. He'd always make us some sort of messy snack and we'd wait to see if Mama would care or not. My favorite was "parched" peanuts and Coke. Daddy would cook them on a big cookie sheet and we'd watch whatever they were showing that week, sometimes we watched "Mutual or Omaha's Wild Kingdom" but I could never stand it if a lion or tiger was chasing some poor gazelle or long eared rabbit so we were particular about those. One the occasional Sunday night when I went to church with Mama I remember dozing off on the hard wooden pews, head propped on hymnals. I'd sometimes shed my shoes and socks and stretch out to count the ceiling tiles. The lights in the sanctuary reminded me of pictures I'd seen of our solar system, circles within circles with one big light bulb in the center. In the early summer the doors to the outside would be propped open and you could hear the crickets and frogs and a car passing by now and then, on more than one occasion a neighborhood dog or cat would wonder in to see what was going on...this convinced me that animals did too go to Heaven, some of them even went to church.
Church was a place of comfort for me. As I grew up I found myself going more and more by myself. It really didn't matter though, I had family there, not biological family but related in a more important way than blood, family put together more by God's design than a gene pool. I am grateful for those early years, for the sweet memories of tapping around the folding chairs in my Sunday shoes, of "Sunbeams" on Tuesday afternoons, of sweet little old ladies who taught me stories about Noah and Moses and David and the Giant. I am who I am today because I was a church kid.

Happy Birthday Ellen

I didn't buy you a card. But, since you chastise me for keeping you up at night reading my blog I thought maybe this would be even better.
Tomorrow is the birthday of a very good friend. I have known her for a long time. I first was introduced to her twenty or more years ago because I just had to meet this remarkable woman who had applied to adopt through two different means, actually had two babies placed by those two agencies and discovered she was pregnant all within months of each other...She was the hero of many women in town. She handled it all with grace and gratefulness. A few years after we met, my family built a house in her neighborhood, we now lived two blocks from each other but had no real connection until that day when my Micah came home from a band trip to Myrtle Beach talking non-stop about a boy named "Blake". Somehow I knew that his mom and I would become friends for life.
A few years later that boy and Micah were planning a wedding. Ellen was a joy to work with on this. She was always willing to go the extra mile to help. She welcomed my baby girl into their family and accepted us and our little additions as her own. I can't begin to count the times she's called and asked if I needed a break, or if she could just take the girls somewhere. She's tutored them, fed them, bought them clothes even bought tap shoes for them. We jokingly refer to our little girls as her "practice grandchildren", of course they love her and always consider going anywhere with Miss Ellen a special treat! I could never tell her how much her help has meant to me but I often refer to her as my "right arm". She's always there when we need her. Once, I had one child with strep. I was busy with my mother in the hospital and couldn't take the sick one with me...she called out of the blue, didn't know that the child was sick but asked me if I needed something...I told her I didn't because I didn't want her exposed to strep, she laughed over the phone and told me she had been exposed to everything under the sun as a teacher (just retired) and to bring that baby to her! That's a friend!
So, instead of a birthday card, I wanted to dedicate this entry to Ellen Melnick, a friend in deed. Happy Happy Birthday!!! You are going to be a fabulous grandmother!
I love you!
Angie

Sunday we had the party I've been talking about to celebrate the life of my cousin John Alexander Starlin III. He served in Vietnam and made it back home forty years ago. His sister, Zula hosted the party at her home in Anniston.We all enjoyed ourselves, it was a very low key, laid back event...from the Mexican barbeque to the entertainment, it was all Johnny. He is a very proud grandfather, he lives for his six little legacies. They were all there enjoying the day with Papa and the other family and friends who joined us. It was a very good day.

Summer 09