Blogosomnia.

At various points in my life, I have suffered from insomnia. I have always been able to fall asleep fairly quickly, but I sometimes wake in the middle of the night and either do or don’t fall back asleep. During certain periods, I couldn’t ever seem to manage anything but lying there wide awake, replaying tapes in my head, staring at the ceiling until dawn.

That hasn’t happened for a long time. I usually sleep through the night now without trouble. But, when I do wake up, what I think about as I’m lying there at 3 AM before falling back asleep has recently shifted. Some usual things I think about: whether I would ever have kids; the way infertility has changed me; the frightening way I tend to put things on hold while I wait to become a mother; the joy of adoption, in which I could finally believe that motherhood wasn’t out of my reach; the way the increasing wait times and threatened stricter regulations by the CCAA feel like a loss even though I wasn’t technically “with child.”

What I have just recently begun to think about: my blog. That’s right, I think about the fact that while I’m all snuggled down deep in the covers, in the dark and relative privacy of my bedroom, my blog is Out There, working for me. It never sleeps. Therefore, virtually-speaking, I never sleep. I am always cyberspeaking, flapping my gums on some subject to some potential someone somewhere, even as I am hunkered down in my bed, believing myself to be “safe” from human traffic. It freaks me out a little bit.

Does anyone else ever have blogosomnia?

Antidote to All Things Buggy.

My latest personal bugspray:

This diaper/wipes pouch

and this bib and this diaper bag .

I love the imagery of the skull-and-crossbones, the candy-skulls, and the tattoos, especially used to adorn All Things Baby. It flies in the face of sentiment and, right now, sentimentality is wreaking havoc on the adoption world. Anything that stands up to its onslaught is allright by me.

What’s wrong with a little sentiment, you ask? And by that question, you mean besides the fact that it leads

to this

and this: An invisible red thread connects those that are destined to meet regardless of time, place, or circumstance. The thread may tangle but will never break. ~ Ancient Chinese proverb

and, yes, even this: Do not be afraid, for I am with you, I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west.~Isaiah 43:5 ?

Sentimentality sounds the death-knell of what’s real because, in fact, the effect of sentimentality is to erase the present moment and replace it with a romanticized version of the facts–a sort of dreamy netherworld. That’s why those who reject sentiment are often accused of being unromantic. Or unpatriotic. Or uncooperative. The world at large really wants to buy into the Hallmark Card. And the ladybugs. And the red thread.

But it is possible for couples to be completely in-love-feel-it-to-your-toes romantic without sentimentality. It is also possible to adopt a child with a sense of outrageous - excitement - about - how - this - is - going - to - change - your - life - forever without sentimentality. It is even possible to swoon over the child’s clothes, her 100 wishes quilt, her nursery, and her diaper bag without sentimentality. Not without swoon. Without sentiment. There’s a difference.

Please don’t misunderstand: I am not advocating my particular taste for Dios de los Muertos fabric as a remedy to sentiment. Avoiding sentiment can be accomplished by a myriad of different tastes. Dress the kid in martian fabric or puppy fabric or ferris-wheel fabric–whatever floats your boat, as long as it doesn’t serve the coded purpose of turning your adoption into a fairy tale…because that is what the ladybugs and the red threads do. I bought the tatooed bib and the calaveras diaper bag because I had never before imagined that flaming hearts and skeletons could be associated with baby (other people are way ahead of me in this realm). In other words, I was not going to opt for the buggy fabric that acts like a secret handshake, that says, hey, I’m one of you, too, and aren’t we all neat, and (queue music) it’s a small world after all. (Pat back here.) Because I don’t believe that. The world is more complex than that, and it’s a damn good thing that it is.

The alternative to living with complexity is to live in a ladybug world. And I have a deep distrust of the ladybug world, not because I am an angry grouch, or because I have some deep-seeded paranoia, or because I want to flaunt my easy sense of counter-culture. That is not the goal. Yes, the cutesiepie bug-and-thread stuff can rise to the vomitous level. Some days (like on referral days), reading some blogs, I come away feeling like I need to get in the shower and wash it all off. It’s that sticky.

But that is not really it either.

I distrust the ladybug world because it exchanges many of the hard truths of IA for platitudes. And it is not that I need to push the hard truths of IA on myself all the time. I’m truly not in the business of self-flagellation. If I lived there all the time, I wouldn’t be adopting. But to never discuss or debate the challenges inherent in IA, to see this opportunity to parent a Chinese-born child as only a way to the warm fuzzies, is to ladybug it.

So, what I’m really saying is that sentimentality is subtly connected to a sense of denial. It has political undertones. If you believe that God wrote in the bible that your children will be brought to you from the east by way of adoption in China, well, then, congratulations…you’ve discovered a spiritual mandate to adopt…If a-parents are connected to their Chinese-born children from the beginning of time by a red thread, then…heck…the birth parents couldn’t have really struggled over their decision because this abandonment was meant to be.

Never mind that the verse from Isaiah was meant as a type of formulae for the destruction of Israel’s enemies and not a commentary on international adoption. Never mind that the original context of the legend of the red thread is a romantic one, a legend about married couples finding each other, not about parents and children. Never mind about that. As Scarlett O’Hara says at the end of GWTW, “I’ll think about that tomorrow.”

That’s the trouble with sentimentality. It’s subtle. It’s easy. It’s familiar. But it makes things disappear.

__________________________

Read this post from the Twice the Rice blog, written by an adult Korean adoptee, for additional perspective on why the buggy-fying (and red-thread-ifying) of international adoption is so off the mark.

___________________________

In an effort to be consistent (something I’m not always so good at), I am going to take my blog’s epigraph (”Keep a green bough in your heart, and the singing bird will come”) down off the site. Although I’ve only ever seen it on one other a-parent blog and so it hasn’t attained the star status that the others I’ve quoted above have, it has the potential to misrepresent the entire IA process as one that is destined to be. And destiny has no place in the IA world. The concept of destiny relies on sentiment to do its dirty work.

I chose this epigraph originally because it seemed to work well for both infertility and adoption, and because it’s a line of poetry and I’m a poet, but my reasons are really beside the point. The point is that it romanticizes adoption (and infertility, for that matter), and so it’s gone.

It’s probably more accurate in my case to talk about a dead branch and a squawking bird anyway. I’ll keep the SBird moniker, though, because I have a birdy name in RL, so it fits that.

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Found It!

I found the photo of the bark scorpion on my bathroom tile from several years ago that I mentioned in this previous post. This was the month we moved into the ranch, and I was completely smitten with the whole idea of Everything Desert. Obviously, I had yet to be stung. My whole body repulses at the thought of them now…nonetheless, in the interest of full disclosure, I bring one to the blog:

I’m still in love with the desert, but now I recognize that the entire enterprise wants to sting you, bite you, or stick you.

To Hell and Back.

So, we’re back from a quick trip to the family’s palm tree farm (see previous post).

Some impressions:

When we arrived on Thursday night, it felt pretty darn hot in the little house, despite the fact that my FIL had stopped by and made sure the thermostat was down so the air could cool. R. blamed it on the open doggy door. I raided the freezer and sat there in the living room with packages of frozen hamburger meat pressed up to my neck and forehead. We had every ceiling fan running on full blast, the thermostat down to 50, and still we were basically circulating the 115 degree air from outside. By the time R. and I got on the same page–that the AC was, in fact, broken–it was six o’clock on Friday night. Here is the nice repairman, who gave up the first evening of his weekend to help us:

Thank you, nice repairman.

We were there for three nights. Very little is open in the desert’s off-season, so we had dinner at the same restaurant three times. This particular place is known for its oil paintings, which cover all the walls and were done by the same artist. There must be about 150 paintings, and they all contain stagecoaches. The artist, Marjorie Reed, clearly had a thing for stagecoaches:

Between the stagecoaches and the menu, there was a lot of repetition associated with dinner on this trip.

We also encountered some strange animal activity: a coyote stalked R. for about 1/2 an hour when he was out on a run. (He runs in the early morning, so it’s only in the low-90s.)

On our way to dinner every night, we came across a series of great-horned owls sitting in the middle of the road. Their heads would swivel around when the headlights hit them. I have seen some owls in my time but never hunting while on the ground. I guess it’s easier just to wait there on the double-yellow line for the mice to come running across the open road then it is to catch them in the brush.

Lastly, this roadrunner came up on the porch and just hung out, staring at the front door. Not sure what message he wanted to deliver.

We took the dogs out for a run, but they can only last a few minutes in their fur coats, which is a good thing since I get tired of worrying about cactus, coyotes, and fire ants (no snakes out in that heat!!).

R. has a lovely toxin-bruise on the back of his shin from his experience with a jumping cholla during his run…in fact, he came back fairly bloodied from his hike-jog on a trail that disappeared. The guidebook failed to mention that the trail succumbs to open desert and involves some amount of scrambling over rocks in a steep canyon. R.’s comment: “those pioneers from back east must have taken one look at this place and been convinced they had arrived in Hell.” This from a guy who’s been coming here for nigh-on thirty years.

And, yet, we had a great time.

Some Like It Really Hot.

When the SBirds decide to take a break from their nest, they do it in true desert style. Where, you might ask, do the SBirds decide to go in the middle of August to escape the heat of their desert home? …To the snowy mountains? To the breezy shore? To the pool at the nearest Y? No way. That keeping-cool stuff is for amateurs. The SBirds’ destination of choice is…more desert…but really serious desert, the kind that is very brown, very sandy and hovers around 125 degrees this time of year. For those of you in the know, we’re talking Mohave, not Sonoran.

R.’s family owns a farm in the middle of the desert. The Real Desert. It’s a palm tree farm. Having grown up back east, I didn’t even know there were such things as palm tree farms. Not that I thought that palm trees grew on trees (sorry, couldn’t resist), but I just had never thought about it before. I mean, who does this?

It turns out, my FIL does. He’s pretty good at it. He basically has his own little palm tree empire down there, although he doesn’t live on-site anymore, preferring the cool breezes (see first paragraph) of the coast. R. has now become the farm’s Vice President, in addition to his regular, man-o-academia job. I think he enjoys it because there are a lot of interesting politics involved in palm-tree growing these days, which can be summed up in one word: water. The depletion of aquifers in the west is a hot-button topic, especially as the baby-boomers begin to retire in large numbers and flock to the southwest.

R. is currently engaged in a confrontation with the local water board there, who want to shut down all the area’s agriculture to “save the water supply.” I put that in quotes because that’s their party line; what they don’t say upfront is that they actually want the agricultural land to build new residential developments (including golf courses) on. Since the farmers were there first, long before the residential folks, they acquired some pretty choice land. And now the developers and city planners want it.

It’s fascinating to listen to the arguments because my knee-jerk response to water politics in the west is to preserve the aquifers at (nearly) all costs, but, in this case at least, it’s not that easy. Do we really think that trading family farms (not just palms, also citrus, artichokes, grapes, etc.) for golf courses is a viable solution? Are we prepared to wipe out an entire segment of the community (the farmers) to make room for new residents? And–the sticky wicket for me: is a palm tree farm categorically different than a citrus, artichoke, grape, or other food-based farm? In other words, how important is it for a palm tree farm to exist?…doesn’t it just provide trees used to develop (and deplete) other places, like Las Vegas and Palm Springs? Is the aesthetic appeal of a palm tree on the grounds of Harrah’s really cause for allowing the palm tree farmer to exist? But, if he didn’t exist, would we allow the land to remain arid or would we build houses and golf courses on it?

I’m a bit conflicted, as you can see.

I just wanted to cover the territory before showing you some cool pictures.

These photos show the trees in various stages of production.

In the 1980s, my FIL grew the palm trees for the Winter Garden in NYC. This is the all-glass structure that was part of the World Trade Center complex. He had to grow the trees for many months under a huge shade-cloth canopy, so the trees would get used to living in low-light conditions. Here’s the remnants of that job:

The trees survived 9-11. In fact, I remember seeing some footage from the day after, where firefighters were searching through the rubble and picking their way past these dust-whitened palms.

When the trees get very large, they can create a dense forest. One part of the farm is so dense that you can lost in there…the trees all look alike. Deciduous trees don’t always look alike, but palm trees of the same age do, unless they grow crooked, which sometimes they do. But it’s hard to tell where you are if you get in there deep enough.

I mention this because my FIL embedded a secret in the heart of the densest part of the farm. It’s a place he calls his Shangri-La, a garden and yard and party-house where he used to host some wild times in the early 70s (wild in a Rat Pack sort of way). It’s actually a little creepy to go there now, and even a little sad, as if the desert version of Miss Havisham is going to step out from behind one of the rangy hibiscus plants and accuse you of trespassing.

But there’s a little house on the farm that the dogs love (a doggie door with a fenced-in running space) and my FIL and MIL will be there and R. will have a business meeting and I’ll hang out and cook and watch birds and maybe even write some new poems. But I probably won’t be able to blog (antiquated computer connection). So, I’ll see y’all next week.

The Political Process.

Hey y’all, I got an answer from my elected representative, Rick Renzi, of the 1st district of Arizona. Well, actually, I didn’t elect him because I didn’t vote for him because, well, he’s a Republican who supports the war in Iraq and is pro-life and pro-development and I don’t and I’m not. But last month, the RQ suggested that her readers write to their congresspersons asking them to support Rep. Heather Wilson’s (NM) initiative to extend the deadlines for renewal of the I-171H forms for adoptive parents. So, I did.

Here is the short (but promising) email I received back from Renzi’s office:

My name is Jim Lester, an aide to Congressman Renzi. Thank you for emailing concerning legislation offered by Rep. Wilson. Rep. Renzi is in Arizona currently, but will return to Washington after Labor Day. I will discuss this issue with him and review the legislation. As an aside, my cousin has adopted a child from overseas, so I have an idea how difficult the process is. Time is running short in Congress this year, but I will check in with Rep. Wilson’s office on what Rep. Renzi can do to help in her effort.

Thanks again for your email. Jim

Jim Lester, Legislative Director, Office of Congressman Rick Renzi

Even if Wilson’s proposed legislation makes it through congress, I am not optimistic that they will be able to extend the deadlines long enough–like, say, to three years–to make it meaningful for China’s a-parents. But it’s a start.

Once In a Lifetime…and I missed it.

My mom sent me this notice on email in July. Unfortunately, this stupendous Mars event took place in…2003. Whoops. I didn’t check my sources. My bad. (Although it does sometimes feel like I’ve lost the last three years.) atomic mama set me straight. And she sent me a private email to let me know my mistake, which was very nice. I just thought y’all should know that about her.

That’ll teach me to stick a “fluff” piece on my blog at five o’clock in the evening, thinking it can do bandaid duty for me while I get my next post together. Oh, well.

I decided to leave the post up here just to illustrate the warning I used to give my students: don’t trust what you read on the web. Especially don’t trust the…ahem…assvice of newbie bloggers shamefully on the hunt for audience.

Mars: The Red Planet is about to be spectacular!

This month the Earth is catching up with Mars in an encounter that will culminate in the closest approach between the two planets in recorded history. The next time Mars may come this close is in 2287. Due to the way Jupiter’s gravity tugs on Mars and perturbs its orbit, astronomers can only be certain that Mars has not come this close to Earth in the last 5,000 years, but it may be as long as 60,000 years before it happens again.

ALTERNATIVE DTC 2006

atomic mama and zen mama (that covers things from A to Z, no?) and I started our own DTC group on Yahoo this week.

Here is the description: Were you DTC during the 2006 calendar year? Are you tired of saccharine religiosity, prayer requests, and overt proselytization? Turned off by red threads and China “angels”? Then this is the group for you! We are thoughtful, open-minded, humorous, and easily frustrated by the likes of red, white, and blue hair-pretties and signature bible quotes. While we look forward to participating in some of the old-school DTC traditions, we won’t be shoving ladybugs at you. ALTERNATIVE DTC 2006 was created by three disgruntled a-parents as an alternative, nonreligious forum for those of us allergic to the traditional DTC group culture. Join us, we’re a hoot!

Here is the link to join us if you’re so inclined: ALTDTC06