Thank you Non-Christians! No Really, thank you!

*Disclaimer—not lumping ALL Christians into this group!  So don’t send me hate mail or a theological _________________ about how you walk in LOVE all the time!

It’s no secret that I call myself a Christian.  Well, I hope it’s not a secret.  I am and I say it proudly. When I say that though, I want to say that I think I am one of the coolest people you might ever have the chance to meet.  But, that isn’t what I want to write about today, now is it? (But really, I am a really cool person!)

It recently came to my attention that some of my fellow Christians, don’t like the fact that I adopted a “Black” kid (their words—not mine).  Now, as with any story, I admit, I am leaving out some of the details (details like—obviously, “[I am]…a lesbian because I adopted a black kid as a single woman” or “I got a tattoo on national TV of my black kid—so I am not only not waiting for God’s order of how a family is built, but I am scarring my temple!…”) surrounding this scenario.  Granted, some of these people have known me for years and it’s pretty sad that judgment, racism, and ignorance still rule their lives.  And for some of this—I blame me!  I have clearly not been a good enough influence or example in their lives to steer them away from such things (add this to the list of things I gotta step up my game for this year!).

But I just want to take a moment to thank all my non-Christian friends (and even strangers) who have had NOTHING but amazing things to say about my adoption.  I just want to thank you for loving my son—no matter what.  I just want to thank you for offering to watch him and be kind to him.  I want to thank you, random lady at Target, who bought me diapers!  I just want to thank you for not judging me for wanting to adopt as a single woman and not say things like, “You should have waited for your husband, so that you could adopt in God’s ‘right’ order.  You are out of God’s will by having a child out of wedlock!” 

Thank you my friends who are worshipers of Buddha and Mohammed, non-believers, Jews, Hindus, GLBT’s (I know this isn’t a religion, but they are part of my life and they love me and K), Atheists and Agnostics (if I left you out, it wasn’t on purpose) for caring about the cause and the plight of orphans like I do.  Thank you for knowing that my tattoo, that I was blessed to get on national television, wasn’t just about the tattoo.  Thank you for knowing that tattoos don’t totally define who I am.  Thank you for knowing that my son is funny and smart and creative and witty and snarky and goofy—just like his Mama! 

Thank you for understanding that there are so many things out there in the world that matter besides petty stuff.  Thank you for being aware of what is going on in the world with things like, oh I don’t know, the plight of ¾ of the world trying to get access to clean drinking water.  Or maybe, just maybe, you might like to know that right here—in our 1^st world life: 13,500 children are diagnosed with cancer every year in the United States, 1 in 5 children diagnosed with cancer will die and everyday, 46 school children will be diagnosed with cancer.  Or maybe worry about/focus on this: More than one in six people worldwide—894 million people—don’t have access to this amount of safe freshwater.  How about the fact that there are 340 million people in the world living with HIV.  Let’s think about there are possible 17 million orphans in the world due to AIDS.  Oh, but why stop there!  Every day 5,760 more children become orphans! 

Ooopsie, Mr./Miss/Mrs. Über Christian—am I making you uncomfortable? Am I revealing trade secrets?  Am I ratting you out?  Well GOOD FOR ME!!! Get over it!  I am not telling non-Christians anything they don’t already know about you—you suck sometimes.  You judge them for piercings and hair color and dating choices and music choices.  You judge them for not being just like you! 

Don’t get me wrong.  I know plenty of people who serve God, love God and love others.  I adore them.  They are in my inner circle of friends, but so are the other people I am thanking in this diatribe.  I have said all of this to say, I still love you—you judgy Christian!  NO MATTER WHAT!  That won’t ever change. I will still hug you when I see you!  I will continue to pray for you because the Bible tells me to “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”  I love you because God loved me when I was unlovable.  I love you because I don’t always deserve love and I still get it, so you will get my love too!  I love you because…just because! 

But—I will end this the way that I started it—thank you, from the depths of my heart, the people in my life who love me and K—just because!

Post Surgery Thoughts

I had emergency surgery!  It wasn’t planned and I wasn’t prepared to be laid up in excruciating pain for a week!  But it happened.  Five years ago, I had major intestinal issues.  Well, they came back!!!  Once I got under the anesthesia—whoopsie, you have hernia also!  Let’s just get that while we have you on the table!

So, here are some thoughts that I have had while laying in bed this week:

It takes just 2 days for my armpit hair to become pretty offensive to me!

Does anesthesia make your leg hair grow faster?

You don’t care if you shower when you hurt ALL OVER!

You don’t care about brushing your teeth!

You don’t care how your hair looks when you hurt ALL OVER!

Once you do take a shower, do you care that the only deodorant at your parent’s house is Old Spice Sport?  Nope!

How badly do you want a Q-tip when you can’t have one/can’t find one? Just askin’!

There were a bunch of other non-coherent ideas and conversations and thoughts in my head while on Morphine, but…I will keep those to myself.

My Neighbor Died

While something like this usually wouldn’t make the blog, this one will.  I was working when I got the email from my other neighbor about JCo.  Since I live in a community of only 9 houses, we all know each other.  He and his wife used to be my direct neighbors, and they were awesome!  They would watch my house when I was gone.  They would help me with changing a light or carrying heavy things into the house.  He was such a sweet man. Until…the economic downturn.  The past 5 years haven’t’ been good to him or his attitude.  About 2 years ago, he allowed his house (that they lived in for over 20 years) to go into foreclosure and lied to all of us saying that they had bought a 3 bedroom across the way from me.  Why would any of us question them, they truly had been the back bone of our town home association for at least 10 years.  When confronted about the foreclosure, he got defensive and started spewing hatred, venom and anger about the government and racial slurs about immigrants and so on and so forth. 

When the new owners of that town home took possession of it, he called the cops saying that people were trying to break in and that people were trespassing!  Not only that, he has harassed the new, new owners ever since they moved in.  I tried to talk to him about it several months ago, but got no where—he was filled with hate and so much rage, I didn’t know how to even respond. 

More recently, another owner (who rents out her house) was staying with them.  She has always defended them and has been friends with them for at least 20 years.  She was one of their last advocates at the association.  After a series of events, he physically assaulted her and threw all of her stuff into the street.  She called the police and had a restraining order against him.

So, why did I write all of this?  His death, to me, is so sad.  He seemed to be a peaceful, happily married, close to retirement guy—for the 8.5 years before the economy sucked.  He was always willing to help someone. He was always willing to be a great neighbor.  And he died filled with hate, anger, bitterness, and unpleasantness.  Even his friends, who he and his wife had spent years hanging out with, had to quit being his friend because he was so angry ALL THE TIME! 

It’s a lesson for me—don’t allow the situations and circumstances of life create a hatred in you that becomes so blinding that you alienate the people who love you.  Don’t allow life to beat you down and take away the joy in your soul.  Don’t focus on the negative.  Negative things come, but wow—don’t let it kill you! 

Toddler Brain

Tuesday Truth-day! January 10, 2012

*I will use each Tuesday to rat myself out about something!  It’s all in good fun and I am sure that these “truth-day” revelations won’t be things people don’t already know about me!

It’s been a while since I posted one of these, but this has been bugging me for a while but I didn’t know how to phrase it, so I have shied away from it!  But here’s the deal—is the education system so horrible that Facebook status’ always need to look like this, “Headed tew skool” or “Ihh dislyk wen mi friends go through mi friends just tew get friends”.  Seriously people, it isn’t cool to sound like an idiot.  Also, is this how you want the world to think you speak and spell?  I know it’s just laziness and wanting to be funny, but as a mom and educator, it bugs the crap outta me!  I know you know better y’all!!! 

Potty Talk

I will admit it, this holiday break I have allowed K to watch large amounts of TV.  For those of you who I see often, you know how I feel about the zombie box (AKA the TV).  I limit K’s TV watching and take it away from him when he isn’t “good”.  Sadly, he LOVES it and is thoroughly bummed when I don’t allow him to watch!  But this break, I have really been lax!  He has been able to watch abundant amounts of TV and has loved every second of it. We have played outside each day for at least 2-3 hours, but seriously, our days have been filled with a significant amount of TV time!!!

The problem I am running into is combating the amount of potty talk that my “approved” movies have in them.  Now, when I say “potty talk” I don’t mean cuss words.  K isn’t allowed to say things like “stupid” or “dumb” or “shut up” and it seems like ALL movies and TV shows say these words.  While I still only allow him to watch PBS shows and DVDs, it’s still a problem.  No matter what the character says, I let him know that we don’t say those words.  He repeats it back to me, but…I have noticed that when he’s playing with his Woody and Buzz dolls or with his trains, he is mindlessly repeating sentences and phrases from movies that have these words in them!  It’s driving me crazy, but how do you combat it?  I don’t want him to be the weird kid who isn’t allowed to watch ANY TV (he’s already got a white mom and no dad!), but at the same time, I don’t allow him to say those words.

So… my friends, your advice?  Or Miss Debbie—have fun next week!  Or maybe I should wish you, K, the best of luck—you might be spending a lot of time in the red chair next week at school!

Who woulda thought that that woulda happened at IHOP!?

I am blessed to work at a place that gives me the week between Christmas and New Years off, and that it’s paid!  Not only that, my dad’s birthday falls during this week, so it’s been our tradition for me to take him to lunch (just the two of us) on his birthday!  Since I have become a mama, obviously, K has joined us and my dad loves it even more now, I think.

So, as per our usual, we went to a late breakfast/early lunch and it was his choice of where to go. My dad, being the decadent guy that he is, chose IHOP!  When I asked him why, he simply said, “I think K will like it because you can see the train tracks from the window, and I like the food, why?”  I wasn’t’ berating his choice, I just didn’t think that this would be his choice since I was footing the bill!!!

But as I have learned, everything happens for a reason.  K does love the view from IHOP.  He can see all the cars on the 6 lane road and the railroad crossing—it’s like a little bit of heaven for him!  Yet, this time was different. As we were walking out, this woman approached me and asked me where my son was born!  I could tell by looking at her that she was from the Motherland, but wasn’t sure if she was Ethiopian, Eritrean or Somalian (not saying they all look alike, so don’t send me hate mail, I just didn’t want to assume anything!!!).  After I told her he was born in Ethiopia, she said, “I am from Ethiopia too!  Can I ask his name?” 

Fast forward 15 minutes.  It was an amazing conversation in the parking lot of IHOP.  Come to find out, her son shares K’s birth name and she lives locally.  She was stoked to discover that there was a little Ethiopian community right here in Orange County.  I shared with her about all of our friends and that we were celebrating Timket in January and that we had just recently eaten at Tana Restaurant in Anaheim and that many of us have gone to culture class in LA. 

We exchanged numbers and she hugged both K and me.  As with most of my encounters with Ethiopians, it was beautiful!  But, it was not only a wonderful encounter; it was fantastic for my dad to see it as well.  Since my dad didn’t travel with me to pick up K in Ethiopia, he hasn’t seen much native, adult Ethiopian reaction to my adoption.  He has asked me, on several occasions, how Ethiopians feel about Westerners adopting “their” kids, so I know it’s a concern of his.  He is very aware of my feelings about making sure that not only K, but others KNOW that he is ETHIOPIAN-American! He was so happy to have had the chance to talk with her and hear her thoughts.

As we pulled out of the parking lot at IHOP, we were all grins and basically shared the same sentence over and over—wow!  Who woulda thought that that woulda happened at IHOP!?