Closer, closer

First, a celestial picture of Josie, taken & manipulated by Laura (I omit last names for privacy purposes).

This has been a strange week! Monday, some in the adoption community expected referrals. The CCAA (Chinese adoption central, that is) sent a delegation to the US, so it was assumed that referrals (for us) and travel approval (for those referred in August) would arrive.

Nope. In fact, Monday was devoid of rumors.

Now, I was not a fan of adoption rumors during the first couple yrs of this adoption. I checked on RumorQueen (now ChinaAdoptTalk) periodically.

For the last few weeks, though, I've been relieved to be able to retreat to the chatrooms full of others who understand that alternate universe AKA adoption from the PRC. It's a supportive group where you can "talk" endlessly abt frustration w/the process, ask questions, vent, etc.

In the end, the process is obviously worth it. In the meantime, though, it is as if a group of people were told to run a race. After runners reached the finish line, they were told to repeat the last lap. Again. Again. One more time w/feeling. Then the rules to the race were changed; some new hurdles were added. Then the judges all moved to a centralized location (okay, that last one doesn't work very well).

Given who John and I are, given who Josie is, we are confident that the match will be right for our family. We just wish it didn't take so long.

I think we'll hear something w/in a week. Or not. But it's looking more promising, sort of.