July in Antigua

Grateful to be in Antigua Guatemala with family and friends. xoxo

Joy

I came across this picture of Tim and Olivia from almost ten years ago and it made me smile. Sharing it with you.

17

From boy to man in an eyeblink. Mateo is 17!

Our front door

If you’ve known me for a while, you know I’m a total creature of habit. I’ve eaten the same breakfast for something like 40 years–crunchy cereal with yogurt, fruit and low-fat milk–do the same number of push-ups every morning (don’t be impressed; they’re bent-knee) and always pay my bills the day they land in my mailbox (mainly because I know they’ll get lost if I don’t). That kind of thing. Something else I do is take a picture with Olivia in front of the door of the house where we lived together in Antigua in 2003 while her adoption was being finalized. We do this every time we visit Antigua. Here’s our latest and some others from years past. (You’ll notice several years are missing. Keeping track of photos is not my strong suit ;-)) xoxo

What would you do?

Another quote I appreciate from Paul LaRosa’s commentary in New York Journal of Books: “O’Dwyer does a compelling job of juxtaposing the adoption experience in a way that is rarely done … The book seems to beg the reader for an answer to the question: What would you do?” Because no answers are simple in adoption. There is no clear conclusion. There is no black-and-white, right or wrong paradigm. There’s only gray. Which I didn’t understand going in. Which I learned only after years of parenting as an adoptive mother. What does it feel like to live in that uncertainty? That’s a question I wanted the reader to consider.