Travel Journal: Days 9 & 10 - Coming Home

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. - Isaiah 43:19

Our last day in Addis, we went out for one last shopping excursion.  Danny joined us again, and we had a great time together.  We bought some cool coffeepots (which were in about 100 pieces when we got home), shields for our knight warriors back home, and some tribal figurines from Abraham's region.  At one point I looked back and Danny had his arm draped around Samuel as they walked and talked, just the way that Ethiopians do.  So sweet. 

As we were packing up I realized I had a lot of Abraham pictures and a lot of Ethiopia pictures, but no Abraham-in-Ethiopia pictures.  So here is my dad obliging me with a picture of our boy against the backdrop of his homeland.

We packed up and left the hotel around 3 pm to go to the Holt offices one last time before heading to the airport.  Abraham was zonked and slept most of the time.

I had such a conflicted heart this day!  I hated to leave Ethiopia but desperately wanted to see my kids and be reunited as a family.  Some of my favorite mental snapshots of Ethiopia:

the view outside the hotel

So many animals in the street, always

donkeys practically buried under their loads of hay

the bright blue taxi cars and vans against the colorful storefronts

the beautiful children of Ethiopia

 

handmade mops everywhere

And many, many more.  I limited myself to a few pictures but I could have posted many, many more.  Konjo no.  It is beautiful.  Beautiful and broken.  Maybe that's why I got such a kick out of those persistent Addis Ababa flowers, dead set on blooming in the most unexpected places.

(photo courtesy of the Schells)

But I digress.  We got to the airport and boarded our plane.  No longer under the nannies' watchful eyes, I rebelled by dressing Abraham in a cute short-sleeved romper.  Abraham had slept through the hustle and bustle of leaving, and when he woke up on the airplane as we were settling in, a strange thing happened.

He screamed. 

Now, Abraham is not a screamer.  But he opened those big brown eyes and they were filled with terror.  All of the sudden I could see things through his eyes.  Here he had spent the majority of his short life inside the walls of an orphanage, and all of the sudden he was surrounded by (1) strange sights, (2) strange smells, (3) unfamiliar language, (4) loud noises, (5) pale-faced strangers, and (6) cold air on his skin that had always, always, always before been previously protected by layers of clothing and blankets.

In all my thoughts about us leaving Ethiopia, I forgot to think about him leaving. 

So I stood there in the bulkhead of the plane and rocked my terrified son as he screamed, with tears in my eyes as I rocked him because I knew he was scared beyond comfort.  I told him, ishi, Abrehem, it's going to be okay, but he cried until his body gave way to exhaustion.  I felt horrible.

Abraham's response to the over-stimulation was to sleep.  He slept for most of our travel home (and for days afterward).  I felt so bad for him.  We went through most of our supply of calming spray and distress remedy in between sleep sessions.  Those were good travel companions.

When we landed in Dubai we had to spend quite a bit of time in line figuring out our hotel vouchers, and then fell into bed in an exhausted sleep.  Early the next morning we boarded our flight to Houston, lattes in hand. It was long, of course, but thankfully uneventful.

Abraham became a US citizen as we stepped off the plane in Houston.  I wanted to get a picture but at that moment was too tired to really care.  Adam promptly went to work trying to get us on an earlier flight home to Austin.  His mission was successful.  As we killed time wandering through the airport, my flip flop broke.  This was mostly funny, because really, if that's the biggest hiccup in your international travel, you're doing pretty well.

We were greeted back home by a group of friends and family complete with signs welcoming Abraham into our family and community. It was a show of love and we felt very supported.  Best of all, we got to squeeze these little bodies again!

And now the real story begins...

The excitement of going through an adoption can overshadow, but the real story is that Abraham begins a new chapter of life in a family full of broken but well-intentioned people.  And our family learns what it means to open our arms and our love to a new life -- one who doesn't yet know that we are Mom and Dad and Sister and Brother.  That chapter began on June 4th, 2010.

So now I learn -- how to negotiate the emotions of a toddler who is angry at us for leaving and even angrier that we brought someone else home in her Ergo.  How to survive a week of jet lag while keeping 5 young children clothed, fed and happy.  How to keep my cool while my boys are pushing every button they can because they're adjusting.  How to respond with grace to rude comments in the grocery store.  How to continually reconnect with my husband who I adore so much amidst the chaos of seven people in a small house.

This is the Real Life part of adoption.  The part where the dreaming is over and the rubber hits the road.  Coming off the extreme emotions of the adoption process and back to the everyday grind of real children with real needs can be a bit like a cold-water slap in the face of an unsuspecting dreamer.

As with each of my other children, God is good.  He is good to show me my selfishness in the face of the everyday.  He is good to use parenting to refine me, continually.  And for that I am thankful.

The song for today is one that has spoken to the hearts of many adoptive parents, Amos Story, by our worship leader, friend and fellow adoptive parent, Aaron Ivey.   

The longing is over, now it's time to live...