Update from Addis

More pictures arrived last week -- the newest littlest one seems to be doing alright. She is absolutely precious. I have been trying not to look at photos or think too much about it -- just play it cool and bide my time until court opens (8 days!) and we can at least be moving toward a court date. Right now, we're not moving toward anything -- just floating, floating, waiting, waiting. Patience, patience.

She is 11 weeks and not quite 10 pounds. Teeny tiny! And yet the child has the head of a melon! She could grow to be six feet tall and her head would be fine just as it is. But as of now she is ... ten pounds. Can you imagine? I can't. I pick up things around the house that are ten pounds and I try to see what it is like to hold such a weight, such a small thing. It is like air. With such a fragile, tiny thing in tow I will no doubt return to creating worst-case scenarios for every room, vehicle or situation we encounter for the next several years. This will simply be my job, and I will not judge it this time around. (Oh, how things will be different this time! I will be calmer and more prepared! Less overwhelmed and worried! More present! Yes! Yes! Yes!)

As excited and impatient as we are to bring her home, I am also strangely calm and ... content. Our lives are gorgeous, and I'm finally getting enough sleep so that I can see it. We're balanced and easy and hitting our stride. Beyond any reasons I could list, our little family seems to be completely ... I don't know. Happy. Quietly happy, ebulliently happy. Happy sleepers, eaters, play dough designers, gardeners, bicycle riders, vehicle passengers. We even come out of time outs pretty happy.

We are very, very far from Square One. The poop, the laundry, the messes, the tied-down-to-a-schedule, I don't mind those things so much. The loss of sleep is what I fear. I really do. I'm a much better person with a solid niner each night, and I am no fool; I know I am not going to have one again for a really, really long time.

Nonetheless. I cannot wait for all ten pounds to be hoisted on my back forever. I can't wait to feel her weight on my chest as I sing her to sleep, I can't wait for the passing of hours and days and days again, and my being intertwined with another being too perfect and tiny for so many words. Of just gazing -- because for so long there will be no words -- and of knowing and conveying, This is how we are now. Forever. We are ready for her!!

Last night I tried to rock Dessi to sleep and have her rest her head on my chest the way she used to. She wanted nothing to do with it. Just Bounce me, mama and Sing me songs and Let's clap and wiggle! And then a swift hug and a kiss and off to bed. I see her moving away from us in this heartbreakingly beautiful way -- our bright, sweet, delicate light. She is strong and perfect and confident and I love it, but I miss her, too. I miss her needing me the way she used to.

Which is all a surprise to me. All that needing was sometimes a bit overwhelming, to tell the truth, and I kinda thought we were adopting again not to fill our needs but to give the universe back some of this love overflow -- because we are fat and happy and blessed. I can see now, though, that a second child won't soak up the leftover love; she will create more. Just seeing her pictures and thinking about her, I realize she already has. I think it will break my heart wide open forever.