Friday, July 1, 2011

Windows of Opportunity

If, like me you are a lark; awake as the sun comes up and have the luxury of waking naturally, you find the creative window, when good decisions are made easily, resolution of difficult questions arrives and whole posts get written before the eyes are even open. Once the technology catches up and posts can be saved as a draft straight to the blog without us getting out of bed, life really will be simple!
I remember back to those days of being woken by the cries of a baby, little hands stroking the face or later the sounds of nearby clattering and busy-ness. Some years after that, awaking later than usual, having been kept awake in the night by music, loud laughter, fun and games, picking out a way to the kitchen through the sleeping bodies, ever room with it's lounge surfers and teens who didn't make it home. I was told many years later, that I was know for being able to feed a battalion of teens on demand and what higher compliment could there have been than that? Providing a shoulder to cry on, a listening ear and a warm welcome were always a privilege and somehow made up for my teenage years when my parents, although not unwelcoming, were strange in their eccentricities, preoccupations and odd ideas about what constituted hospitality.
That uneasy fit was a source of much discomfort, embarrassment and disconnection as I grew up. My mother's criticisms of our neighbours, who had very different ideas on hospitality and neighbourliness, was probably the very source of my determination to be more generous, sharing and comfortable with others.There followed many wonderful years of working with people, some of whom are friends to this day, a busy family and social life, with plenty of activism of one sort and another threading it's way through the mix.
Through out all those years, I marvelled at the way in which women are able to work together, have fun together and care for each other, in ways that appear effortless, natural and straight forward. Get a group of women together and food will appear, tasks will be achieved and all without discussion of how it's done or who does what. It all just happens magically and so it is with this blog. You have posts scheduled, all neatly lined up waiting to go on date, the topics fit together in an interesting and diverse tapestry of ideas and topics. As if by some unknown scheme, women have come together, some of whom will never meet or never know each other except through these posts. Brought together by a common bond; that of being adoptees and bloggers who care to write about their lives and experiences, feelings and thoughts on adoption. Now that has to be something to be a happy adoptee about!
                                                                          Von