The End is in Sight

"Consult not your fears but your hopes and your dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what it is still possible for you to do." ~Pope John XXIII

I ran across the above quote this week and thought it was a good one to share and look back upon every once in a while. Not that this kind of outlook comes easily to me, but it would certainly be a good way to approach life.

I also got a fortune in my take-out the other night that I DEFINITELY need to hold onto: "Your present plans are going to succeed." I'll take that one! Here's the thing - I am NOTORIOUS for getting non-fortune fortune cookies. 99% of the time I get garbage like "Wisdom is a treasured quality" or something bland and boring like that. It may be true but it's not a "fortune"! Seriously, I don't get fortunes. I remember once I was telling a date about my lame legacy as we were at a Chinese restuarant and I once again got a non-fortune. He didn't believe my luck, so he asked the server to bring more cookies. I think I opened three more, all with the same results. So heck, when I get a fortune like this, I'll keep it! I may have to start checking my horoscope and playing hte lottery too!

See, Adoption-Powers-That-Be, I don't need big progress to be happy - little bits of fake progress work too!

I am on my last night of Puppy Week. Tomorrow afternoon I can head back to my regularly scheduled life (well, for a week, then I have a different pup in-house for the week). It actually has gone better than I expected, thankfully. Yesterday was particularly challenging because I got HAMMERED in work that I could only do on my home computer. But the pups were champs and my cats are not terribly happy with my nightly disappearances but they are hanging in there.

Tomorrow night is my Aunt A's big party. Technically it's her 50th birthday party, but the big reason we're making it such a big deal is that she is doing so well right now four years into a diagnosis of ovarian cancer. A few months ago she had given up on the party idea because her chemo just wasn't working well, but they have finally found the right combo and she's doing really well. She'll never be off chemo again, but she has such an amazing approach to it all. She really is the sister I never had, and we will all be kicking up our heels tomorrow.

I've had a lot of my fellow bloggers on my mind this week with the I-600 changes and general upheaval out there. I'm very sad for the delays this will likely cause some of you who have so diligently crossed the t's and dotted the i's and waited for oh-so-very long. I think the change is a good thing in the long run, but hate to see the seemingly sudden implementation keep families apart for the holidays.

There sure is a lot going on "out there" with Vietnam adoption. I haven't really tackled it here because I'm not sure I have anything of value to add when so many others have already addressed it thoroughly and eloquently. Or I should say I have plenty to say, I'm certainly plenty opinionated, but nothing quite yet. I'm very sad for the children who have had to be left behind in Vietnam while investigations are done, and I hope the increased scrutiny is a wake-up call for all of us to do everything we can to make sure our adoptions are ethical. I am continuously reading, learning, researching and re-evaluating everything I can about the process and my agency. I know I can't fix everything by myself, but I think if we all take the responsibility to make the best choices we can, we can make a difference. More on all that some other time I suppose...

Hope everyone in bloggerland is hanging in there and has a great weekend!