Children of Dreams, An Adoption Memoir (26 page)

Bits and Pieces

In the beginning...

Genesis 1:1

Although I grew up in a moral home, it was not a Christian home. As a young teen, I read the Bible in the darkness of my room under covers and was amazed at the humanity of Jesus Christ and His unrelenting love for those who hated him. It was as if I was among the masses that listened to Him on the hills of Jerusalem. I was amazed by His teachings and accepted His salvation—so I could be with Him in heaven for all eternity. I didn’t want to go to hell.

Without a Christian worldview, my choices were based on human determination and not godly wisdom. Neil Armstrong’s words when he stepped on the moon, “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” resonated with my “nothing ventured, nothing gained” mentality. I believed I could “go where no man [or woman] had gone before,” as the Enterprise did in the original Star Trek series. Whether it was chasing aliens on distant planets or becoming the next Jacques Cousteau, I thought if I made straight A’s and met “Mr. Right,” my dreams would come true. They didn’t.

In the fall of 1985, I was a full-time student at the University of Florida when I returned home from school one day and discovered that my husband had packed his bags and left. I frantically called him to see where he was. Why wasn’t he coming home? Did he not love me anymore?

After working six years as a court reporter putting him through graduate and medical school, he had promised me that I could return to school when he began his residency in radiation oncology. Obtaining my college degree was another “dream” that had been taken from me. Now all that mattered was my husband had left. I withdrew from college for the semester to deal with the crisis. We had a few counseling sessions, but he wasn’t willing to work on the marriage. I continued to work on me.

The following January, I enrolled at Santa Fe College to retake the Calculus course I had dropped the previous fall. When I got to derivatives, a mental flashback to my husband abandoning me made it seem insurmountable. The professor had been covering derivatives the day I came home and discovered he was gone. Rather than dropping the course or communicating with my professor at Santa Fe College, I quit going. Despite attempts by my instructor to contact me, I never answered her calls. I received an “F” for the course on my otherwise impeccable record at Santa Fe College.

A few years later, when the divorce was final and God had given me new direction, an opportunity arose through the National Court Reporters Association to enroll in the External Degree Program at the University of Alabama. The thought of earning that elusive college degree consumed me. Without missing a beat, I called the University of Alabama to obtain more information on applying to the program.

Suddenly that “F” in Calculus looked “damning” on my record. I had no one to blame except myself. I deserved the “F.” There was nothing I could do to change it. The ink had long dried, recorded in the books for all to see, including the Registrar’s Office at the University of Alabama.

I went to the Office of Student Affairs at Santa Fe College to obtain a copy of my transcript. Thirteen “A’s” and one “F” were printed across my transcript. I shared with the counselor the circumstances surrounding the “F”, lamenting how I wished I had dealt with it and how I hated seeing it on my permanent record. It never occurred to me that they could do anything about it. I asked her if she thought it would cause my application to be rejected from the University of Alabama.

The counselor told me to wait in her office for a few minutes and she would be right back. She left and returned shortly and handed me two sheets of paper. The first sheet contained my official transcript. On the second page, in large letters written across the Calculus I course were the words, No Record.

Santa Fe College had deleted the Calculus I class from their computers. As far as they were concerned, I never took the course. There was “no record.” I looked at the transcript page, and sure enough, Calculus I was not there. I didn’t know colleges had it in their power to remove courses that students had taken and for which they received failing grades.

That day God showed me forgiveness. I left knowing I didn’t deserve that kind of mercy. I realized God had revealed to me a greater truth. I had to forgive everybody that I had any bitterness toward if I wanted to receive God’s forgiveness. The day marked a turning point in my life. I knew I was without excuse.

I couldn’t just forgive once—it had to become a way of life. How could I be a good mother if I brought all of that baggage into a “forever” family with Manisha and Joy? Forgiveness was the cornerstone of my healing and essential for God’s redemption.

It wasn’t until after my painful divorce that I understood it is God who shapes our dreams and directs our paths. It was then that I gave all of my life to Jesus Christ—including my dreams. Little did I know what wonderful plans God had in store. Not that my life has been easy; if we embrace a radical Christianity, I don’t think it will be. God took me as I was—bitter, hurt, and angry—and began a huge reconstruction project.

One hot afternoon when I arrived at my favorite pool to take a cool dip, a group of swimmers were already there with an assortment of things, including tanks, snorkels, flippers, face masks, and unusual, intimidating gadgets that I came to know later as octopuses and BCs. I jumped at the opportunity to learn how to scuba dive.

I could not have known then how God would use such an amazing pastime for His divine purposes. God had a plan to prepare me to be a single mother—He wanted to equip me to rescue two children from the remotest regions of the earth.

I was mesmerized by the unparalleled beauty of the waters of the deep. With unlimited visibility, air becomes blue, sand glistens like snow, eels mimic wavy stems of plants, and blue rays glide like a flock of birds. The high definition, Blu ray cinematography created a world of enchantment dotted with multi-colored coral, sea anemones, blue damsels, and grouper. If I was lucky, the occasional eel and nurse shark would reward me with a surprise appearance.

I often wondered why God would create an underwater world with so much diversity that most would never experience. I never felt closer to God than when swimming weightlessly in the ocean’s depths, feeling His presence in every breath inhaled through my regulator. I had indeed met the Great Master, who cares for the simplest of creatures—even the little worm I discovered clinging to a sunken ship at fifty feet on a night dive. Never would I doubt that God was the Creator.

My dives throughout the world gave me allegorical clues to the great battle waged in the unseen world of good versus evil. The immediate dangers that lurked in the deep became metaphors to me for human sin and evil.

On a more practical level, Scuba diving helped me to develop self-esteem, overcome insecurity, face my fear of failure, and deal with not always being physically comfortable. I have some pretty tall tales I could tell.

Without God’s work in my heart on so many different levels, I would have remained a miserable, wretched, person—codependent and insecure. I cringe when I think what I would have missed out on if God had not had mercy on me, but God promises to heal the brokenhearted and restore what the locusts have eaten.

God brought me through many adventures that became life lessons, more than enough to last a lifetime, but it was during the years in the “wilderness” before I left for Nepal, while in the crucible of suffering, that God did His greatest work on my heart. I realized, sitting in a chair at the Jacksonville Airport that cold night, it was only through forgiveness that God was able to fulfill my dreams, redeemed by His grace and mercy.

…choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve…

Joshua 24:15

How are my daughters doing today? This was the most common question asked by the proofreaders of the first draft of my book. As I put the finishing touches on
Children of Dreams
, I can’t believe how quickly the years have slipped away. We have our children for just a short season. One day we turn around and our babies and toddlers are headed to school with backpacks and a lunchbox. We barely blink and they want the keys to our car. I hope the wedding bells and nursery are still a few years away.

Manisha Hope, my oldest, will be eighteen in just a few months. She would have died when she was seven if I had not adopted her. She would never have known the Lord, never felt a mother’s love, or had a chance to become everything God created her to be.

Joy would have remained in the northern reaches of Vietnam without the opportunity to achieve her creative potential, to know Jesus personally, and to fill my heart with so much love. I would have spent the rest of my life never knowing the child God had chosen for me. Our Lord doesn’t put any child with any parent. There is a great plan crafted by our heavenly Father from the beginning of time.

As much as I would like to think my children are mine, they aren’t. They belong to God and I do not own them. They are on loan to me to raise and love for a few short years, painfully fleeting as I look back, but hopefully, when the Lord returns, He will say to me, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”

Now that Manisha is almost an adult, I have been reflecting on what words of wisdom I will impart to her as she approaches adulthood. She will soon be stepping out into the world on her own, and I wonder whether I have done enough to prepare her for the harsh realities of life.

In so many ways I know I have failed because I am not p
erfect. We have all failed and come up wanting. But God loves Manisha and Joy more than I do, and I know my prayer and my heart’s desire, above all else, for both of my girls, is for them to love the Lord with all their hearts. Ultimately, they will have to choose which road they will travel and which God they will serve—the God of the Bible, or a manmade god that could entice them away from everything I have tried to teach them and show them.

God was the perfect parent and Adam and Eve disobeyed Him. If the perfect Father can have rebellious children, it doesn’t make me a bad parent if my children go up against everything I believe. Part of letting go is allowing them to choose how they will live and accepting them as they are, whether I agree with their lifestyle or not. I must love them anyway. God is our example. Help me, Lord Jesus, to be like You.

Some of the saddest stories I have heard are from adoptive parents whose children have chosen the wrong friends, made incredibly foolish choices, squandered amazing opportunities, or refused to acknowledge Jesus as their personal Savior. Often times the parents blame themselves for their children’s mistakes.

Hopefully, in twenty years God can write HiStory, the testimony of two orphans who faithfully served Him, whether Manisha becomes a missionary, Joy a doctor, or they are “ordinary” in the eyes of the world but “heroes” to someone in need. For now, that part of the story must wait. At seventeen and ten, my daughters have barely begun to live, but God has given them the opportunity through adoption to become everything they were created to be. I hope as they both mature, they will dream big dreams, climb huge mountains, and continue to walk humbly with their God.

My treasure hidden in the mountains of Nepal, it seems like yesterday when Manisha and I first met and walked around the building picking flowers and admiring the birds. She is almost eighteen and the biggest issue we “fight over” is why I will not buy her a car. She is a beautiful young woman who has accepted Jesus as her Savior, and there is evidence of her relationship with Him in her life. Friends call her the “little mother,” because she has been such a wonderful big sister to Joy (most of the time) for which I am thankful.

Getting through the teenage years with my oldest daughter has not been easy. We still have a couple of more years to go, and I pray that God will be with her each day, draw her unto Himself, and keep her safe. There is no room for pride when raising a teenager; it has been hard work but rewarding.

As an aside, Manisha’s Algebra teacher this semester is the same professor that gave me the “F” and for which Santa Fe College removed the failing grade from my record—the object lesson God used to teach me the meaning of forgiveness. What would I have thought twenty-three years ago if I had known that someday that same professor would be my daughter’s instructor?

Joy just turned ten and is now in fifth grade. It’s been eight years since I was in Vietnam. My pearl of great price—how empty my life would have been without the one I almost didn’t get. I have been homeschooling Joy for the past two years and I try to make it a lifestyle and not a drudgery (most of the time). We bought seasonal passes to Disney World for a year and have made several trips to study the African animals, learn about wildlife, and develop a greater awareness of history through the elaborate exhibits. At Epcot, the World Showcase, I have introduced Joy to other cultures from around the world, and we’ve eaten at several of the restaurants offering French, German, and Moroccan cuisine.

Soon we will go on a kayaking trip to Atsena Otie Island off the coast of Cedar Key to study migratory birds and the history of the island. I have used homeschooling as an excuse to have fun and learn about God’s great universe, where His handiwork is revealed in the precious life and beauty around us.

Joy is also a talented gymnast on the girls’ gymnastics team and will compete at level eight in January. If she stays injury free and I can afford it, she has the physical agility and strength to go as far with it as she wants.