Dreaming and falling in love

I was hoping to sleep in a little this morning, before the big day of housecleaning ahead of me. Instead I was awakened by a dream, and a nice one at that. I was dreaming about Jessica. Not much to tell; I was walking around the house carrying her in my arms, all snuggled up, or she would follow me around like a lost little puppy as I was doing stuff. Now I know that reality may look something quite different, but it may also not be too far off base. I have to keep my head on straight as we're still in the make-up-your-mind phase of the process. But I can't help myself though - I'm completely sold on being this little girl's father. The more we learn the more both Angel & I feel that Jessica is the one. And we learned a lot about Jessica yesterday as we met with Jessica's adoption worker. It was a four hour meeting packed with tons of information about Jessica's history, as well as planning the next meetings with the various parties involved. This even includes meeting Jessica's birth mom, who will need her mind put at ease about the complete strangers who will be adopting her daughter.

After our meeting Sharon, Angel & I went to Tim Horton's for some badly needed lunch (we didn't get out of the meeting til after 1pm) and to debrief from the avalanche of information. Over bowls of chili we talked about how we were feeling about everything, and I said to Sharon that she had pegged me right. I was referring to the comment Sharon made at one point during the meeting, where she looked at the expression on my face as we were absorbing all we were learning. "You're already falling in love, aren't you?" The sheepish look on my face generated laughter around the table, and all I could say was, "It's too late! It's too late!" I was, of course, referring to the advice we were constantly given - use your head, not your heart. But honestly I don't think even the workers involved are following their own advice. As Angel observed as we were driving home, they can see the witting on the wall too. Everyone knows where this is going.

And when this will all end, if we make the decision to adopt, is indeed going to be a lot sooner than we imagined. Over the next four weeks we'll be attending meetings and then we'll go away to Jasper for the weekend to mull everything over. Once we make a final decision, assuming it will be a yes, the dating process begins. This will happen, we are told, over a 4-5 week period prior to placement. This means, in Sharon's words, that we may get to play Santa Clause this Christmas. If, for whatever reason, the placement is delayed past the middle of December Jessica will not be moved until the new year. This goes back to the idea of the seamless placement, where placements do not occur around the holidays. This is to ensure that Christmas is not associated with upheaval in the child's mind. And for Jessica this is especially important as she has had a few unhappy Christmases.

I'm amazed at the range of emotions I feel about all of this. Last night when I went to bed I was feeling fearful about the whole thing, but this morning as I write this post I feel excitement and anticipation. As I said to Angel yesterday I'm ready to leave behind that part of our lives where it was just the two of us, and that's been 18 years in the making. There was a time where I though that I couldn't make the adjustment to parenthood, simply because I was so used to us being a couple with no responsibilities to tie us at home. But I'm in a different frame of mind now, and my focus is on getting ready for parenthood. There are things that need to get done beforehand, things that were causing us some amount of stress. We've just finished renovating our kitchen, and it has that great IKEA look to it, but the place is a shambles. Hence, the big clean-up today. In addition I have my final course to wrap up before my graduation date in December; doing that while attending all those meetings will be a challenge, but it's more of an issue of how I use my time as opposed to having enough.

To be sure, time is the issue here. As Bob Dylan sang, "The times they are a changing" and that is so true for Angel and me. How we spend our time over the next 8 weeks will be life changing, not just for two people but for three. It's a time of hope, fear and anticipation. It's a time of dreaming, and falling in love. I know Hendrick, use your head and not your heart. But I can't help myself here...