tea and things.

So, according to my calendar, I'm just about six months "pregnant" now, and over the past weeks I've been experiencing sudden, intense cravings for Chinese food. Go figure.  

There is a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant less than one mile down the road that serves up some amazing chow-mein. The noodles are salty, earthy, and doughy...wholly satisfying.  They soothe my waiting spirit, my primal maternal angst, which is starting to groan and moan daily as we wait for our referral from China. 

Chris and I had a date night a few weeks ago and we went out to eat...Chinese food again.  Each time we crack open our fortune cookies at the end of the meal, I hope for some sort of sign, wanting God to cosmically communicate some secret message that indicates how this will all pan out and when it will all go down. But instead, I open up my crinkled piece of paper and read,

"a modest man never talks to himself."

Hmmm...whatever.  That gives me nothing.

We are nearing the end of paperwork now, and every evening when Chris comes home with the mail, I ask...

Did IT come?

That is, our approval from US Immigration, the last prized piece of paper we need before our dossier is COMPLETE.  

We're coming up on two months since we sent in our application, which is the usual amount of time it takes China families to get immigration's approval, so it should be any day now.

In the meantime, we are just waiting...drinking tea, eating lots of noodles, and reading lots of meaningless fortunes.  

We hope and anticipate that our dossier will be in China by the end of July, and that we will find out who our boy is by the end of the summer.

***  

In other news, I'm reminded that nothing passes the time like busyness and distraction, which equals SCHOOL for me.  I'm back in school this summer, completing the final two classes before I start my thesis, which I'm still uncertain about, but I'll cross that bridge when it comes.

The class I'm currently taking is Advanced Workshop in Poetry II. This is actually the first poetry class I've ever taken--I volunteered to move up into the advanced level course because it was going to cancel unless a few more students joined.  I also moved up because the professor of this class is one cool dude and is the head of our whole MFA program.  So far, so good.

The description of our "student lounge"--the message board where we can virtually raise our hands and ask questions--reads:

This is the Student Lounge. It has plush leather chairs and a mini-fridge filled with travel sized bottles of Cristal. There is a masseuse on call, and take my word, the personal chef creates the gustatory experience of a lifetime. If you have forgotten your smoking jacket, loaners can be found on the rack to your left, next to the Rodin. Yes, indeed, the National University MFA program spares no expense!

Needless to say, the Student Lounge is my kinda place, and it's amazing what kind of classroom you can create for yourself when it's left to your imagination.

Anyhow, some words that immediately come to mind though when I think of poetry are:

frivolous

impractical

unnecessary

melodramatic

And...I suppose it can be all of these things...and I LOVE IT.  Perhaps I have an affinity for impracticality. I think Chris is expecting me to change my track from nonfiction to poetry. I'm not sure, but we'll see. Poetry, just like prose, seems to be GOOD THERAPY. Putting thought and emotion into words is cathartic and freeing, and I find that it offers a great sense of pleasure and relief in the midst of life circumstances that are largely out of our control. So, in that sense, poetry is the most practical and necessary thing ever! 

So...you guys may be seeing more poetry up in here over the next eight weeks.

For me it's been hot tea, chinese noodles, and poetry...

but what soothes your waiting heart?