15 May 2006
who will you eat with?
I knew Five had reconciled himself to his fate the day he asked our guide in Guangzhou who she would eat with when he was gone.
Five had been smitten with her from the first. He'd turned to her, naturally, in trying to turn away from me. Had it been my first adoption, I would have been upset about this. I would have tried to prevent him from running to her when she showed up to take us somewhere, from sitting next to her at meals, from hugging her and sitting in her lap at every opportunity. I would have worried that he was "bonding" with her and not me.
But I already knew that it would take time, time, and more time. Love is an incremental emotion. Just as you can't charge up to your (future) beloved and demand instant adoration (Romeo and Juliet and a whole history of Hollywood films notwithstanding), you can't scoop up the child you've been loving for months and months and expect reciprocation. If you can expect anything, you can expect what I got at the first scoop: spit in the eye (in my case, literally, but the metaphorical version isn't fun either).
This refusal to take you at your word is a healthy response, and you know that of course. Still, you find yourself thinking as you are lugging around 55 pounds of arched back, that a little bit of the ol' "eyes across the crowded room" wouldn't be amiss.
So Five preferred the guide. Why shouldn't he? She was sweet, pretty, attentive, spoke his language, and laughed at all his jokes (which, evidently, were legion). In the interstices, he did give me a bit of attention. When she wasn't around, he would hold my hand. And after all, it was me he was going home with.
And that's what counts--with prom dates and with newly adopted kids.
It hasn't been quite 2 years that Five's been home. He still has his stand-offish moods--not whole days anymore, thank goodness. I remain as smitten by him as I was from the beginning, but my love for him is far less theoretical and far more day-to-day real.
I know I'm the one he'll be eating with for a long, long time, and he knows that too. And that, finally, is what family, trust, and love all come down to.
Five had been smitten with her from the first. He'd turned to her, naturally, in trying to turn away from me. Had it been my first adoption, I would have been upset about this. I would have tried to prevent him from running to her when she showed up to take us somewhere, from sitting next to her at meals, from hugging her and sitting in her lap at every opportunity. I would have worried that he was "bonding" with her and not me.
But I already knew that it would take time, time, and more time. Love is an incremental emotion. Just as you can't charge up to your (future) beloved and demand instant adoration (Romeo and Juliet and a whole history of Hollywood films notwithstanding), you can't scoop up the child you've been loving for months and months and expect reciprocation. If you can expect anything, you can expect what I got at the first scoop: spit in the eye (in my case, literally, but the metaphorical version isn't fun either).
This refusal to take you at your word is a healthy response, and you know that of course. Still, you find yourself thinking as you are lugging around 55 pounds of arched back, that a little bit of the ol' "eyes across the crowded room" wouldn't be amiss.
So Five preferred the guide. Why shouldn't he? She was sweet, pretty, attentive, spoke his language, and laughed at all his jokes (which, evidently, were legion). In the interstices, he did give me a bit of attention. When she wasn't around, he would hold my hand. And after all, it was me he was going home with.
And that's what counts--with prom dates and with newly adopted kids.
It hasn't been quite 2 years that Five's been home. He still has his stand-offish moods--not whole days anymore, thank goodness. I remain as smitten by him as I was from the beginning, but my love for him is far less theoretical and far more day-to-day real.
I know I'm the one he'll be eating with for a long, long time, and he knows that too. And that, finally, is what family, trust, and love all come down to.
