Preparing for Departure

Thursday
August 1, 2013

August.  It's finally here.  It's been such a whirlwind since Michel's arrival, it's truly hard to grasp that August has arrived.  On one hand, I can't believe how much we've done in the past month.  I think we've visited more local attractions in the past 29 days than in our five years in Des Moines.  On the other hand, she leaves tomorrow.  I can't think about it too much, because it breaks my heart.

We have spent this week still trying to cram in new experiences and see friends who haven't yet met Michel and finish our month-long bucket list of everything Michel wanted to do and everything we wanted to show her.  At the same time, we've started preparing for her departure.  Buying a suitcase, assembling her photo album, washing all of her new clothes one last time, making choices about what goes back to Colombia and what she'll leave behind.  Her departure is definitely on everyone's mind.

Michel seems to be taking it in stride.  In our host family training session last weekend, we were told that some kids withdraw and become distant in the final days, as they mentally start to prepare to say good-bye.  Other kids become clingy, as if they need one last chance to soak up your love and care.  Michel seems to be tending toward the clingy side - not in a bad way, but she definitely wants more hugs and wants to be by my side during the day.  I'm glad she's not withdrawing, because it would be hard to not question whether we had done something wrong to offend her.  But her near-constant presence now will make her absence awfully noticeable after she's gone.

Michel joined the local Kidsave coordinator this morning, along with his daughter (a Kidsave Summer Miracles kid in 2011), another Summer Miracles "alum" who was adopted locally, and three of the children hosted this year, to visit a local home-building company that has donated money to help fund the kids' visits to Des Moines.  Huge thanks to Destiny Homes & Genesis Homes for your generosity to the Kidsave program.  You are changing the lives of children and families, thousands of miles away and in your own backyard.

The leaders of the company were able to meet the kids they have helped in the past and the kids hoping to find families this summer.  Michel enjoyed the outing, especially since she got to hang out with some of her close friends with whom she has traveled, and since they stopped for ice cream at McDonald's on the way home!

My best friend from college, Lizz, is in town from the Washington, D.C. area, with her husband and three kids this week. They came over for lunch to meet Michel - just in time before tomorrow's departure day!  When Lizz is in town, the tradition for our families is to order pizza or Chinese take-out, so I gave Michel the choice between those two for lunch today.  She loves pizza, but the other kids from Colombia that she saw this morning told her she had to try Chinese because she would love it.  I knew she likes chicken but not anything too spicy, so I figured sweet and sour chicken was a safe bet.  She loved the chicken, pineapple, and sauce.  The onions were a "no thank you," but she seemed to like her first tiny foray into Asian cuisine.

Lizz's job involves traveling and living in countries all over the world, so she was just the resource we needed to guide Michel's packing process.  Michel made a lot of careful choices - with less drama than I would have expected - about which items would go back in her suitcase, and which would be left behind.  We knew she couldn't take everything back in her one allotted suitcase and one backpack, so we helped her pick her favorite clothes and most of the souvenirs.  Lizz was full of international travel tips - shoes clipped to caribiners on her backpack, thicker clothing items worn instead of packed.  Without Lizz's advice, she probably would have had to leave a lot more behind.  However, I'm mildly concerned about how this poor kid is going to navigate when she gets to the airport:  she's currently planning to wear jeans, a tank top, a long-sleeved shirt, the yellow Summer Miracles t-shirt required for travel, and a fleece jacket, with another jacket tied around her waist.  If she doesn't die of heat stroke while waiting at the airport, she may collapse under the 48-pound backpack during her four-hour layover in Atlanta!

We are grateful this license plate was at our house today,
carrying a master international suitcase packer!

Michel played Phase 10 with our neighbor Elizabeth after Lizz and her family left this afternoon.  (Yes, the Elizabeths are taking over the world!)  I don't think they finished the game, but Michel was in the lead, as always.  Thanks, Elizabeth, for being a good sport about playing with the perpetual Phase 10 champion!

The five of us had a quiet dinner at home, and then we let Michel pick where she wanted to go for one last round of American ice cream:  Coldstone, Dairy Queen, or Baskin-Robbins?  (Ever hear the parenting tip - usually with toddlers - to give choices, but make sure you can live with any of the options?  Yeah, I thought I could live with any of those.)  She chose Coldstone, her new favorite.  So, off we went to Johnston for ice cream.  We talked, laughed a lot, and soaked up as many memories as we could.

On the way home, a song came on the radio called "Summertime Sadness".  It was especially fitting for our last night with Michel.  I think we're all feeling some summertime sadness.

I also hope we have given Michel a summertime of joy, of experiences she might never have had otherwise...and perhaps, we have built a bridge to her forever family.  On this last night of Michel's amazing summer vacation, we dream of what her future could hold.

At bedtime, Michel brought her (heavy!) suitcase to the hallway outside her room.  She pulled it back and forth and posed for lots of pictures.  I think she enjoys having her first "real" suitcase and looking like a grown-up traveler!  Now, if we can just get it to stay upright and not tip over from the weight of everything packed inside...

Tonight, after the kids were in bed, Mike and I worked on a good-bye letter to Michel.  It was so hard to convey everything we want to say to her.  We thanked her for spending her summer vacation with us and talked about her many gifts.  We included as much "parental" advice as we could - study hard in school, maintain good friendships, seek wise counsel from adults if you have a problem...trite, perhaps, but our last chance to impart a bit of wisdom before she leaves.  May these words encourage and sustain her until she can come home to a forever family.

As we composed the letter together, we wrestled with the unfairness of seeing such wonderful, amazing kids grow up without the unconditional support of a family.  Mike kept saying, "It's not okay.  No kid should have to grow up without a loving, supportive family."  I think it's fair to say that our boys were born into blessings they often don't even recognize, while some kids are hungry just for a dad to read them a bedtime story, for a mom to lie down and rub their back at night.  Michel isn't asking for the world.  Just someone to love her, to have fun with her, and to stand by her, no matter what.  Forever.