changing seasons

Can you feel it in your neck of the woods - the season is changing? I can feel it around here. Maybe it's because daylight savings was last weekend and the light is with us longer in the evenings. The temperature is starting to thaw. I find myself tugging off my mittens on my daily walks to and from work.

The snow is still well over a foot deep in the backyard, but it's melty and crusty around the edges. It's slowly dissolving and rich brown earth is starting to appear at the edges of all the drifts and piles. I can see the raspberry canes spiking up through the drifts. Soon maybe some buds will appear on the little maple tree we planted in the backyard two years ago.

The changing season makes me think about our adoption. We receive updates every month and have been getting "hits" and inquires over our profile. Well over a dozen birthmothers have asked for a copy of our profile book, but we are still waiting. I wonder if maybe one of the birthmothers who is looking at our profile - "our birthmother" - is still early in her pregnancy and is wondering what she will do. Maybe she looked at our profile and then tucked it away somewhere as she sorts through things in her heart. It is as hard on her (maybe harder) than it is on us. I think about her every day and hope she is taking care of herself and the little one she is carrying.

I look at my frozen garden, mostly hidden beneath the snow, and I tell myself "Next year when the raspberries blossom our baby will be here" or "next fall when the maple burns red we will be celebrating that we have made a connection with a birthmother." And I will remember the berries and the red leaves on the maple and how they helped me count the days of this wait.

Patiently waiting (well . . . waiting)

Jillian