I’m not proud of being impatient.  I’m not looking for a dozen friends to reassure me, “Oh, now, I saw you be patient when…..”   It’s just the way I am.  Though I usually hide it better than I’ve hidden it the last few hot, cloying weeks of summer.

Is it the really heat that’s sucking the life out of me?  Or the humidity?  Or being 54 years old?  Other than financially, summer is my least-stressed time of year.  I don’t cook much.  I don’t rush to fix breakfasts in the morning, or race to fix dinner in the evening.  There’s no child in after-school care anxiously awaiting my arrival.  I’m not in a frenzy to grab Chick-Fil-A and  to make it to church Wednesday night.  I still do laundry daily, but there’s less of it.  Nobody needs an emergency trip to Wal-mart to finish a project.  Yet I find myself less and less patient when I get home and find a mess in the den, or unwashed dishes, or a dozen pairs of cast-off shoes in the entryway.

I always think – and now too often say – “Why have you left a mess?  Didn’t I tell you what to do?  Didn’t I write it down for you?  You’re my child.  Don’t you have any better sense than this?”

I listen to K-Love on the drive to and from the bus stop (and sometimes on the bus, thanks to the iPhone app) not because I am a “good person.”  I’m not a “good person.”  Believe me, I know.  I listen to contemporary Christian music because it helps center me.   Worshiping the one true God of the universe puts my day in perspective.

The other morning, the DJ was reading from the book of James, which is my favorite.  I don’t need a theology degree to understand James.    “Take note of this.  Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.” Hmmm.

And then I thought – God is probably looking at me every evening thinking, “Why have you left a mess?  Didn’t I tell you what to do?  Didn’t I write it down for you?  You’re my child.  Don’t you have any better sense than this?”

James also tells me “…to be patient then.. until the Lord’s coming.”

That could be tonight, or tomorrow – when I’m tripping over the pile of flip-flops by the front door.

Sigh.

Okay.  Tomorrow, I’ll give this patience thing one more try.

Let’s hope I learn it quickly.

We know our family.  With three older girls, we felt another girl had the best chance of attaching.  Aged 4 – 8 we felt was young enough to mold, distanced enough from Hannah and old enough for us to shepherd her into adulthood.  No serious medical, emotional or physical conditions – with both of us working outside the home, we weren’t seeking more of a challenge than we’d already have simply by adopting.  Ours was a faith journey, and while we were trusting God to sort it all out, we weren’t going to be foolish.  We weren’t going to say “any child” and be matched with a three-legged, 15-year-old pyromaniac.  We didn’t specify race because – based on the demographics of St. Pete – we figured our girl would look like some flavor of us.  Not a clone.  But close enough not to attract rude stares.  I grew up with a limbless brother and know how siblings are affected by one-offs.  I wasn’t going to willfully subject my kids to that sly scrutiny – period.

The adoption forums, blogs, etc. are stuffed with families’ preferences, many of which express a desire for a child “as young as possible.”   Most couples want babies.  I understand that.  We didn’t.  But I understand why most do.  Attachment is certainly easier.  Most families – especially if they’d done much research – also want kids that look like them.  More points of commonality = easier to attach, for both parents and children.  If other children are in the family – easier for them, too.  Also easier if the child is added to the family in birth order, if there’s only one adopted at a time (unless bio siblings), etc.

That’s not to say that transracial, out-of-birth-order, multiply-adopted children can’t attach.   Not at all.  We all know families for whom these adoptions have worked.  But every stray card you’re dealt decreases your chances of attachment.  Harsh – but true.

I’m not criticizing how families choose to adopt.  I wouldn’t presume to.  I just know that for us – we wanted to increase our chances for success every way we could.

The adoption blogs and boards are ablaze now with news from Italy.  Its government has decided to outlaw race as a criteria for adoption.  So Italian PAPs (Prospective Adoptive Parents) can no longer specify a child’s desired race.

This sounds so brave, so wonderful, so egalitarian.  Who could argue with a decree so noble?

I notice – perhaps unfairly – that those who support this type of Big Brother edict have never adopted, or are past the age where it matters.

I notice – perhaps unfairly – that those who have never adopted are quick to tell those of us who have what they think they would do if they did adopt.  “Well, I’d never look at race.  A child is just a child.”  “I’d take a whole houseful, not just one.”  “I’d never change a child’s name.”  And on and on.

I notice – perhaps unfairly – that those who are past the age where it matters cast a golden glow on their parenting experiences.  “When we got Sally, we never asked about race.”  No, you didn’t have to.  It was assumed.

When I’ve spoken to families adopting who already have children, their #1 concern is ensuring the kids they have aren’t hurt by the experience.   Adoption begins with loss, and it’s always a gamble.  How many risks are you going to layer on the children you already have?

If Italy is going to declare race off limits to adoptive families, how about the child’s age?  Teens aren’t “as young as possible” though, are they?  How about physical or mental challenges?  Surely everyone has the resources to handle those?  Gender – my gosh, surely that shouldn’t matter?   The child’s friends – can’t leave them behind, now can we?

Where does government dictating to PAPs end?

I think Italians will likely choose alternative paths.  The less wealthy won’t adopt if they can’t have the most basic control over the first and most fundamental, God-given unit of society:  The Family.  The more wealthy will go black market, or live elsewhere long enough to adopt.  Or they’ll adopt only from countries – like Russia – that are likely to offer children similar in appearance to them, bypassing Italian children languishing in foster care.

Adoption is – contrary to much politically-correct babble – not just “about the child.”  It’s about the whole family – its desires, its goals, its limitations.

That may not be fair.

But it’s true.

And I notice it.

Last week, an American mother returned her seven-year-old adopted son to Russian after seven months in her home.   She felt her life was endangered by his behavior, including his threats to burn down their home.  She had her mother put him on a non-stop flight to Moscow, where Russian officials promptly hustled him off to a hospital for a physical examination.

Julia’s first plane ride was part of a 27-hour coming home marathon.

The mother was wrong on sooooo many levels, not the least of which is that now Russian officials are – once again – looking at suspending all adoptions.    We were caught in a similar mess in 2004 – 2006, which is why our adoption  took 21 long months.  My heart breaks for the families in process who have a referral, or who are waiting on court dates to book that oh-so-important second trip.

The Russian adoption community is in a furor.  With blogs, forums, Facebook and other forms of social networking – even with relatively few of us – it’s easy to make contact with other families.  And they are steamed.

3,702 Russian adoptions in 2006, when Julia came home

I understand the furor.  In no way, shape or form do I condone what the mother did.  In fearing for her own life, she destroyed her son’s chance at a better one, and may have crushed the hopes of thousands of PAPs (prospective adoptive parents) as well as the abandoned children they sought to embrace.

I also understand what is too-seldom a topic of discussion:  Not all adoptions are going to be successful.  Successful means an attached child and in the case of an older child – attached parents.  To me, adopting older (past infant/toddler) children is like a marriage.  You have to go into it thinking “forever.”  They have to choose you as well as your choosing them.  And you don’t really get to date those kids before you’re married.  And like a marriage – there’s a honeymoon period.  And later – there’s just the marriage.  And what do you do when it’s not working?  Counseling?  Medication?  Structured behavioral modification? Go ask Mom for advice?  Spend more time away from home?  Or is it divorce – on, in adoption, disruption?

I don’t know what this mother or her son did and didn’t do.  The seven-year-old boy had been home only seven months.  That’s not long enough for attachment.    Was he really so badly damaged that it was not safe for her to parent him?  Maybe.  Or did she just quit trying too quickly?

But there’s another major player here – the agency.  I didn’t love our adoption agency – Buckner – every moment of our process.  In fact, Keith and my good friend Sharon can tell you about an afternoon in a Chicago conference room that I absolutely gnawed on them,  slammed down the phone and spent the evening crying.    But as I have told every PAP who has asked:  Buckner does a better job of preparing adoptive families than any other agency of which I’ve ever heard.  We had to read books, and prepare book reports.  We had to attend a two-day session in Dallas in which they basically tried to talk us out of it, telling us every horror story imaginable.   We had to pass a home study,  and after Julia was home, our social worker visited monthly for the required six months, then annually for three years.   When we needed help from Buckner after we got home, we could pick up a phone and get it.

So where was this woman’s agency – which is one of the powerhouse agencies, BTW?    Did no one from her agency discern any red flags when they met this child in Russia?   Was the mom not counseled that attachment would take longer than seven months?  Was she not visited by a social worker monthly?  Her last visit should have occurred in March, before she put her son on a plane in April.   What happened there? Was she not matched with other adoptive families – with mentors?    Was she not pushed at forums?  Was she not given books and articles to read?

If she wasn’t prepared – if she wasn’t equipped to deal with this troubled child – then yes,  I understand why she did what she did.   And her son would have been troubled.  Those kids are thrust into school not speaking the language.  They’re eating food they don’t like with people they don’t know.  They miss their orphanage mates – their family.   They miss all things familiar.   And somewhere under it all – they miss their birth parents, and they’re angry at being abandoned.  And they take that anger out on you the parent,  just like every bio child who is unhappy does, too.

Love is not enough to overcome all those circumstances.  It never, ever is.   And that is why your agency prepares you.

I’ve spoken to or emailed with parents who have awoken to their adoptive children standing over them with knives.  Children who have set fires.   Children who constantly lie, and try to break up marriages.  Children who have abused younger siblings.  Children who have stolen from home, school, church, stores, you name it.  Horrible things that generally escalate over time when a child suffers from Reactive Detachment Disorder.  Not one of those families was a Buckner family.

This child may have needed professional therapy.  If he was really threatening violence, he may well have needed 24 x 7 monitoring.  His adoptive mother was single.   How would she accomplish that plus work to pay for that therapy?

I know the adoptive community wants to vilify the mother.   And she was wrong.  Without a doubt, she was wrong.  A child is not a pair of shorts to be returned so casually.

You don’t need much preparation to decide you want shorts.  Shorts don’t threaten to burn down your house.  You don’t keep shorts forever.  You’re not paying an agency to help you find those shorts, and ensure they fit your family.

And in adoption – that fit is a very, very big deal.

I grew up with stories of my Hoosier mom – Wyoming – and her three sisters – Arizona, Oklahoma and Nevada – plus their four brothers – Hugo Denver, William S. Hart, Texas and Kirby.   My mother’s father – a despicable hillbilly drunk – was enamored with the American West.  My mother’s mother – a long-suffering Quaker – acquiesced to his moniker choices.

(l-r) Oklahoma (Mary), Wyoming (Wy), Nevada (Neva) and Arizona (Zum) in the 70′s.  To tease my mom, I’d say, “Oh, Wyoming, you’re in such a state.”

We lost Mother in 1998.  Mom’s four brothers died long ago.   Her last sister – Mary – died in the wee hours Monday.

Aunt Mary and Me in 2007

Mom and her sisters – including Aunt Mary – did not let their bleak childhood circumstances define them.   They all attended college or completed professional training; all reared/encouraged their children, nieces and nephews; all used their creativity, generosity, wit and intelligence to leave this world a far better place than they found it.

The older I’ve gotten, the more I’ve marveled at what they accomplished.  They truly were “The Greatest Generation.”  I wonder if I could have done the same.   I know I’ve been given more, and accomplished less – that is not false modesty,  it’s simply truth.

I’ve grown weary in recent years of adults whining about their parents – perhaps because I tired of it in myself.   What our parents did.  Or didn’t do.  What slights, hurts and psychic sores we’ve picked at for decades.

When do you just grow up and let it go?  Seriously.  When do you?

Maybe it’s when your parents – and their siblings – are all gone.

Because then there’s no one left to blame.

You’re “it.”

I spoke to Aunt Mary at least once a week, and listening to her was sorta like hearing my mom again.   I loved her chuckling through stories about my family.  Our family.

Those stories have helped define me.  I know now, too, that the threads that weave family ties don’t always have to be knit in the same pattern.   And those threads can span generations, and even worlds.

Mom and her sisters always hated to say “goodbye.”  So I won’t.  I’ll just say, “Your life was a great story, Aunt Mary.  I’ll make sure my girls hear it.”

I miss you already. But you know that.

5’11″ no more….Hannah is taller than me now.  And as for 150….well, maybe in each thigh…..  Here’s what I look like now.

For my corporate anniversary gift, I chose diamond-crusted bling .

I love the big analog dial.  I can read it!

Very early in my career, I read three op-ed pieces in the Wall Street Journal that influenced me greatly.

First, I read a piece by Peter Drucker (the father of modern management, we learned at UH) that espoused co-workers had taken the place of neighbors.  He advocated human investment in the work place – to remember we were really people – neighbors, as it were.

The Ones to Call On:  Dennis – creator of the “Disbursement Family Feeling” – and long-suffering Vicki, who tolerated many  jokes and jolts in the 9051 Parkwest neighborhood.  I’m glad we’re all three still virtual neighbors.

Second, I read the results of a decades-long study that concluded children with two parents who worked outside the home were no more or less happy and productive than children with one parent working outside the home, providing a single critical condition was met:  Mom had to be happy at work.  If Mom wasn’t happy, nobody was happy.

Mom Lisa – who helped get blood donors at work for me and preemie Lois – has always been the best at finding something in which to rejoice.

Finally, I read an article that basically said, “You can’t do everything for or with your kids.  Find what is most important to them – do that – and don’t stress about the rest.”  Easy to say.  Hard to do.  But I’ve tried.

Early on, I noticed Mom-friends like Konen planning wonderful family beach vacations, baking for the school, etc.  Konen taught Vicki how to curse,  me how to be a gracious winner and everyone else how to quilt.   She claims no credit for imparting my mad fashion skills, like wearing vintage political campaign buttons (William Howard Taft with campaign ribbon shown here.)

The 1986 set of 40th birthday nails I painted in Konen’s honor bemused her.

Here’s what 30 years at AT&T has taught me.  Don’t expect to view this litany in the Wall Street Journal, as I did those three influential articles

1.  The 70′s divas were wrong.  You can not have it all.

When I graduated college, I  passionately embraced the feminist mantra of “You can have it all.”  I could birth or adopt brilliant children with naturally straight teeth, sprint the corporate ladder with book-smart ease, enjoy  leadership positions in a dozen community organizations, grow spiritually and support my church piously, whip up gourmet meals effortlessly every night – all while completing my MBA in my spare time.  Nothing could stop me.  Except,  of course, reality.

2.  It all has to balance, but family rules.

It is very, very tough to keep work life and home life balanced.  How late do you stay when your kids expect you to not only eat dinner with them but also to cook it?  And what’s more - you want to.

When Rachel was seven years old, she contracted a rare case of strep throat.   On the way home from the pedi, we had to pass the office….so I thought just a few minutes to check e-mail…..next thing I knew, it’d been a hour and Rachel was asleep on the floor of my cubby with give-away T-shirts cradling her feverish head.   I was disgusted with myself.  What was the matter with me?  I coded vacation, scooped her up and hurried home.  And never forgotten it.

You do your job.  You do it well.  But the job isn’t life.

3.  If you can’t be with the ones you love – love the ones you’re with.

I’ve often been uprooted from jobs, people – even a city – I really liked.  The strange thing:  There’s always been somebody good on the other side.    I would have missed meeting some really neat people if I hadn’t moved around – voluntarily or involuntarily.  My closest friends – the ones who have embraced me at my lowest – started out as work buddies.

4.  Have fun when you can.  Because you can’t always.

Look for the fun.  Take the fun.  Make the fun.  Be the fun.  While you can.

Looking for more bars in more places:  Dancin’ in the Dark with the Station 90.51 crew – Natalie, Me, Gaye, Tim & Linda

Reach Out and Touch Someone:  “Ghostbusters” debuted  while we were preparing for Divestiture.  My unit danced through the building in our hand-decorated T-shirts, jam-boxing the movie’s theme song and handing out candy on Halloween. For Christmas, we stuffed pantyhose with wadded paper, affixed a pair to each of our heads like reindeer antlers and shared candy canes.

Our units gathered for doughnuts when Natalie snipped my hot pink rat tail before I interviewed for the Rotary trip to India.   My rat tail matched my eye-scorching pink jellies and florescent pink tie – which my boss Vicki endured with raised eyebrows and a bitten tongue. That’s Margaret looking on fearfully, probably afraid I’d leave the dyed locks on her desk, like “someone” left (and photographed) the Baby Ruth in the women’s room to taunt that month’s beleaguered “Quality of Work Life” manager.

I had to be at the Astrodome for a promotion anyway….so why shouldn’t Rachel and Lois run the bases?!  Rachel also fondly remembers my pulling her out of school early for us to go “check the signage” at SBC’s “Race to the Red Planet” promotion at Space Center Houston in 1998.  She also flipped the symbolic light switch at Uptown Holiday Lighting in 1996.  And clapped for Byonce and Destiny’s Child at the Southwestern Bell African American Arts Festival.  Big fun!

5.  Do what you have to do when you have to do it.

There is never a convenient time to have or adopt a baby.  Or take vacation.  Or visit with extended family.  Or attend a funeral – as I failed to do for Judy’s  father-in-law on a Saturday afternoon when I thought SBC would crumble if I didn’t supervise cleaning up a payroll mess.  What an idiot.

6.  If you’ve not had your time in the barrel – you will.

Everyone has an “off” time at work.  If it’s not happened to you yet – it will.  Sales declines.  Monthly close bombs.  Grievances.  Outsourcing.  Health problems.  Significant issues at home.  Whatevah, baby.  It will happen.

7.  Even when things aren’t so great – take deep breaths – you don’t know what’s around the corner.

In 1984, I truly thought working on Outside Plant Divestiture would be the “biggest thing” in my career.

I worked every day from early August 1983 to mid-January 1984 with two days off – Thanksgiving and Christmas – thanks to Divestiture, Hurricane Alicia, late September flooding and a three-week labor stoppage.

Well, in 1987, I represented Southwestern Bell with Rotary in India for six weeks and even spoke to a crowd of 5,000.  “Well, that’s it.  That’s the big one.”  I thought.

Enterprise magazine featuring my favorite photo

In 1991, I politicked hard to be sent to do stories and a photo shoot on the combined Bell forces working Hurricane Andrew restoration.   Got it!  Multiple telcos ran my stories and photos.  “Wow, that’s it,” I thought.  “It’s all downhill from here.”  I could have stayed in Employee Information for many more years.  I loved it – my favorite job of all time -  but later came sports and events marketing, and I loved that, too.  And then launching up2speed in 2001 – my baby.  Plenty of jobs between all this stuff but finally -  U-verse.

U-verse has been the bomb.  It’s the culmination of everything I read more than 30 years ago, when I was slugging through books and magazines for the owner of Remco TV Rental.  Not every day is a picnic, and I don’t know what’s after U-verse – but I know the potential for something good is out there.

We may have been the only Comptrollers  Section Staff  in town, but we tried not to act like it.

The potential for something good has always been there.

This has been my 30 years – my career to date.  Delivered.

Our girls are in Houston visiting family this week, so Keith couldn’t bundle us all off to the midnight show of the newest movie opening, as is his custom. He was stuck with just me – a somewhat reluctant partner, I will confess, until he reasoned, “Look, you don’t want me going by myself at midnight with all those kids and looking like a creeper, do you?”

So I couldn’t let him look like a creeper! I had to go, too.  Along with  9+ completely sold-out theaters full of fellow fans at the Quarry.

Quiddich, anyone? I think decades served in corporate America have prepared me for a career as a Beater.

Rachel and Lois borrowed Sarah’s car to go see it in Pearland.  The texts were flying between the four of us.  In fact – the theater auditorium sported scores of cell phone lights before the movie started.  Keith said, “Can you imagine the data streams going out of here?”

I loved those books, and now better appreciate the movies. In fact – like all great books I’ve read – I’ve even learned something from them.

10 Things I’ve Learned or Had Reinforced by Reading “Harry Potter”:

1. Not all witches ride brooms.
2. If you poke a dragon – expect to get burned.
3. What’s accurate is not always what’s true.
4. Home is the place you’re safest. Or should be.
5. Howlers are to be avoided.
6. It’s our choices that define us.
7. You might die for your friends, but the only thing worth living for is an ideal.
8. The past is always part of the present.
9. “Good” is eventually going to win. The last book was a Revelation.

And finally….
10. Nobody loves you like your mother.

Hope you enjoyed this blog.  After all…….”Nothing like a nighttime stroll to give you ideas.” Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Can you do it?

Lois read this book last week, then insisted I read it.  Hannah quickly snatched it.   We alternated reading our favorite six-word memoirs aloud before deciding to compose our own.  Drum roll, please – here are our original creations:

I didn’t let you depress me. Keith,  a Ronald Reagan conservative who insists on working hard and being happy

People think they know.  They don’t. Rachel, mysteriously collegiate

And she played like never before. Lois, who treats play like work and work like play

Family.  Friends.  There to the end. Hannah, always 9 oz. in an 8-oz. cup

Asked my sister and niece, too:

Never what I plan or expect. Judy, my Houstonian sister who knows we only think we know what we’re doing tomorrow

Aimlessly wandering.  Deepening faith.  Boundless joy. Sarah, my brilliant niece who’s a stay-at-home mom and Junior League volunteer

And a few friends:

Laughed lots.  Licked Cancer.  Loved Always. Shelley, a healthy San Antonio business professional and devoted wife/mom/grandma/(great)friend

Excited to see through her eyes. Kate, a blogging buddy in St. Petersburg and mom-wanna-be who’s just been matched with a six-year-old girl

Procrastination, silly jokes overwhelming good intentions. Konen,  an AT&T survivor, wife/mom/grandma/(great)friend and generous volunteer extraordinaire

Living to be worthy of life. Brooke, a friend of Lois’ and president of her sophomore high school class

Molded by parents.  Loved by God. Mike, a Christian community Service Center volunteer in Houston

Self:  How did I get here? Eileen, a Chicago MD, wife, mom, and Sarah’s friend of forever

The greatest thing about aging?  Grandchildren! Johnnie, the face/voice heart of our church

Life imitates art.  Mine is finger-painted. Rachael, a Michigan blogging buddy MD, wife and mom of three bios and one from St. Pete

And finally – mine.

Got the write stuff.  Thanks, Mom.

More about the book here.

And now – please write your own!  Click the blue comments link below.  Then come back and let’s read each other’s six-word memoirs.

Keith was one of the 16,000 at the San Antonio Tea Party last night.  I would have loved to have gone, but someone had to manage the home front.

Keith’s video reminded me of when I talked my way into a press pass at 1986 San Jacinto Day festivities because I really wanted to to hear – and be near – Jerry Jeff Walker.

Read my lips:  #41 (to be) was there, too.

But Jerry Jeff was da man of the hour.

That was then.  This is now.  And now it’s time.  Really – it’s time.

Add hot water.  And stir.

I think his gnawing desire to know the details of what happened to his family strikes a widely-vibrating chord being hummed in social networking now.  Why are so many people like me enmeshed in user boards, blogs, bulletin board sites, Facebook, etc?

Just last week, I discovered both a long-lost first cousin and neighbor girl on Facebook.  I’ve had no contact with either for 40+ years – yet now, I’ve emailed each of them and they’ve responded.  I am particularly delighted to have heard back from my eight-years-older cousin Clyde, whom I remember as looking a lot like Judy, and having him say the childhood me was “just darling.”  It’s been decades since my name and “darling” were used in the same paragraph.

My good friend Chris (from elementary school) showed me a letter he compiles annually for his extended family, where each household contributes a page about itself, then he emails it out.  I was so impressed – and so interested reading it! – that I started a user board for my mom’s extended family and plan to do the same thing for us later this year.

Thanks for the family letter idea, Chris.  And really – I’m all over your beating me for class president.  By one vote.  When I’d actually worked on my campaign speech and you just winged it.  Truly – all forgotten now, buddy.

But why?  Why try to re-establish relationships, keep up with cousins, find old friends on Facebook or Myspace or user boards or whatever?

For me – it’s because I hate losing people.   I like most people, and love a lot of them.  Losing contact seems like such a pale imitation of how we’re supposed to live, especially with the tools we have available now.  The second greatest commandment is “Love your neighbor as yourself.” How do you do that if you don’t know anything about your neighbor, whether he lived across the street 20 years ago, or is slurping Diet Coke over the cubby wall right now?

I think the desire to find what’s lost in our lives is hard-wired into us.  The lost sheep, the lost coin, the lost cousin, the lost friend, the lost days – we want them back.  I think that’s why people go to class reunions, and church anniversaries.  I think that’s why we sign yearbooks, and squint at photo albums.  And why many of us drag out dusty boxes of mementos when the blues overshadow any living color.

I imagine one day Julia will start her quest to find what’s lost to her, too.  There’s not much we can tell her – though every scrap of information we have and everything we’ve been able to surmise will be hers.  She’ll be googling and posting and mining with other adoptees on her own search for The Lost.

As the author I’m reading now illustrates so well – she’ll eventually have to acknowledge what she’s lost, however painful and time-consuming that might be.

Because then – and only then – will she be able to acknowledge what’s she found.

I checked my 401K balance records today. too.  It’s back to where it was in August.  August of 1999.

Driving home from the bus stop in my six-year-old mini-van with an expired extended warranty, I heard a bit about the $75 billion bailout for mortgage lenders.   I confess I didn’t listen to all of it, because I was mulling over a recent family discussion of the woman with six kids (no husband, no income) who used fertility treatments to give birth to octuplets – and now wants private donations in addition to her taxpayer welfare.   Something tells me her medical bills are higher than the cost of the two 90-day prescriptions I mailed off today – though that $500+ will come right out of my pocket, and I doubt she’ll pay a dime.   The first few months of the year are always tighter, until we hit our deductible and co-pays kick in.

My government seems to think that I need to pay $30,000 for a golf course in Austin, and $5M for park trails here in San Antonio.   Huh?   That is the responsibility of the federal government – how?!  I guess the marriage penalty we pay in federal income tax helps with that, right?

This year:  Our family will take home less income and spend more on necessities than we have ever before.

So I have a question.  A sincere question.

Where’s my bailout?  Who is running beside me with a microphone while I whine about no raise, higher medical deductibles and looming college costs?  Who’s worried that Keith will never retire with health benefits, and insurance doesn’t cover things like Julia’s asthma spacers?

Where’s my bailout?

And where’s yours?