You can't win - no matter what!

Dearest Dema,

Hope you are doing well. As I told you last time, we have started the paperwork chase to get all of the forms filled out and papers signed. I am sure people that have adopted before will laugh and say that we are not even in the thick of things yet, but I feel already like this has been going on forever!

One place that I will not miss after this is the post office. After the marathon session there the other day, I found myself back there today. After running all kinds of errands, here and there, that was the last one. Actually, I shouldn't even have had to go. Usually G3 can FedEx things from his office cheaply and expediently, so all I have to do is to get papers together and then give them to him. But on this day, he noticed the address I was supposed to send the papers to was a PO Box and FedEx won't deliver to one. So back to the post office I went, dreading the experience.

As usual the line was huge, so I settled in for a wait. I made some phone calls and figured I would be able to at least get some business accomplished in my wait. Well, wouldn't you know - the one time I come prepared to spend some time, the line zipped right along, and before I knew it, it was my turn at the front and I was getting dirty looks from everyone as I tried to get off the phone to get the papers mailed. Oh well, you can't win… And as I am writing this, I just remembered one thing I forgot to include in the papers, a copy of G3's driver's license. Arghh - back to the post office tomorrow with that!

I also have started cleaning out closets in preparation for shuffling some things around to make room for you. It's amazing how much stuff you can find hidden back in the recesses of a dark closet. It's also kind of frightening since none of the closets in our house have lights in them, so you never really know exactly what you are going to find. Today, it was the craft and game closet. I was able to clean out bags and bags of bits of fabric, googly eyes, dried out glue sticks, and old, stiff paint brushes. I figure at 13, you probably aren't going to want to play with arts and crafts!

The problem with starting a task like this is that it always takes more time than you have allotted to accomplish it. Or even in the unlikely event you have allotted enough time for the task, life in the form of children will interfere. Like, they need to be fed, they need clean clothes, etc. Either way, I promise you, that you will be pulled away from the task before you are done. Then you face a decision. Either leave all the items out until you can come back and finish later, or do part of the job and come back and finish the other part later. The problem with the second solution is that if things are put away nicely, there is very little impetus to go back and continue the job. You pretty much mentally wipe that task out of you brain with a little imaginary check and then later when you go back to the closet, thinking that it was cleaned out already, you get a nasty shock finding it very different than you were expecting. Then you have an unexpected amount of work to do extra at the last moment, which tends to induce panic attacks.

The first solution, sounds better - doesn't it. But after consideration, you realize that this isn't too much better. It leaves everything in a big mess. And once other people start coming around, inevitably there are two things that will happen. The first is that people will accuse you of doing nothing but a big mess, and the second is that the system you were using will deteriorate as things get picked up and exclaimed over.

Anyway, I opted for the first method and left everything out. I am sure I will hear about it later when I come home….

Love,

Bethany, Amanda, G3, & G4