Itsara

You know how the air gets very still just before a tornado hits? Yeah, me neither. But I imagine it’d be something like what we’re experiencing now.

Cindy’s due date is the 25th. The doctor is thinking it’ll be sometime next week. Regardless, Cindy is not teaching dance now, and she’s not tutoring. She is cleaning things up and making sure everything’s ready for the baby. Though most of that is done, so really we’re watching Friends and playing Agricola.

Cindy’s mom arrived yesterday to help us out. So now Cindy’s not even cooking and the boys are often taken care of. It’s good and bad. We have a lot of time to relax and prepare, but Cindy has a lot of time to stress about the birth.

I’m even taking a break from writing. Yesterday I finished work on novel #2 (working title: Air Pirates) and sent out my first batch of queries. That’s really exciting for me, but only vicariously exciting for you since it’ll probably be months before I have any other news.* In any case, I don’t plan on writing for at least a couple days, maybe not until after the birth.

And then there’s the rest of our family. Isaac and Nathan are finally (FINALLY!) sleeping through the night in their room. Pan and Lu are doing life as normal, though everyday they wonder if we’ll be here when they come home from school.

We’re still getting stuff together to adopt Pancake; we plan on going to Bangkok during the April break to turn everything in. We’ve also heard about other kids we might take in, but no real news yet. I can’t tell you how many kids we’ve said yes to but then couldn’t have for one reason or another. As always, I’ll give you news when I have it.

So that’s it. The quiet is nice, but temporary. Something big is coming, I can feel it.

* If that. It takes 1-2 months to hear back from agents at all, on average. If they actually request to see the novel, it takes even longer. You won’t hear much from me on the subject until I can say, “I have an agent!” in 3-14 months — if I actually get one.

And that’s just getting an agent. Don’t get me started on how hard/long it is to get a book deal.

A little while ago, Pan wanted to talk to me. She told me about things that have been bothering her. Misunderstandings that resulted in her getting mad at us (which she never shows and she always feels guilty about… I so wish we could take credit for this girl). Concerns she has about her future.

Pan is in 11th grade, and plans on going to university in a couple years to become a teacher. But she’s afraid of how much it will cost. “I’d like to go to some place like Payap, but it’s too expensive,” she told me. “There are other universities that are cheaper.”

She also said, “Sometimes I’m afraid to ask you for money for school. You always want to know what it’s for, and I wonder if you trust me.”

I smiled when she told me this and explained that I just need to know what I’m giving her money for so I can keep track, and if needed, report it. It has nothing to do with her. Though I understand why she’d think it does; not every kid is as trustworthy as Pan.

As for university costs, I assured her, “Your education is very important to us. We’d go without food, if we had to, to get you a good education. But don’t worry, because it won’t even come to that. We have money, and if someday we don’t, we know a bunch of people who would be more than happy to help pay for you.” (In fact, my dad said this very thing just a few days before this. I told Pan so.)

The next day we had a family devotion/worship/prayer time. Pan shared how happy she was to know she was taken care of — that even though it doesn’t always seem that way (those were my words), she is very important to us.

Sometimes I forget that all it takes to love is a little time talking. Sometimes we all forget that, I think.

My parents came to visit for a few weeks and took a lot more pictures than I normally do. My dad wrote a blog post on their time here, including links to a bunch of pictures and videos. I highly recommend the album from Cindy’s dance performance (including Pan and Lutiya) and the video of Cindy doing homeschool with Isaac, Nathan, and Abby.

Ah, heck. Why don’t I just embed that video here.

You can see their attention spans waning, but they’re so dang smart! Part way through you can see Nathan trying to stop Opa (my dad) from taking pictures. He’s saying, “No cheese, Opa! No cheese!”

Go to my parent’s blog for a bunch more pictures and videos.

I think there might be one picture from Christmas in here.

Isaac’s birthday was in December. We also had a shared party for Isaac, Nathan, and some other 2-to-3-year-old friends (at least one of which had a birthday around the same time too). We didn’t know how to explain to them that it was some of their birthdays and not others, so we just gave them all a candle. Finally Lutiya had a birthday too, which we’ve celebrated a couple of times with food, but we have yet to go Airsofting like she wanted.

And then there’s Children’s Day. We took everyone to a local carnival, consisting of a few slapped-together rides — often being welded or fixed on the spot, some grounded via a stake in the dirt, jury-rigged wires connected to a breaker switch or foot-operated brake. So in one sense, this was the most terrifying carnival I’ve ever been to. But the kids loved it and nobody died, so I guess that’s a win.

Click here, or on any of the pictures, for more.

Sean’s got an update on his blog with more information on Abigail, news about a new teenager he has, and some other stuff. Go check it out.

Here’s a quick rundown of what’s going on around here.

Sunday is Cindy’s birthday, Monday is Isaac’s, and Nathan’s was last month. So today we’re having a sort of joint party/playdate thing with lots of sugar (I’m taking bets now as to who will crash first: us or them; also when).

The Fantastic Emmet is coming to visit soon (and for a while, I hope) before he leaves for Uganda. That means we’ll get a lot less done, but we’ll be having so much fun who cares? We don’t know what we’ll be doing for Christmas yet, but I’ll let you know. Then in January my parents come, followed by a new Heine in February. So lots of visitors, one of them staying forever.

And in other news, I finally sold something I wrote!* It’s a fantasy short story set in the same world as the novel I’m working on. You can see the writerly announcement here. Feel free to ask questions in the comments.

Also, we owe you guys a newsletter. I’m working on that.

* Technically, I’ve already sold fiction. But that Twitter-sized stuff only goes for $1.20 per story. That supports half our family for like an hour.

From The Great Divorce, in which two men living in a sort of Hell or Purgatory discuss the state of the place:

‘It seems the deuce of a town,’ I volunteered, ‘and that’s what I can’t understand. The parts of it that I saw were so empty. Was there once a much larger population?’

‘Not at all,’ said my neighbour. ‘The trouble is that they’re so quarrelsome. As soon as anyone arrives he settles in some street. Before he’s been there twenty-four hours he quarrels with his neighbour. Before the week is over he’s quarrelled so badly that he decides to move. Very likely he finds the next street empty because all the people there have quarrelled with their neighbours — and moved…. It makes no odds. He’s sure to have another quarrel pretty soon and then he’ll move again. Finally he’ll move right out to the edge of the town and build a new house. You see, it’s easy here. You’ve only got to think a house and there it is. That’s how the town keeps on growing.’

‘Leaving more and more empty streets?’

‘That’s right…. The nearest of those old [interesting historical characters] is Napoleon. We know that because two chaps made the journey to see him. They’d started long before I came, of course, but I was there when they came back. About fifteen thousand years of our time it took them. We’ve picked out the house by now. Just a little pin prick of light and nothing else near it for millions of miles.’

Living in community is hard. Really hard. It’s hard enough to be married, share a house, children, money… To make decisions good enough for two people instead of one. It’s harder with more.

The four of us have a unique situation. We each have our own house wherein our word is law (more or less), but we’ve also got this huge, fenceless space between where we have to agree on what’s done. Especially in regards to our kids, who have no boundaries and love to run back and forth between the houses.

Sometimes it comes to a head. Especially for someone like me, who doesn’t like to talk about things. I’d rather work on my own problems, let other people deal with theirs, hope the problems go away with time… But every so often, those little problems grow and fester until they explode in an ugly mess of puss and blood that gets all over everybody.

It happens to me all the time. Heck, I can’t think of a single person I lived with that I didn’t fight with. Every couple of years, I need a reminder that I have to interact with people to love them; I have to communicate to be a brother. I used to think something was wrong with me that I’d always get annoyed with people, but now I know it’s normal. People fight, and when they share space or authority those fights need to be resolved or the relationship needs to end.

We can’t pick up and move like the shadows in Great Divorce, and for that I’m thankful. It forces me to learn how to work with others. God didn’t put us in a world where ending relationships was a viable way to live. He intended us to fill this world, run into problems of shared space, and then work them out.

The other option, which I’m constantly in danger of (I guess we all are), is to end up alone. Maybe not alone physically like Napoleon, but spiritually and emotionally for sure.

‘What was [Napoleon] doing?’

‘Walking up and down — up and down all the time — left-right, left-right — never stopping for a moment. The two chaps watched him for about a year and he never rested. And muttering to himself all the time. “It was Soult’s fault. It was Ney’s fault. It was Josephine’s fault. It was the fault of the Russians. It was the fault of the English.” Like that all the time. Never stopped for a moment. A little, fat man and he looked kind of tired. But he didn’t seem able to stop it.’

6:30 AM: Either Isaac or Nathan — both being in our bed with us — wakes and either (a) cries until we get out of bed, (b) goes to their room to find Mommy, who moved there so she could get some sleep, or (c) puts their face 3 inches from Daddy’s and says, “Daddy, downstairs?” over and over until I get up.

6:45 AM: Lutiya and Pan, being responsible young girls, are ready for school. Pan takes them on the motorbike.

7:30 AM: The boys have calmed down, eaten, had their diapers removed, and/or Abby has come over to play with them. Mommy and Daddy can eat.

8:00 – 10:00 AM: Mommy and Daddy try to accomplish things.

10:00 AM: Mommy leaves to tutor a friend’s children. Daddy stays home and tries, much more difficultly, to accomplish things.

10:30 AM: Daddy gives up on accomplishing things and instead spends time with, or disciplines, the boys as needed.

12:00 PM: Mommy comes home for lunch.

1:00 PM: Daddy leaves to write. Mommy puts the boys down for their nap so she can accomplish things.

1:45 PM: Mommy wakes up from the nap she didn’t mean to take with the boys and gets ready for dance.

2:30 PM: Isaac wakes up.

3:00 PM: Daddy comes downstairs and helps move furniture, sweep, and change the water for Mommy’s dance class.

3:30 PM: Mommy’s dance students arrive. Nathan (finally) wakes up. Daddy attempts to keep one eye on the boys and one on the computer. Daddy fails.

4:30 PM: Mommy’s dance class is over. Lutiya and Pan come home from school.

5:00 – 6:00 PM: Mommy makes dinner. Daddy spends time with one or more of the kids.

6:00 – 7:00 PM: Dinner, then chores.

8:00 PM: Struggle to get Isaac and Nathan into the shower (or, if they go in easily, struggle to get them out).

8:30 PM: Daddy begins the almost-literal song-and-dance show that Isaac and Nathan have come to expect before they sleep. Lutiya and Pan shower.

9:00 PM: Everyone goes to bed (or at least their room). Mommy and Daddy either talk, watch Friends, eat Secret Snacks, or pass out.

11:00 PM: Isaac and Nathan climb into our bed…

I was just thinking about how much Lutiya’s changed in the last few years, and I wanted to tell you about her.

Lutiya came from a village 2 hours north of here called Mae Gawn. Her story’s a little confused, but we know the place she was staying was unsafe for her. She came here with Alaypa and Pan, as you’ll recall. In fact, Alaypa was from the same village, so they already knew each other a little. They spoke only a little Thai and no English.

She cried herself to sleep the first few nights. For all that her old home wasn’t safe, she still missed her mother.

It took her a long time to get used to us. She would play quietly, sometimes with Alaypa or Sandra, sometimes alone. She was polite enough, but if we corrected her she got sullen fast. I had to spank her once, but only once. After that she would accept discipline, albeit unhappily. Fortunately she didn’t need to be disciplined very often.

Even so, she hadn’t taken to us yet. She knew we were safe, but we weren’t home. For a while, we still had difficult times.

But life continued. She couldn’t read Thai, so we helped her a lot that first year. She had few friends at home. Sandra was mad at her back then. Alaypa followed Matt around everywhere. Even Pan was still trying to adjust to recently losing her parents.

I don’t know when it happened, but she’s different now. More often than not, she comes home smiling, telling us about her day. She loves to play with Isaac and Nathan, or to play games with me (real games, too, like Ticket to Ride and Settlers). She likes to draw, too. She consistently gets compliments in class on her drawings and even won a contest. She loves math, and she can read Thai without help now.

More than that, she’s started to speak English. She told me she was embarrassed the other day: They were doing some English exercise in class – pairing up and exchanging basic greetings. The teacher asked who should go first, and everybody pointed at Lu. Why? Because they all knew she was the best. Even she knows it; the teacher asked her who she wanted to partner with, and Lu chose the girl who was second best in the class. She told me, “Her English is okay.”

It’s amazing how far she’s come. It’s one of those things you don’t notice until you think about the way things used to be. It’s so rare we notice any improvement; we often expect not to see the results at all actually. Seeing this kind of thing reminds me why we do this.

Life is a lot different here than it was a few months ago. As you know, Sandra’s gone. I keep mentioning it because it’s still strange. She was our first kid, after all.

Also, it looks as though Matt will be staying in the US with his mom. He says he wants to try 11th grade again, so he’s going to do it there (where it’s free). If he does well, he’ll go on to 12th grade then college. We’re praying for him. That’s weird too, though, because we were expecting him back. I think a lot of it was that, when he left, he thought he’d be going to Grace International again next year, and maybe it’s just too weird for him not to. I don’t know.

Cindy and I have been doing a lot of time management. Cindy teaches dance and is now tutoring a friend’s kids – she may even teach them part-time in September. I’m trying to write everyday. I have one novel being read by a group of beta readers, and I’ve been working on a couple of short stories that I’m going to try and sell. We’ll see how that goes.

Cindy and Prang decided to start “officially” homeschooling our three 2-year-olds. Cindy teaches them in English for an hour, then Prang in Thai. So far, it’s not much different than what we always do with them, just more intentional.

And then there’s the question of new kids. We have space, both physically and emotionally. The thing is, we’ve never actively looked for new kids. God has always brought them to us. I pray for new kids everyday, but I want them in his timing. And I just don’t know – is God giving us a needed season of rest, or should we be looking ourselves? Are we acting out of fear or faith? I ask God everyday. I have no answer, but I have peace. I guess that is an answer, but, you know, I still doubt. There’s always doubt.

Of course the last time I expressed doubts like this was exactly 16 days before God doubled the size of our family. So there you go.