Yesterday we went to the airport to pick up our newest family member, Andersen Tobias, who is six years old.
We adopted him from Haiti.
He is as beautiful as we remember from seeing his pictures; however to see him in front of us, to actually touch him, hold him, is nothing like anything we've ever experienced.
This is our first adoption. We'd been trying to add to our family for the past two years; it was only in the past few months when we found out that the adoption finally went through.
As a result, our family has grown by one. We now have four children, two boys, two girls. We also have three dogs.
Andersen is a most handsome little boy: painfully skinny (no meat on his bones), dark, dark skin that glistens in the sun, tightly curled, close-cropped black hair, huge, orange-brown eyes that don't miss a trick, a ready smile on his face.
He is as healthy as a horse; no defect or disability, according to the doctors who examined him prior to his coming to America. A huge relief on our minds.
There is but one problem: Andersen dosen't speak English: he speaks French. This is going to be a challenge because we don't understand French. The only word we know is "Oui" (yes), and also "au revoir" (goodbye); any other words sounds like pure gibberish to our American ears.
Last night we were awakened in the middle of the night with Andersen crying out in fear. He was saying something like "Mama," "Mama," "Mama". It took over an hour to hold him, try to comfort him.
This morning he stared at us, trying to figure out who we were, why we took him in, and where he was. The cool, lush mountainous scenery was foreign to him; he was used to hot temperatures, palm trees, old, broken down delapidated homes with little or no running water or plumbing.
We tried to put his fears at ease; however we are just as frightened as he: we don't know if we can do this. The language barrier and the fact that our newest son is black is probably the two biggest problems, challenges, we will face as a family; with God's help, however, we will make it.
And so will our new Haitian-born son, Andersen. Our new son. Even the words make me glad!
~To be continued.~
