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The photo above is Hannah a week after she arrived at home in July, 2003. The story below continues to tell about my sister and her husband adopting the baby in Nanjing.

The babies didn’t cry. When the new parents—this group was traditional couples, except for one single woman—took their daughters to their hotel rooms and held them, whispered or sang to them, fed them and played with them, you heard the parents but not the babies. We learned that in their first year of life, no one in the orphanage had responded to cries, so now these babies saved their energy.

Janice and other guides from the US and Chinese adoption agencies checked to make sure the parents and babies were in the right hands and getting along. Diapers, cribs, and formula were provided, and any questions answered.

After an hour or so, Mary and I took Xiao to the hotel’s play-room, a carpeted space marked by walls fitted with glass from the waist up. A vast assortment of plastic toys in primary colors littered the floor. The toys were day-care classics: blocks that fit one inside the other, a spectrum of donuts that varied in size and stacked on a spindle, flat boxes with knobs to turn and buttons to push; bells to ring, horns to blow, and small, muted drums.

Xiao was one-year old but looked maybe half that. Her hair was shaved in back and on the sides to avoid unnecessary heat. Most likely, she had spent most of her life in a crib. She couldn’t sit by herself yet and wasn’t crawling or standing. Two or three other new mothers and/or fathers and baby girls were in the room, trying to play with the toys.

A feeling of frustration vying with anxiously-summoned patience filled the air. Mary had invited on me the trip partly for moral support during her first days of motherhood, but also for my experience with babies. And part of the playing in that room was an unofficial assessment of whether the babies were developing normally. Could they turn handles yet; determine big from small, open from shut, a cow from a pig?

We all wish lifelong bonds arrived on cue, but more often than not, they take time. Wanting to love a child you’re unsure of is painful—no way around that. And for each parent there, getting to this moment had involved immeasurable hope and desire and heart-wrenching decisions, not to mention countless interviews and negotiations.

So the playroom was tense. Few babies were strong enough to play with the toys even with help. But I knew a game almost any baby eating solid food likes to play, and I came equipped with a baggie of Cheerios. Setting Xiao so she lay on her bent legs, I played a shell game with the empty blocks. Her eyes stayed on the block covering the Cheerio and, weak as she was, she managed to grab the correct block and eat her prize.

We played for a while and then Mary played the game, hiding the cereal in smaller, similar toys. Xiao’s hunger never failed. “Babies don’t come smarter than that,” I told my sister.

Later that night one baby cried. Soon they all cried, up and down the hotel hallway. That night the mothers and fathers carried their children through the hotel, cooing and comforting them, lulling them to sleep. In the morning, they were still crying but—also laughing.

The picture above is based on the one the orphanage in China sent of Hannah as a newborn. Low resolution, age, and countless wire tranfer rendered it an abstrast of pink and green squares. What you see is one of my many ham-fisted attempts to restore it via Photoshop.

This month Hannah, whose Chinese name is Xu Xiao Yan, turns six-years old at almost the same time that my sister Mary and her husband Tom adopted her five years ago. Xiao proved unpronounceable to us, although Mary comes close. My best Xiao sounds like Sh-eow, rhyming with meow.

I’ve written about the adoption before, but because the trip remains among the most significant and memorable journeys I’ve had the privilege to take, I’ll attempt to retell it here. How Hannah’s blessed us and opened our lives and continues to fill us with joy far surpasses anything I can write, of course, but I never stop trying.

Following protracted adoption preliminaries, the agencies gave Mary and Tom unusually short notice, partly because the 2002 SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) epidemic in Guangdong province had been contained, and any pending business rushed ahead. My unexpected invitation to accompany them came on the heels of that. Tom and Mary brought me along as a mother. I knew something about babies, if practically nothing about China. And with no time to study, I didn’t try.

We flew to Beijing and then Nanjing where we met Janice, a representative from the US adoption agency. Under Janice’s guidance, Mary and Tom and I stayed at Nanjing’s Howard Johnson’s Hotel along with approximately ten other US or Canadian couples ready to adopt baby girls.

We spent a couple of days there, getting acclimated. While we waited for the babies, guides took the group to Dr. Sun Yat-sen’s mausoleum and an art museum. More on those excursions later.

On the third afternoon, a buzz of excitement zipped through the hallways. As I remember it, the present minutes hovering after years of expectation filled the air-conditioned rooms and hallways with great flutters of emotion and hushed, hushed voices. “The babies are here,” whispered a guide. “Come, it’s this way,” said the mother-to-be in the room next to Mary’s.

My sister and I grabbed hands and pinched each other’s forearms, too overwhelmed for words. As we got closer, Mary and Tom may have lagged; for soon I was moving fast toward a half-way open door. An older woman wearing a hairnet was holding a baby girl with a tiny green bow tied to a thatch of long dark hair on top, shaved in back and along the sides. I knew instantly. Everyone else dropped from view. A rush of affection and unmistakable recognition—I knew that baby belonged to Mary. “Is that Mary’s daughter?”

The woman was nodding and now Mary was beside me. “That’s her,” I whispered. “That’s your little girl.” As I recall, Mary caught Janice’s eye to be sure.

This bright-eyed, tiny, startled baby was Mary’s daughter. Never have I felt surer of anyone’s identity than I did upon first glimpsing Xu Xiao Yan: She belonged to Mary, to us. A few heartbeats later, Mary was cradling Xiao and Tom was lowering his face close to the baby and calling himself Daddy.

"The View from Here" <http://viewfromheremagazine.com>, a rockin’ online literary magazine debuted Friday, April 18, 2008.

The main man setting up this magazine is Mike French, the UK author of “The Dandelion Tree” <http://thedandeliontree.blogspot.com>,
a novel of love, faith, and reconciliation presented online in lively excerpts, asides and artwork. He’s also one of the ten international founders of the inspirational community blog, "Go! Smell the Flowers" <http://www.gosmelltheflowers.com>,
which presents posts and threads full of contemplation, life inspiration, and advice for journeys of all kinds.

In taking The View from Here LIVE, Mike has signed up four writers, including himself;
Paul Burman
<http://paperbooks.typepad.com/paul_burman>
an Australian novelist (The Snowing and Greening of Thomas Passmore will be published by PaperBooks [UK] in 2008);
Stella Carter
<http://stellascript.blogspot.com>
a U.S. fiction and screenplay writer whose blog offers fiction, book discussion, two haikus a week,and writing tips.
And me. Each of us has agreed to a post a week.

Since my few attempts blogging non-fiction have always embarrassed me, Mike has generously agreed to let me try my hand at short stand-alone fiction posts. As a driven serial storyteller, short stand-alone fiction looms like yet another daredevil experiment. Of course, that's all I do. Even when I burn and crash, I’m happier than when I must struggle with facts, which mutate into an unforeseen perspective before I can stop them.

As for author interviews? I don’t personally know any known authors, and have never attempted to interview a writer. Should that opportunity develop, I’d never turn it down, with the caveat that I tend to honor literary endeavors beyond reason and regard serious failures as noble acts.

My new, still unfamiliar, colleague, Paul Burman wrote that despite his crushing writing obligations, he saw "The View From Here" as too good an opportunity to let pass. He referred to “Alice in Wonderland” and its many doors opening into adventure, risk, reward, and danger. When he stood upon the View’s threshold he saw mostly adventure and reward. Lucky us.

He has always posted his first essay on "The View"
<http://viewfromheremagazine.com>
tells about his latest epiphany. Take a look. I promise it’s worth a minute or two.

http://viewfromheremagazine.com
http://thedandeliontree.blogspot.com
http://www.gosmelltheflowers.com
http://paperbooks.typepad.com/paul_burman
http://stellascript.blogspot.com

When this country completed its fifth year of inflicting war upon Iraq, I decided it was high time I updated my Peace Globe for Mimi Lenox’s famous campaign to promote Peace by rallying bloggers to contribute a personal message, graphic, or simply add their name to one of her Peace Globes. Mimi offers a variety of Peace Globe backgrounds, collects everyone’s creative efforts promoting Peace on the planet and to the planet, and showcases them on a slide-slow that runs front and center on each of her four Peace (she writes two personal blogs, too, but if you link to any of her sites, you're sure to find the others.)

True, despite her prodigious efforts, which includes a semi-annual Blog Blast for Peace and regular radio appearances, a cynic might note that there's still no peace going on in Iraq, Darfur, our sorry government, or even in many our homes, which a lot of us are about to lose. But think again: All this terrible pandemonium is only more reason for bloggers to unite and make whatever impact we can.

Yesterday, Easter Sunday, Manny and I attended our ritual Sunday six p.m. yoga class. It’s always rigorous and helps us start the work week less anxious than we would be otherwise. The class begins and ends with Om or a short prayer wishing all living things “health in the body, spirit, and mind.”

Last night when the teacher started the class, he informed us that world wide, starting at 6 p.m. EST (our time), a movement had formed to chant “Om” for an hour, everyone’s voice rippling into the atmosphere everywhere. No one gasped or prepared to leave, though an hour of “Om” was not why we were attending that class. We were after yogic exercise that The Kula Yoga Project has long promoted as “sweaty, intelligent, ecstatic.” To my relief and I'm sure several others', the teacher announced we'd do our part with three minutes of Ohmming at the start and end of our practice.

Our teacher believes that declaring peace, finding it in oneself, and radiating its benevolent power toward everyone you know and love—and then taking it farther, extending it to the ultimate collective self—has an effect. Yet even he sees that a focusing on Peace for six minutes total plays a part.

I don’t know about "Om's" universal effect, but have no grounds for disproving the claim.

Simultaneously, however, I have a good deal of faith of that Mimi Lenox’s Peace movement is a growing power that costs bloggers nothing; it’s an excellent way to blog, take a few minutes and send your personal message into the atmosphere aiming far beyond anything normal. Why not? Try it.

To get a Peace Globe:
http://mimiwrites.blogspot.com/2007/09/how-to-get-your-peace-globe-november.html

Or you can go here:
http://mimilenox.blogspot.com/

[This short piece serves as a bridge near the end of my latest serial story.]

The Labyrinth

Certain experiences never go away. Extraordinary things can only happen outside ordinary time. Of course, they’re past—over and done. And yet, at unexpected moments, they re-emerge as immediate as ever.

Emma knows what I mean. It happens to her, too. We race through our days, but sometimes, when we stop to look at each other, there it is—this hideous mystery from years ago. We hug each other for protection, staring at what’s still going on right in front of us.

Not everyone, she says, experiences this. Some people cope better than others. They can lock practically
every heartbreak securely in the past. Yesteryear’s terrors never come up.

Some people’s minds develop solid mental walls. Internal doors and dead-bolts protect them from the rushing galactic wind that cries with lost names and past voices. It’s not really a choice, Emma says, whether you relive the dire past or store it so that it stays where it belongs.

Maybe we keep getting pulled back because the house in Costa Rica was all floor and roof; no walls except for the bathroom and studio. Otherwise, it was open. The jungle and ocean were always in view. The howler monkeys howled, the insects stung, snakes bit, waves crashed, and the sun burned—nonstop. Life teemed in the hot, heavy air, and rotted quickly. There was no escape, past, present, or future.

Don’t get me wrong. Emma and I have adapted. We function as well as anyone. Reality consumes us in the here and now, and nowhere else. Like all sane adults, we always know exactly where we are and what we’re doing in this time frame.

But sometimes we grieve in our sleep. Sometimes we simultaneously wake up bereft, just as stunned now as we were then—frantic with disbelief.

To read the story from the beginning, go here Diary of a Heretic and a post titled "Escape Artist." (I couldn't get a permalink to work, sorry.)