Yellow Trees

I remember a time when I was in college and LB was visiting me, and we were walking across the campus on the kind of fall day that I can only describe as a gift.  Not too cool, not too warm; the leaves on the trees popping with color to the point where I felt like I wandered into a film where the saturation was even a little too deep, the hue just a little too bright.

My mind has never been able to stay in the present, and that weekend it was already leaping ahead to

The Undecided

I suspect that I am worse at making decisions than other people.  Although in truth I’m probably about average, it feels like I end up regretting more and more…. that I can’t decide anything right.

I regret doing things that I wish I hadn’t, and not doing things that I wish I had.  While other people can shrug their shoulders at their disappointing decisions or focus on the lessons learned for next time, I feel like I am kicking myself so often that

Where’s Sang-Shil?

It’s a little like “Where’s Waldo?”, especially with the matching shirts.

And if you are benighted enough to think that Asians all look the same, then it will be even harder.

Intrigued?  Click here to play.

Emails

I had a password on this whole blog temporarily because I’m not updating it much, and due to recent developments in my life, I wasn’t sure that I wanted people poking around when I wasn’t keeping an eye on things.  But I’ve since taken it off.

To the people who have sent emails asking about me and/or this blog — thank you; I really do appreciate it.

I’ll respond when life doesn’t suck so much.

Thirtysomething Years Ago Today

… I might have been born.

Another “birthday”.

Another year.

And still, the same things that were unknown before are unknown now.

Perhaps, as The Man in Black says, I should get used to disappointment:

Inigo Montoya: Who are you?
Man in Black: No one of consequence.
Inigo Montoya: I must know…
Man in Black: Get used to disappointment.

Except that rather than wanting to know who anybody else is, I simply want to know who I am.

Why is that too much to ask?

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This June has been the darkest month I’ve seen in a long time… and I mean that both figuratively and literally.  (Those of you who live in my neck of the woods should have no problem understanding the literal part. >< )

But the crazy weather aside, I’ve really been struggling lately.  Not only have I not been writing in this blog, but I haven’t been reading other people’s blogs either.  So my apologies for being more than a little out of touch.

I’m keeping this blog open for now, if only because I have a habit of suddenly finding myself with lots to say just after I announce that I am going into hiding.  I’m also thinking of starting another blogging project, which I may announce here if it ever gets off the ground.

But things may continue to be quiet.  Jus’ saying.

Adoption Jumble

It’s nearly 3 am where I am right now, and I can’t sleep.  By itself this is nothing particularly new for me, but tonight I suspect that my mind is so full that it simply can’t slow down enough to drift off.

The last week or two have been filled to the brim with adoption-related events in my real life, and things are starting to become this huge jumbled mess in my brain.  I have had deep, heavy, adoption-focused conversations with a number of other adoptees.  I have had a disturbing adoption-related conversation with my parents, which would be downright humorous if the people involved weren’t…. my parents. I spent the better part of today with a large number of adoptive parents and got a splitting headache as a reward punishment. I am either involved in or am contemplating involvement in a number of adoption-related side projects.  I want — need, even –  to write about so many things, but can’t piece things together in the orderly way that I usually like to do.

I’m also running into this problem with my worlds and identities potentially colliding.  Some of the people that I talk to in real life have found this blog, and so I worry about my privacy, about how many details I can share without revealing connections that I would rather keep hidden.  I may need to change some of those details, something that I am usually loathe to do for reasons that I hope are obvious, but we’ll see what actually happens.  I have a feeling that much of it will simply end up under a password.

I wish my brain were something that I could turn off.  I wish I weren’t so damned drawn to adoption-related stuff, whether books, events, conferences, blogs, articles, etc.  I’m becoming one-dimensional and borderline obsessive.  It’s like I know that there are all these holes in myself, and that if only I could gain more information, then all of the voids would be filled and I would be a complete person somehow.

I would be fully human, rather than this flickering shadow with no light of my own.

25 Random Things About Me

Reposted from my Facebook page because… well, because it’s easy blog fodder :

Protected: Barely

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Protected: Ten Years Ago

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Protected: Before and After

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