square peg. round hole.

read an article at work in the courier. how i felt reading it reminded me of how i felt when i was employed at the youth shelter.  it went like this:

the article was about kids serving life sentences for first degree murder. the supreme court just ruled that life sentences aren't a mandatory sentence, although, states can still choose to use them as punishment. i thought about kids being in prison all their life--how if they DID get a chance for bail and they did get off, how letting them go might be more cruel than keeping them incarcerated. i mean, if they've spent 20 years in prison starting at age 13, in entering society, again, ya THINK they're going to be maladjusted?! but ya THINK they weren't already maladjusted since they, on purpose, killed someone?!

God (this is where i start talking to jesus), it's not supposed to happen! square peg, round hole. it's not right. this reality doesn't FIT.

and WHY are kids killing people to begin with? what's happened to them/what choices have they made/where were or WEREN'T their parents?!! it's a square peg and a round hole! nothing that's happening should be happening and it's all wrong!

and it's this CONSTANT pounding and grating between what's right and what's actually happening that turn my brain and my heart into one big cement mixer. and it's that rock of RIGHT and rock of REALITY grinding against each other with each beautiful kid that passes through my eyes and into my guts and into my being that starts to create gravel. and that gravel gets finer and finer and toughing it out only works 'so' well. nonetheless, i keep loving the kids (cuz it's the resounding emotion that comes out when i think about them) but pretty soon, tears--haha, why NOT incorporate tears into this metaphor--TEARS gushing from my face, day in and day out, start to create a paste with all that gravel turned powder stuff. and that gravel turned powder stuff and tears mixed together (PASTE) are bent on plastering and hardening themselves over everything in me that once was soft and warm and FREE.

and, in a short while, i'm so hard and so disgustingly broken that you (God) pull the chute and i'm out. (for those of you who don't know, i left the shelter quite unexpectedly...for sound reasons but ones i didn't really see coming until right when they [those reasons] forced me to quit). and maybe all this turmoil i was going through wasn't the reason why you took me out of the shelter...but it's definitely in the pile of possibilities that i mull over every once in a while--when my guts still hurt for those kids--those beautiful kids--who STILL need someone... and ME not being there in the trenches with them feels like...

square peg. round hole.

(and just so everyone knows, the kids at the shelter aren't necessarily bad kids with run ins with the law--some of them are just there because they're in a transition period and others, yeah, are there because they fought the law and..so far, the law is winning..but each one of them is awesome and hilarious and has a heart and have people they love with more passion than anything. they're beautiful people and i miss hanging out with them more than ever. they're great and they make my life great...but it's also hard because your heart breaks and breaks and breaks for them. so much so, you didn't know your heart could break into pieces that small. but it's worth it. and love STILL is the resounding emotion i get when i think about them.)

daydreaming about infertility. no, seriously.

i think you're underestimating the passion that's in me for adoption. i'm researching hysterectomies, folks. i'm REALLY not EVER, AT ALL interested in having biological kids.

why am i talking about this, though? i'm not even dating anyone! answer: because i feel like it. end of story.

the thought has crossed my mind several times, "what guy's gonna want a girl who's not interested in furthering his blood line?" and i've got no answer for that...only to say that any guy who cares so much about furthering his bloodline doesn't have much in common with me.  i think my gene pool is quite fantastic--my family's a ton of fun--but, at the same time, that's a luxury. biological family, i think, is a luxury...one that tons of kids aren't allotted in life.

and for me to adopt isn't to sacrifice that luxury...more like, it's just knowing that some kids need homes and making way for that need to be filled. and it's my personal belief that biological kids would get in the way of those kids, already born, who need family. i mean, really, i'm one person. i can only take care of so many kids. and if i'm gonna take care of kids, i want them to be adopted.

what happens if i get married and in the process of married life, i get knocked up? well, then, bring it on. but i'm never ever going to plan on getting pregnant. guess, if i do, then that kid is really important to jesus for him to go around my plans and give me a kid. so, why wouldn't i want that kid? sounds like a great deal.

but...my plans are my plans for a reason. jesus gave me passion for adoption for a reason. even as a single person i crave infertility. i'm serious. besides, if you want the nitty gritty, it's pretty annoying having a monthly hormonal visitor when i've got NO USE for it during any point in my life. stupid.

if everybody adopted their whole families then pretty soon nobody would be without a home. there's fricking commercials for homeless puppies on the street...who CARES about puppies!? SAVE THE KIDS!

and doing everything in my power to destroy my own fertility tells my future adopted kids that i never wanted ANYBODY in the world but them. EYE. WANTED. THEM. and i planned on them from the very beginning. from before the beginning.  and i wouldn't go through medical procedures (even if i'd find a reputable doctor who'd perform them) JUST so i could tell my kids that...i'd do it first and foremost so that i didn't have to worry about getting pregnant. that way i could adopt all the kids i don't get pregnant with! fantastic!  and, secondly, it just so happens that those procedures also show the kid, in print, that i wanted them more than anything else.  and i wanted them not because i couldn't have my own kids but because they WERE my kids.

and i'm so excited to LOVE 'EM.