When you have made a decision, act without hesitating

Never Done: Finished the first round of adoption paperwork
Never Done: Bananamenore
Tshuve: Brooklyn Soup Swap

It makes sense, but I find it harder to do something I've never done on work days than on the weekend. This coming weekend, for example, I have things lined up for both days (seeing the Youth Pride Chorus, and hosting a craft gathering at my apartment.) Technically, I do things every work day that I've never done, but I don't think they're always worthy of counting, or of writing about, so by the end of the day I often find myself torn between trying to justify writing about something mundane and getting the inspiration (and time) to do something worthy of the Never Done project.

Those are the days with the long lists.

Mich made gorgeous red and white lentil soup this week for Brooklyn Soup Swap. Full of vegetables -- a little rice, cumin, turmeric, lime. I came home and ate it for dinner, which is, technically, something I have never done. When we were hanging out at Mich's apartment, we realized we need to blog and brand the Soup Swap, along with the team T-shirts that we decided to make on the inaugural night. So we have some soup support projects to do.

As Josh and I were sitting down for dinner, I wanted to light a menore, and wanted it to be one I've never made before. I saw the bunch of bananas on the counter, and was inspired. It was the third night, and it was a banana bunch of four -- perfect for the three nights and the shamesh -- the attendant candle that lights the others. I loved the solidity and 3D depth of this menore -- the candles spread out in a semi-circle, but not in a straight line. But when they burned down, they didn't transform the banana bunch as wonderfully as the candles on a cheese menore do -- when they melt the top of the cheese and create oil -- the miracle of khanike! What I love about making these is the moment when I see new possibility in an object that I live with every day. (But I have to admit. I have an idea for a kitshy one made out of something I definitely do not have around the house.)

After dinner, Josh and I finished our first round of adoption paperwork -- the Application to Adopt and the FBI Criminal Background check, including 28 years' worth of street addresses. Mine get a little sketchy in the late 80s -- with approximate dates and locations. My life itself wasn't even sketchy any more in those days; I was out of college, and working in and around Waterville, Maine -- as a Family Planning counselor, the co-Director of a Rape Crisis center, at Railroad Square Cinema, and also at Railroad Square Cafe. (Remember the days when we got out of college and plenty of work?) But if you think I can remember my street addresses from back then....

This feels like or first milestone in the adoption process. We are going to submit this paperwork at MAPP class this weekend, and then we'll officially, bureaucratically be on our way. After they accept the paperwork we can ask people to write us references, and they can fingerprint us (woohoo!) and I think we can start meeting children.

This week's mide is decisiveness: when you have made a decision, act without hesitating. Thinking about the adoption process though the lens of decisiveness makes me realize that the main thing between not adopting a child and adopting a child is the decision to go ahead with it. It's been something I've thought about since I was a little girl, when my friend Claire and her three adopted siblings lived across the street from me. It's not, of course, that I would have adopted anyone at that age, but that I understood it was a real option for family-building. But I've been actively considering it for the past -- what? -- five years. And really, the difference between thinking about it and doing it was a decision to start the process -- and then, of course, ongoing decisions to continue the process. Handing in the paperwork today feels a little bit like jumping off an embankment into a cool beautiful lake: I know it will be amazing once I get in, but it's still scary and transgressive to take the leap.