Day 2: The Arrival

After a night in a +\- 2 star hotel in Florida we boarded flight 2277 to Port au Prince. An eventless flight other then having some extra room to stretch out and pleasant flight attendants who enjoyed their coworkers and served their cliental well. (This is in contrast to flights where we were tucked in tight like some kind of canned meat waiting for someone to peel back the top to let us out. No loud, bossy mom continually scolding her well behaved kids and husband on this leg of our journey.)

Customs, a breeze. Baggage, arrived and ready. Airport hassle, none. Eighty-six degrees with a strong hint of humidity was a nice departure from 40 and damp. 

The two hour ride out of the capital to Petionville was full of Haiti: sights, sounds, and smells. I love this experience. Every bit of it. As we drove through the streets and alleyways passing people going about their lives sweeping the street, selling goods, offering services of all kinds, or walking home from school I watch their faces, the women mostly, and think. I think about the lines and concerns that are deep in all of their faces. No matter if that face is showing joy and expressing laughter or darkened with troubles and worries, they all reflect one thing. Hardship. Haiti. I think this was the life my daughter was destined for. 

Before. Before loss and her own tragedies, that came so early to her (like they do for so many here), led her to a place of refuge, a sanctuary, and now into our family. I wonder will her face bare the marks of hardships that she was dealt so early or is she safe. Or are her hardships just different now.

We pull into the guest house and were told Leïka is already inside waiting for us. No more waiting or even a chance to change out of smelly shirts for us. It was time. My girl was waiting for her Forever Family. Waiting for her new mom and her new dad, previously introduced but still strangers in most every sense of the word. Waiting to be pulled from every familiar scrap of her existence and plunged into a world as alien as any imagined. 

So we arrived. We arrived at a new cross-section woven into our thin fabric of life. What does she remember, if anything, about having a mom? What kind of man was her dad and how was she treated? As a cherished reminder of her mother? Or as a burden left behind by a woman to be forgotten? We arrived at questions of how to shape our relationships and future. We arrived at impending challenges, questions, joys, and triumphs. We arrived and I am glad. I am anxious and I am scared. I am excited and I am hopeful as she sleeps for the first time in a room with only two others, Heather and I - mom and dad. This alone is a freightening and brave step for all of us.

So here we are, but by no means have we arrived.