Gotcha +365

Exactly one year ago, at the moment that I'm writing this, Lisa and I were flying from Beijing to Wuhan. Sophie was still a few hours in our future, following a cold and cramped plane flight, a long van ride to the hotel, and a strange waiting period just hanging around our hotel room. We would soon be sitting in the hotel's conference room along with all the other traveling families waiting to meet our littles ones. It's what they call Gotcha Day.

Gotcha Day is to an adopting couple as Christmas morning is to a kid. It's the reason, meaning and goal of the whole process. After months and years of frustration, you're suddenly sitting in a room watching a caretaker help a little girl dance on a tabletop. And you think how the girl won't be leaving with that other woman, she'll be leaving with you. She'll be confused and probably pretty scared, but you will be too.

Then, almost as suddenly, it's a year later. The little dancing girl is a talking, running, playing, crying, growing, loving, learning dynamo who probably doesn't remember anything about that day. But you do: you remember trying to guess which girl is the one you've been looking at in pictures for months. You remember how she played with your ring, and you remember putting her bare foot in ink and then stamping it on legal documents.

But those memories have to wait a while, because even though it's the 1-year anniversary of Gotcha Day, a certain little dancing girl is screaming in her room. Not that it's a problem -- there's nowhere else we'd rather she be screaming.