Meet My Son.

On Wednesday, as I had (typically) four Microsoft Word docs open on my screen -- and was working on all of them, my office phone rang. I glanced at a number I didn't recognize on the Caller ID, and let it go to the machine. Mrs. Sticking Point and I had been in nearly continuous contact all day long (this fact is going to be important a few paragraphs from now), via IM, email, and telephone. This call wasn't from her, so...I let it go.

A few minutes later, I wondered if the adoption agency would ever call me at work, or if they'd only try the house. Checked the voicemail. I heard the following message:

Hi Tommy, _____ from S-C. This is an important call, I have some good news for you. Please call me as soon as possible at 212-###-####. Um...I don't have a work number for...telephone number for S----, and I did leave a message on your home phone. You can reach me, again, at 212-###-####. It's Wednesday afternoon, the twenty-ninth of September at quarter of five. I'll be at the agency until six or six-thirty; or you can reach me tomorrow morning. I'll be in at nine o'clock. Between nine and ten would be the best time to reach me. OK, so GIVE ME A CALL...'k, bye.

Whoa. The cliche parade: my heart raced...I began stammering...I stood up...I sat down.

As I listened with the receiver in my right hand, I began typing out a one-handed smoke signal instant message to my wife. I think it looked something like this:

sSWEETI E CALL _____ CALLED FROM SPNCE! SHE SAYS GODD NEWS IMPROTNTA! CALL NO W!

But I think it was less clear and more frantic looking. Like I was cobbling together a ransom note! And then I got the auto response that the darling wife was away from her computer. I grabbed the phone to call her, and had to restart after mis-dialing three times. I took a deep breath and said it aloud: "OK...9 - 1 - 2 - 1 - 2 - 6 - 5 - 4..." She wasn't at her desk either. I muttered spoken language's quickest-ever "dammit," and called the social worker back.

"Is this the call we hope it is?"

"Yes."

She told me our referral was in, and went right into the basic details: It's a baby boy. He was born on June 13. His name is Jung Ho.

This is it, I thought. This is the start of it all being real. I grabbed the sheet of note paper that was next to my computer, and jotted down the info. So, to the Sticking Point family scrapbook, I will now add this sheet of paper, which contains the names of six writers I'd recommended for work, their phone numbers, and the first few facts I ever learned about my child.

She asked if I'd be able to get in touch with my wife, and when would we like to come and review the documents. We could do it today before 6:30, or sometime tomorrow (Thursday) after 3:30. I assured her that we'd definitely be up there today. S. is working in our other building, just up the street, and we've been in constant contact. "I'll get in touch with her and call you right back, " I told her.

I dialed S's work number as quickly as I could. Left a message to call me ASAP. Tried the cell, left message. Called the office number. Hung up on the machine. Tried cell. Hung up on the machine. Figuring that wherever she was, she was simply unable to hear her Coldplay ringtone, I just kept dialing it and hanging up on the outgoing message.

This went on for five, ten...two minutes before I'd had enough. I shut down my computer and ran out of the office with my cell phone in my left hand. I was heading up to the S's building to get her.

When I got to her desk, she wasn't sitting there. I wandered around the floor for a minute and couldn't track her down. I was going over in my head how cool it was going to be to poke my head into an office, ask to "borrow" her, and then share the amazing news I was by now bursting to tell her. I sat down at her desk, with show outlines and Weekend Update jokes printed out in small piles, and called her cell phone another time. In a second, I heard "Clocks," by Coldplay drifting from the desk drawer. Shit!

We'd been in near-constant contact all day long...but at the moment of truth, she was AWOL.

I called our friend SOC at his desk downstairs, and found the wife there. I asked if he'd please send her up to her desk. He was all light-hearted about it, laughing. I must have sounded like a real jackass when I said, "No, this isn't funny. It's important." (Melodramatic douche.)

She gets upstairs, and I stand up, and forget all that I'd been rehearsing for the past half hour. "It's good news. It's here. I mean, what we want. It came." It was supposed to be so much cooler than that.

We bolted. In the elevator bank at 1633 Broadway, I told her the three details I knew: gender, birthdate, name. Then, the slowest taxi in New York City got us to S-C at 6:00.
(On the way, we took a picture of ourselves with her cell phone. I thought we should commemorate the event.)

I'll just add some random notes about the rest of that evening, because some of it is private and some of it I simply don't remember, because it was ALL a blur.

Sitting in the waiting room, I told S. I hoped the social worker was as excited about this as we were. I just didn't want her to go about this in too business-like a manner. It was HUGE for us, Day One of our family, and I didn't want it to be devoid of feeling. Here's how that turned out: When she came down the hallway and stood in front of us, she smiled, then giggled, then actually snorted with glee.

The room where we conferred wasn't what I expected. It wasn't the type of room, it would seem, where good things happen. Couch, two arm chairs, three side tables. Box of Kleenex. I've been in too many rooms like it in my life, and I'd never left one smiling. It reminded me of a side-room at a funeral parlor.

We learned all about our baby, our son, and at alternating times me, my wife, and our social worker got choked up and cried.

We were handed seven photographs, taken in mid-August. That's him, that's our son. (Do I keep repeating that? It is still boggles my mind.)

We learned, from the pages and pages of medical and developmental notes that this little one is perfectly healthy, is an "eater" who loves his bottles, and doesn't sleep for too long.

The cab ride home found us giddy and still a little stunned. Our next step was to provide all of this information to the world's foremost international adoption pediatric medical authority, who would look everything over and give her assessment of the baby's health and medical outlook. At which point, we'd give the nod to move forward with the process of adopting Jung Ho. So, we had the taxi drop us off at out neighborhood Kinkos, where we made all the necessary color and B&W copies for the doctor. (Holy crap. I hadn't been inside one of those places in about seven or eight years. What happened?! It was so thoroughly, bone-chillingly depressing in that place, that if I weren't Xeroxing paperwork about and photos of my brand new son, I'd have drowned myself in a bucket of toner. The place was like a DMV, but with less of a party atmosphere.)

All I can remember of that Wednesday night was making phone calls to the immediate family, and shooting them some of his photos in emails. I don't even know if we ate dinner.

His picture is in a frame on our mantle. We check in on it every four minutes or so. Every time I look, I laugh. I think that he has a great sense of humor in his expression. He is also (and those of you who talk to me next week are going to hear this plenty) freakishly handsome. It's ridiculous, how handsome he is. How could a human be so damn beautiful?

Listening:
Deanna from the album Best Of Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds by Cave, Nick And The Bad Seeds

Comments

[Michael Hanscom]

Wow congratulations to all of you!

[Figlet]

Um. How the heck did I miss the singularly MOST IMPORTANT POST OF 2004?!!!!! Has this been here since last week? I mean, WHAT? I mean I already knew from Mrs THS but it's so uncool not to post my glee for you on the internet as well. You know what? He IS a handsome fellow. (I mean I'll know that when I see his picture so I might as well just go ahead and say it.) I just can't wait to squish his cheeks and teach him how to say "I Love Little Sweet Pea"!

xxx
Figlet

[Tommy Himself]

Michael -- Thanks for stopping in and leaving good thoughts!

Figlet -- Yes and no. I started writing that weblog entry on Thursday morning, but fear and superstition kept me from posting it until last night. And then I pre-dated the entry. I've emailed you some photos of the world's most handsome baby boy. How you'll find him suitable to court the sweetest of peas one day.

[walein]

congratulations to T himself and S herself. i was out of town at the time but I di get to see the post at a MAC store and showed it to my girlfriend and she got very girlie about it all...and i sort of got a little girlie too.