The homestudy

Four and a half hours is a long time, and yet it felt much shorter.

I was a little surprised at the extent of questions pertaining to extended family. "How often do you communicate with your sister?" "How would you describe your relationship with your brother?" "How were you disciplined by your parents?"

My brain immediately supplied funny (to me) answers, which I rejected in favor of honest and straightforward answers. The rejected answers to the above questions: "Actually, we're permanently telepathically linked, and she doesn't care for your tone." "Strictly platonic, no matter what he tells you." "They turned me into a newt.... I got better."

I even made the interviewer get just a little sniffly at one point. She asked me to describe a highlight of my relationship with Ann... and I choked up trying to describe what I felt when I saw her in her bridal gown for the first time. I was so close to crying at the memory that all I could say about seeing her was, "The world stopped."

It did, incidentally. You may not have noticed, but only the grace of God kept us all on the planet.

Although there are still a few technicalities to work out (who knew that we would need to report the acreage of our property?), we have been told to consider ourselves "approved."

We could theoretically be "on the shelf" within days... and then it's just a matter of waiting until the next time the world stops.

--David