Windfall —”an unexpected gain” — who wouldn’t want one?

Oh, have I got a story for you, a tale worth a roomful of candles and cake . . .

S.O.S.

One week ago the local adoption agency phoned our eldest daughter, mother to our 16-month-old grandson. The agency’s request was urgent, the need, dire.

A struggling newborn in the Deaconess Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) needed someone to help her learn to eat. Hopefully, to thrive. Overworked nurses wanted someone calm and caring to hold one tiny girl, coax her into life. Would our daughter come?

She and her husband weighed the risks. There were many.

Still, she went. Stepped right into miraculous, heart-wrenching chaos for five days. We met our newest little one in NICU that first evening. Ashen and frail, with an awkward feeding port in her skull and cords snaking off to various monitors, she looked like a small electric doll. [Read more…]