foster parent month

For those of you who are unaware (or have forgotten), I work in foster care. I am a licensing worker for LCFS (Lutheran Child & Family Service) and have for the past 3.5 years. I highly enjoy the agency I work for. My job is to conduct all regular "maintenance" on our foster homes...I have to do a home visit to each of our homes once per year and I also conduct investigations when someone says that they, as foster parents, have done something they shouldn't have done. The yearly visits are enjoyable. The investigations are not.

I was privileged to spend my morning today on the front lawn of our state capital building in Lansing. May is foster care month, which means that if you know any foster parents, tell them thanks! There was a "rally" this morning (I'm not sure what a rally all entails, but I'm pretty sure what we did today wasn't very rallyish) in which we stood in front of the capital building and listened to a few people give speeches about what great things foster parents are doing and what the state is doing (or trying to do) to improve the foster care system in Michigan. Then we retreated to the tent where we had our booth set up for people to take our pens and candy and other LCFS freebies. They gave us free pizza too. It wasn't the most exciting event in the world, but it was much preferred over sitting in my office working on my reports!

mourning my lack of unnecessary things

My life has taken an interesting turn the past month and a half. The utter lack of several luxury items having a presence at my house has been a hard change. No doubt, the benefits of having moved to my house outweigh these disappointments, but yet, they linger. I do not have a computer. Or an internet. Or any TV channels. Previously, I had regular access to all of these things at my residence (including cable channels). I do have internet access at work (and thus, I'm able to check up on other blogs and even leave comments, but I don't feel justified in taking the time to write out my thoughts, post pictures, or really do anything that will take more than about 2 minutes time. While this helps me feel connected to everyone else, it does not help you all feel connected to me! I'm sorry for this...it cannot be helped.)

My TV viewing, however, can be rectified. :) I have wonderful friends who bless me with time in front of their TVs for the necessities in TV viewing (namely, Grey's Anatomy). I can't say that it would even make sense for me to have any TV channels at this point...I'm never home to watch them, along with the fact that I have to sit 2 feet in front of my TV to catch any sort of a detail of what I'm watching (it's a small, small TV).

Yet, as I sit here at the library and complain about these things, I am reminded that these things are luxury items. My life is absolutely complete without these items. I can fully function without 24/7 access to the internet and TV. It's just that I don't want to. :)