Juno ... I think I love you!

Okay, I very rarely LOVE movies. Often I really like movies.

I love Juno. Love it. Will probably buy it. Will probably watch it many times.

I started writing this near the beginning of the movie. Because I more than really liked it. I was cracking up, relating, laughing, loving. And now the movie is at an end and I'm laughing and sobbing.

I have, in many ways, been in the position of Vanessa. I've been in a not-so-great marriage, so desperately wanting a baby that I've ignored the awfulness of every thing else. And, I've been in the position to finally hold my child. MY child. He wasn't born in my body, but he is and always will be mine. I know that ache that stays an ache when arms are finally filled. And, I know that question, "how do I look" which is always, "is he really mine". This feeling that one year later it still makes me cry. No, not cry, it makes me cry so hard that I can hardly see and makes my throat hurt. This feeling where I am forced to draw my evening to a close because all I can think about is crawling into bed so that he can curl into me, placing his sweet hand up to my face and softly say, "mama" before he falls back to sleep.

Thank you Juno for such a beautiful portrayal of the adoption process in all of it's awful and wonderful glory. How nice would it be for all birthmoms to have such a remarkable process. I know that the process; the triad, is not always so happy and doesn't always have such a ... I don't want to say nice, that feels like it's negating all of the emotions and hurt that comes along for the ride with adoption. Not nice, but proud ending. Being in a closed adoption, I don't even know what ours is. I just know that our lives have been blessed, enriched, filled with joy.

Watching it from the birth mother's perspective and seeing, from the outside, the joy of the adoptive mother, makes me wish I could carry that joy within me. Not for myself, but to give that to another woman. Which is a very novel feeling for me. How beautiful it is to become a mother when you believe you'll never achieve that. And, how beautiful it is to share that, become that, with the help of another woman. We have the most amazing gift, given to us by a woman who doesn't even know us. Humbling.