want/need

i am not satisfied by this blog template but far too distracted to do anything to change it right now. i needed to get that off my chest in case you were wondering. this evening i'm distracted by a certain felicitous moment which occurred last night as i got home from work. i've spent much of my free time this past week trying to find a way to adopt a stranger for christmas. my preference being that this stranger is the age/size of a youngish child who would otherwise be left off of the list. (i'm speaking, very specifically, about SANTA'S list here, people) lately i'm just blown away by kids: they're so incredible and wise and fragile and ... the potential! the thought of that being quashed by adult things beyond their control just makes me hurt. so i wanted to maybe, possibly, fulfill a wish, remind someone that his world is bigger and less scary than it may seem, and that someone somewhere is pulling for him. the problem? i couldn't find one! where were all of those giving trees i remembered were everywhere this time of year when i was a kid? we didn't have any clients this year to adopt and the ywca just wanted toiletries and canned goods (not that those aren't worthy needs). i was discouraged. and then i got home, opened my mailbox and found a newsletter from the seattle children's home, a local group that provides in-patient treatment for kids with severe developmental and learning disabilities (whose newsletter i have never, ever, seen anywhere, let alone in my mailbox, before yesterday). turns out they want people to adopt their kids for christmas. so 12 hours, two emails later, i have christopher. a 17 year old who loves art and music and who, an SCH staffer tells me, "could really use the extra support this time of year." he wants a discman and some new headphones and some books about drawing animals and cars and some pencils and nice sketchpads. so discman and books and pencils and sketchpads he will get. 'cause when i was 17, that's all i wanted too. and i didn't have things like poverty and disability looming over my head. i'm going to try and find these moments of felicity more often.