Where's the Map?

** warning**
I process things by talking and typing...
it's how I do it, 'thinking out loud, so to speak/type'
and so I have to post and then I'll try to stop whining.
But I will put up a kid pic tomorrow instead, I promise, you've done your time.**

So.
Here we are.
We've been over the what's and why's, below.
We are stuck, my daughter is stuck in a bureaucratic mill.

And so now, while Coffeedoc still tries to figure out how to turn this around, if remotely possible, we have to move forward.
And I want to know: where's the map?

I know, I know.
There IS NO map.
I am to move forward in faith.
Next step, pitch black.
Next step, go.
Well....I'm trying.
I really am.

I'd just dearly love to do this with tremendous grace and ease and show that it's not so hard, it can be done with a minimum of effort and a smidgeon of faith.

But you know, I am not graceful, never have been.
I am a clumsy mess, most of the time.
And apparently, especially now.

And, even for those with faith, this sort of thing is a challenge.
And I DO believe God knows what the perfect timing is, and I do really want His choice....but I'd sure really like it to jive up with mine, when push comes to shove.
So, yeah, I'd like to holler out: "I want a map, please."

How do we move forward?
This is uncharted water, in many ways.
What do I do with this grief and this worry and fear?
Do I just set it aside and pray over it and look at it as I pass by in the normal hectic rush of my days?
Do I just set it aside and ignore it, hoping it will go away if I don't give it any attention?
Do I ogle it and lose myself inside it, my very own "precious" as I morph into Gollum?
Do we blithely throw ourselves back into the hum of our busy lives here, and just kind of not think about it all, lose ourselves in the busy?
Can I?
No.
I don't know what to do with all this.
I want a map.

What do I do with the very real fact that I have a daughter, there, not here...
in every way she is mine: legally, sacredly, morally, committedly (I know it's not a real word, but I don't care), ethically, our responsibility, and growing in our hearts to what degree she can at this point.
What do we tell the world? "Yeah, we have a daughter, she's in a foster home, in Ethiopia."
{Not that the world is so important here; I find this not sitting well within my own chest either}
According to the Ethiopian government, she is our responsibility.
Our child.
According to the US govt, that may be true but we can't get her.
What do we do with that?
How long? What if it's for so very, very long?
Do we set her up with a Nanny in a separate home?
Do we move there and ditch the business and life we've built here?
What's realistic?
Do we move over there temporarily, also ditching the business and school and doctors and life here that we have built and also need and others who need us?
Do we split the family up to move there for awhile?
Live separately?
How do we honor our ties to her and care for her from here, when our hands are tied in so many ways?

sigh.

I don't know what to do with all this, this grief and worry and wonder.
I DO so so want a map.
But I know, in faith, that I don't get one.

So, I will do the only thing I know how: I will hurt through this and I will do the next thing.
I will do the next load of laundry.
I will make the next meal.
I will referee the next fuss.
I will pick up that set of shoes off the floor.
I will hug my sweaty toddler, Gabey, when he wakes up from his nap.
And I will think about her, aching, every single step of the way.
And I will offer it all up, in faith, and hope, and a little bit of kvetching in my prayers.

And I will remember God's answer to one who was truly really hurt {Yeah, Job} when He said "Did you hang the moon, the sun, the heavens?" (That's my paraphrase, you get the idea...I say the same thing in essence to my kids:'I know what you want, leave me alone I know what I"m doing and you don't have a clue').

Yesterday, I read this, it helped a bit, it's from a French Carthusian, named Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart.

In all that we do, and at every moment, God has ordained an exact balance between what we have to do and the necessary strength to do it; and this we call grace. Our part is to bring ourselves into line with grace.
God uses all the horrors of this world for an infinitely perfect end, and always with an infinite calm. It is part of his plan that we should feel the blows and experience the wounds of life: but more than anything else he wants us to dominate them by virtues of faith, hope and charity, and so live on his level. It is these latter which will raise us up to him, and then we shall share in his calm, and in the highest part of our being.

h/t Anchoress

So I will do the next thing, again and ongoing: pray for the virtues of faith, hope and charity, and so hope to find the calm in the ache.
And try hard to stop searching for that map and just keep taking the next step.