Back before the end of April, I noticed that Tim had e-mailed himself a notice about a job opening for a physics professor position at a small, teaching-oriented university. A couple days before the deadline, I asked if he was going to apply for it, and he said probably not. The town wasn't anything approaching diverse (92% white, with precisely three residents of foreign birth), and we have always said that we didn't want to raise Esther in a place where she would feel like the odd one out. And at that point, after a frustrating year of trying unsuccessfully to move into a higher-education teaching career, Tim had already shifted his focus to making a career change into actuarial science, and was pretty excited about it. I have always seen Tim as a teacher and was feeling a little sad about leaving that dream behind, so I encouraged him to apply anyway--it was an easy application, and what could it hurt?
After Tim sent in his materials, I spent the next few days racked with guilt that I could even think of raising our precious little girl in a town where no-one looked like her. But as days passed and nobody contacted him, I began to relax. Then he got a call for a phone interview. Well, that was no great investment on anybody's part, so he went ahead with it. Then he got asked for an on-campus interview! At that point we had some serious discussion. Was there really a possibility that we would move to that kind of small town for the right job? We didn't want to waste the committee's time or the university's money by interviewing for a job that we weren't prepared to accept. We had made a firm commitment to raising Esther in a place that was good for her--but what did that mean, exactly? I know from talking to and reading about adults (both adoptees and not) who were raised in communities where they were part of a tiny minority that it does, inexorably I think, affect one's self-image and reactions towards others in ways that are a much bigger deal than the rest of us are able to appreciate. I know from my own experience growing up as a "farang" (foreigner) in rural Thailand that it affected how I see myself and others, but I had the advantage (sometimes disadvantage) of belonging to a very privileged minority, and relished my strong resemblance to my father and siblings. Esther doesn't have that. At the same time, was this one issue sufficient to outweigh the other advantages that there might be for her personally and for the family as a whole?
In the end, Tim scheduled the interview. By the end of that week, he had gotten an offer. It was decision time.
At the time, we were staying with my grandmother celebrating her birthday, and my mother was also there. So my grandmother and my mother agreed to watch Esther for an afternoon so we could get off by ourselves and pray and talk.
We started by getting ourselves quiet, and in a position to listen to God. Beyond being quiet, I spent some time reflecting on what I know to be true. I wanted us to make our decision on that foundation, rather than in reaction to our fears. So here are some things I know to be true: God is big. God can (and does) bring healing and wholeness to even the most difficult situations. No-one is doomed to a life of helpless suffering from an emotional wound if God is in the picture (although healing may be difficult and requires us to deliberately embrace the process). Avoiding suffering is not the ultimate goal of life. Those things that hurt us can also make us deeper, more resilient, and more compassionate.
When I stood on this foundation and looked at the reasons that I wanted to move, or didn't want to move, I could see that most of my reasons for not moving were fears. They were not without substance, but at the same time they failed to take into account God's power and willingness to redeem difficult situations and use them for the good of us who trust in God. Meanwhile, the reasons for wanting to take this position were mostly healthy ones, things like wanting Tim to use the gifts God gave him, and to be in a position where he could be a mentor and a positive influence in many lives. Tim's list of reasons for wanting/not wanting to move and wanting/not wanting to stay overlapped some with mine as well as having some unique items, but overall he found the same pattern: the reasons for wanting to stay or not move were based largely on fears, while the ones for wanting to take the position were mostly reasons that affirmed the things we know to be true.
So, we decided to take the position. I still believe that Esther will experience certain hardships as the result of our decision that she would not have experienced growing up here. (She might, of course, have experienced different hardships growing up here, but that's a subject for a different post!) I can't guarantee that she will allow God to use those situations to make her a better, stronger, more compassionate person, but I pray that that will be the case and we will do everything in our power to give her the tools and support to live well in her new environment.
Meanwhile, there are things that I think she will love about living in our new small town. She is such an outdoors girl, and the outdoors will be more available to her than ever before. We'll be able to see stars at night, we can go camping more often, we may have a backyard that she can play in, and we'll be able to give her more freedom to play outside at an earlier age than we could here. We can afford to send her to preschool! She is such an extrovert that she thinks going to school must be the ultimate adventure, and I think she'll be thrilled to get to spend regular time in an environment with other kids. We'll be able to live in a place where no-one is living under us and she can run and jump and dance in the house as much as she wants to. We will be living less than three hours' drive from my grandmother, with whom Esther has a very special relationship, so they will get to see each other more often. And, Tim has a great deal of freedom to do what he wants during summers, so we will be able to spend an occasional summer in China!!
If in the future we see that the race issue is having a significant negative impact on Esther, we are prepared to move (or seek other creative solutions), but for the moment, we think it's going to be a good move for all of us.
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