We have a graduate!!

 Back when I knew everything (before parenting a teenager) I took it for granted that graduating from high school was just a given.  I have learned that this achievement needs to truly be celebrated.  So, I whole heartedly applaud my daughter Taisha who graduated with academic honors from Cedar High School last night.  That is a major accomplishment for anyone but particularly one who is hard of hearing.

Taisha first entered our family 16 years ago and has continued to bloom into a gentle hearted but iron willed young woman.  She stands up for the weak, for the lonely, for the people who others may not notice.  The little girl who was once labeled unable to speak has found her voice and uses it to make the world a more fair and honest place.  Because she has trouble hearing she has had to learn to listen very carefully and watch the world. She sees so many things the rest of us miss.  She may have trouble hearing but she can truly listen.  We have yet to see all the great changes in the world she will continue to make.  She has an academic scholarship waiting for her at the university.  A child whose feet once padded along the rural banks of the river Yangtze now will walk the halls of academia.   

Why did destiny require that she leave her native China and be grafted from one family tree to another?  We don’t know.  What we do know is that she is a child of two great cultures.  She carries the gifts that came from the countless generations of Mandarin ancestors before her and shares them at this time with the world when those gifts are sorely needed.

We adore and admire you Miss Taisha.  The very first night she was with us in a hotel room in Wuhan, China, she grabbed onto Daddy's t-shirt and held on all night.  She wouldn't let go.  Now it is our time to let her go and we don't know how we are going to do that.  She is going to create a spectacular life.

Robert is the next "graduate in waiting".  We are counting on you to get us to the next graduation ceremony Robbie.