A Photo Treasure

Picture in your mind the image of a woman walking down a dirty, dusty road.  Perhaps it is under the dark cover of night.  Perhaps it's in the wee hours of the morning just before sunrise.  Maybe it's even in broad daylight.  Imagine this woman comes to the gate of a building, a locked door and long brick walls that forbid any passersby to peek inside.  Picture that woman coming to that wall, that gate and leaving a package by the door.

These days we don't like unattended packages left out in public, do we?

This woman sets down her package carefully on the ground outside the gate.  Does she stop and think? Or does she scurry away as fast as she can?  Does she look back wondering if she made the right decision?  Or does she press on, boldly going forward, never turning an eye back towards the gate?  Does she cry?  Does she mourn?  Is she sorry?  Is she convicted?  Is she angry at the circumstances that seemingly forced her to make such a decision?  Is her heart crushed to smithereens?  Or could she be completely numb fully believing that she simply must do what she must do?

That unattended package was my daughter.  

On what adoptive parents call "Finding Day," my Quiet Tiger was found at the gate of the orphanage.  There could hardly be a more perfect place for her to be left.  I've wondered about that day and how it went for the woman whose daughter I'm raising as my own.

This past week I received 2 photos from a new Facebook friend whose child also came from the same orphanage years ago.  My new friend had 2 pictures of the exterior of the orphanage, including the very gate where my daughter was left by her birthmom and found by orphanage staff.  I had never seen any pictures of this location before.

The Yulin, Shaanxi Children's Welfare Institute Gate.

The photo is simply a treasure to me.

My daughter will one day have many questions.  She'll wonder why her mom gave her up after 2 whole loving months together.  She'll wonder what forced her to make such an agonizing choice to give up a precious child.  She'll wonder if her mom thinks of her.

I won't have answers.

But the question of, "Where did she leave me?  Where was I found?" has been answered.  And that's a very nice piece of the puzzle to have!

It was a sad place.  

The place of agonizing loss.  

But it is also a beautiful place 

for it is the place where my Quiet Tiger's 

story of redemption 

begins.