Travels with the T's: February 2010

Today Kathee, Gideon, and I headed to downtown Chicago for an 11:30AM appointment with the Department of Homeland Security and/or United States Customs and Immigration Services. Gideon had an appointment for his N600 which is an application for a certificate of citizenship. Although I don't quite understand everything, he has been a US citizen since we readopted him. Soon after the readoption, he was issued a new birth certificate (as if Kathee birthed him in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia), and was issued a social security card. So I'm a bit hazy on why this document was needed, however, we were told that if we waited until Gideon was 18, that he'd have to go through the process of naturalization (which we didn't want to do). Also, we want to get Gideon a passport and must have this N600 to receive a passport. I know, I love government, too!

So we left at 8:00AM, and drove to downtown Chicago. It turned out that the building was just a few blocks from my brother's old apartment, so I knew the area very well. We parked the car and walked in to the building at 11:05AM, for our 11:30AM appointment. After following the signs for "citizenship appointments"to the third floor (which is what we were there for), the lady at the citizenship appointment window told us we had to go back down to the first floor to window #18. Needless to say, I was a bit torked, and Kathee told me it would be best to settle myself down (until we left the building).

As we waited in the line for the guy sitting at Window 18, the lady (Doris) working Window 17 took to Gideon while she was on the phone. She said a couple times how beautiful he is. She asked if he was Haitian, to which I said he was not. After the pleasantries were completed, and we talked to Man @ Window 18, we were told to fill out some paperwork and wait for our number (B-6) to be called. After Kathee completed the paperwork, she asked me if I thought our number would be called (as all the other letters being called were C-something). So I popped up, and stepped back in line for Man @ Window 18. While waiting, Gideon came running up to me and hugged my leg. So, Doris, who was still on the phone, asked where he was from. I responded that he was born in Ethiopia. She again spoke of how beautiful, and friendly he was. She also said that it was obvious that he loves his daddy. As she was speaking to us from behind glass, I was having trouble hearing. So I walked up to her window and speak cordially with her. She asked what I needed, and I asked if our number would be called and where we needed to sit so as to not miss our number. After filling me in, I asked Gideon to say "thank you" to the nice lady and we returned to our seats.

A few minutes later, Doris decided to take a bathroom break, I guess, so she came out through the large area and talked with us further. When finding out his name is Gideon, she asked where we got the name. Seeing her Star of David necklace, I said, "It's a name from the Old Testament (should have said Hebrew Testament but didn't) and means "Warrior," because he is going to need to be a warrior in his life. She shared that she was Jewish.

Then she asked what business we had, and upon finding out she said, "you don't need to sit here and wait for that. Here I will take care of this for you. Come with me and we will get you in and out of here in no time." So Kathee followed her to the cashier window, she spoke with the cashier, and Kathee wrote the check. While Kathee was there, I asked her why this document was needed and she explained. Then she yelled to someone behind one of the windows for a copy of the document. She showed me a copy of the N600 document and said we'd receive the document in 9-12 months. After Kathee paid, we thanked her multiple times, I told her she'd made our day and we parted ways for good.

From there, she asked where we were having lunch (since this is a special trip and you're from so far away). I asked if there was a Giordano's Pizza around. After receiving the bad news, she said that we should go to Portillo's Chicago Hot Dog (which I remember my brother Zach saying was one of his favorite eating joints in Chicago when he lived there). So that's where we had lunch.

While eating lunch, Gideon was flirting with the lady at the next table over. Soon the entire table of about 7 or 8 were messing around with him. Turns out, they were from Philadelphia and were in town for the Simply Youth Ministry Conference (the lady he was flirting with was actually the youth pastor). We chatted with them for a bit, told them a few things to see in Chicago because they wanted to know what visitors must see in Chicago (Navy Pier and the Sears Tower) and parted ways.

Oh you think the adventure is over? Not even close.

For those of you who don't know me, I'm a big birding guy. I love watching birds. And I absolutely love watching bald eagles. There is a state park on I-80 near Utica, Illinois, called Starved Rock State Park. I know that each year they hold bald eagle days at the park, and I thought it was sometime soon, so I wanted to stop at the park, in order to literally run to a place that would be phenomenal for eagle watching (while the other 2/3 of the family was in the visitor's center). I wanted to do a bit of an eagle count to see if it was worth driving there for their eagle days, or if my sights in Moline are sufficient. So after running the path, getting to the lookout (and seeing a bald eagle about 20 yards from the trail), and returning to the car, Kathee and Gideon weren't there. So I walked in to the visitor's center, only to find Kathee and Gideon chatting with an old friends from Guatemala.

It turns out that while Kathee and Gideon were looking around, a girl (Marcella) walked to her mother (Kelly) and said, "that lady over there looks like Pastor Karl's daughter." When Kelly looked, sure enough, it was Kathee and Gideon (they'd never met Gideon before). So Kathee and I sat and talked with Kelly, while Gideon played with Marcella, Sophia, and her friends. So fun for us to see them again. They were members of Kathee's dad's church when he pastored in Guatemala. Marcella, who was young when we visited there, was taken with Kathee and loved to spend time with her. It turns out, they were spending the weekend a few miles from the park at a large water park hotel.

Upon coming back to Moline, we stopped at Chick-Fil-A for supper. While waiting for our food, I started talking with a team (turned out to be the men's tennis team) from Olivet Nazarene University. Upon finding that out, I asked if they knew a girl who I youth pastored some years back and is now one of the best tennis players on the girls team at Olivet (they know her and their team is actually eating supper at Erica's parents home after their meet tomorrow).

All I can say is... IS IT A SMALL WORLD OR WHAT? What a great day! I hope you enjoyed reading this post as much as I did writing it. What an adventure. Whenever we leave the house we ask Gideon if he's ready for an adventure. Today was certainly one of those. Each step totally unexpected, and so fun to experience!