Author: Jeannie Norris

Maria

Maria loves animals. All animals.
Creatures with fur, fleece, feathers, scales, shells – they’re all good.
But one is her favorite.
His name is Rusty, and he is the bearded dragon her parents bought for her 11th birthday.
“She loves this thing,” Desta, her mom, laughs. He walks on a leash and sits in her lap to watch movies. “She
talks to him – she’s really attached to him.”
Desta got the idea for Rusty after watching Maria chase lizards all summer at The Refuge, a camp her family runs in rural Greene County.
Maria wants to be a zoological veterinarian, a caretaker of animals unfamiliar and undomesticated, and she’s found her home with a family that sees her passions and strengths.
Every day with Desta and Sammy, living at The Refuge, she is discovering her capacity to learn, love, and grow.

Kaydin

Give Kaydin some encouragement! Use the Leave a Reply field at the bottom of this page.

When I look at you, I see I have a family to go to whenever.
When I hold you, I feel that I am safe and I don’t have to worry if I can eat or sleep that day.
When I smell you, I smell the cupcakes we were eating that day at the celebration of our adoption.
When I first saw you I knew that it was finally true.

When I think about you, I think of all the years that I felt sad but now that I have you I’m happier.
When I imagine my life without you, I picture a place I would feel unsafe.
When I hear others say you are a ring*, I say you are way more to me.
When others see you they think of you as jewelry, I think [of] you as new mom.

When I feel cold on my skin you remind me that I don’t have to worry.
When others say I’m the girl that was in foster care and then adopted, you say I’m that girl that is safe now.

*On the day of her adoption, Kayden was gifted a ring by her new mother, Tina