By Terra Avilla
Some stories you hear once, but they stick with you for a lifetime.
For me, that story is that of an old man walking along the beach, throwing stranded starfish back into the ocean. The old man did this, day in and day out for years. As the tide went out – if the starfish were stuck on the beach – they dried up and died.
A young man would watch the old man, walk the beach every day slowly picking up star fish and throwing them back into the ocean.
One day, he approached the old man on the shore right as the old man picked up one of the hundreds of stranded starfish. The young man asked the old man why he even bothered and told him that his efforts did not matter.
“The next day,” said the young man, “a hundred more starfish are going to be stranded and die. Some of the starfish thrown back today will be stranded again tomorrow.”
The old man looked at the starfish in his palm, smiled and threw it back into the ocean. Looking at the young man he said, “Today, It mattered to that one.”
This story has always resonated to me. Sometimes I feel like my efforts to save the world are somewhat futile or that what I do isn’t making any dent into the common good of our community. Then I remember this story and it helps me to continue in my efforts.
This story was told to me long ago, by family friend who was a foster parent.
If there is special VIP spot in heaven I can tell you it is unequivocally reserved for men and women who become foster parents.
Our community is in desperate, desperate need of foster parents.
You do not have to be perfect – you just have to care. Care enough to make a huge difference in child’s life.
A foster child won’t care if you can squat 200-pounds, recite Dre lyrics, or if you make enough money to buy them the newest IPhone or take them on lavish trips. They want safety. They want security. They want to feel some sort of normalcy in what is sure to be a very scary time in their life.
Did you know that some of our children in Foster care have to be placed out of the county? How tragic that we cannot place them locally. A child, who has had every shred of their normal routine disturbed, now can’t even see their teacher or their friends at school. CFS (CPS) spends countless hours driving those children to their appointments out of county, back into county and so forth.
Please understand, our local foster families are doing a phenomenal job. I cannot count the number of times when I have encountered youth on the job who, despite being out of foster care, still call their previous foster parents ‘mom’ or ‘dad.’ I can attest that these foster parents give it their all.
I have several friends who are perfect foster parents – who fell in love with their foster children. Like, one family that drove more than 8-hours to pick up their foster daughter from the hospital the week of Christmas – kind of love. They had to buy a new house and new car so they had room for their foster kids, kind of love.
The “I will continue to show up to whatever court dates I have to, so that I can support you and show you are loved” – kind of love.
I watch these families navigate this world and I am so astonished.
They pour love around these children knowing that the ultimate goal is to reunify them with their families. I will never forget walking into work and my very good friend was crying because the baby his family had nursed to health was being reunited with his father.
My friend was so happy that the infant had a father who was doing everything he could to be a great dad, but my friend still missed his ‘boy.’
My friend still checks on the family and the boys’ father is appreciative of all the love my friend’s family gave to his son.
Another local family is routinely fostering older children. She stated that she loves having the older kids around, she just is saddened because she wants so much to share with her family the pictures of her new family, but she can’t because of confidentiality.
She told me the 7-year old that she fosters had never seen a picture of herself before. She was 7-years old and the very first picture she has of herself is with her foster family.
Are parts of our system broken? Yes! Absolutely. Can you make a meaningful change in a child’s life? Yes! Absolutely.
To all of our amazing foster parents, I know that so much of what you do is not, and cannot be, shared with the world, but it is beautiful. Important. And it matters. You matter.
Even if you just foster one child. It matters. I see you. And you are very much one of the reasons I love this place we call home.
If you would like information on how to become a foster parent, please contact Child and Family Services.
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