The above is from John Donne's Meditation XVII, which is one of my favorite poems (do "meditations" count as poems? I don't even know.) ever. I thought of it today as I was reading this article, about the tens of thousands of orphans left by the earthquake in Haiti, in addition to the 380,000 orphans the country already had before the earthquake. That's, at the very least, estimating very conservatively, 400,000 children without parents or homes. I was sitting at Noah's Bagels eating my lunch today thinking about a) how mindblowing a number that is, and b) how those children are the world's responsibility now; that even though this tragedy happened in a country that might be far away from our safe, privileged lives in Seattle or wherever else, it is everyone's moral obligation to take ownership of it and do what they can to help. Also, I was wishing I had a huge house and a ton of money and could take in at least a few kids myself.
I do know that at some point, when I am ready to have my own kids, I want to adopt them. I know I want to be a mom (although not for several years!) and I think that saving a child from unsafe, unfair circumstances is one of the greatest good deeds anyone could perform. Doing good while also getting a chance to do something I really want seems like kind of the ultimate win-win situation.
Photo from: http://hosted.ap.org/photos/A/af50da05-26cf-47df-9976-c7a1295a7b08-big.jpg
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