Discretionary Funds

Someday when my adoption debts are all paid off (hah!!) and I again have that wonderful item euphemistically known as a discretionary fund, there are a few things I intend to do that serve no practical purpose whatsoever--just because I want to. (Those of you who know me well are gasping in shock and wondering what on earth has come over me, I know!)

One of them is buy a forensic photo regression of Charlie. I would like to make a really nice lifebook for him as a gift if/when he marries, but I have no baby pictures of him. In fact, the earliest pictures I have of him (and very few of those) are from the age of about 12. The orphanage never bothered to take baby or young child pictures of him because they never believed he would be adopted. They didn't really start taking a lot of pictures until the summer before he was adopted, when they found out someone was interested in him. But you've heard of how they can "age" a missing child photograph to show what the child can look like today after being missing for several years? Guess what? They can do it BACKWARDS as well! I caught a link for a company that does both progressions and regressions on photographs, and I'm so excited at the thought of having baby pictures of Charlie that I'm simply beside myself!! You HAVE to check out this link and look at the picture of what Elvis would look like today. This is really cool--take a look at some of the regressions they've done. http://www.phojoe.com/forensic_compositing.html

Another thing would be to start a search for his birth parents. I asked Charlie if he would someday want to know who his birthparents were if that information could be found, and he said yes. That's one of the reasons I follow Brian Stuy's blog (see Research-China.org in the blog list). He's the recognized expert in that field. I have no idea what it costs to mount a search--I have seen how extensively he works on a project from some of the descriptions, and I imagine it's a pretty penny, so it certainly isn't anything I could justify just yet. But someday, when Charlie turns out to be the next John Yeh, (see http://www.gazette.net/stories/12192008/businew173336_32472.shtml), it would be neat to at least reach out and let his birth parents know he turned out okay.

I'm sure I'll find more things to add to the discretionary funds list, but I think these two will be priorities!