Latchu Baby

it's no secret that my feelings have been a little slow on the uptake concerning our newest monkey. it has NOT been all fluffy clouds and rainbows with cute dancing teddy bears.
in spite of this, good things continue to happen.
jamison really loves hot food. he calls it latchu ("spicy" or "hot pepper" in chinese) this is phonetically spelled. so each morning when he wakes up, he asks me for latchu noodles. he started all of this when julieann and i first met him in china. he would just randomly say the word latchu, and then bust a gut laughing about it.
he still says it, and he still thinks it's funny. nobody knows why but him.
but i started calling him latchu baby. my little spicy baby. and he's not little...well, maybe if you compared him to another 12 year old he'd be little. and he's not a baby. but in SO many ways he is a baby. in so many ways he is just starting out. he is brand new to our family. emotionally he's so tiny and young, fragile. he wants to be held. a lot.
he cries. a lot.
this world is new to him....our ways, our rules, our language, our food.
he is so curious and wants to learn. and he is learning like crazy. you would not believe how much english he understands. he loves to be called latchu baby. he used to think "baby" was a really mean thing to call him. but once he heard me calling scott "baby" and all of his brothers "baby" he quickly realized that it was not a bad thing at all, but quite the opposite. so now in the morning if i say, "good morning, jamison" he says, "no, jamison mommy.....latchu baby!"
it's so cute. i'm telling you, i'm softening. it will come. i have faith that it will all come in due time.
today at a doctors appointment, the interpreter asked him if he liked it here with his new family. he said something to her and she started laughing and told me that he said "of course i LOVE it here, there is no where i would want to be more than here."
i started crying right there in the waiting room. i'm so happy he likes it here....with us....i so desperately want him to be happy and to feel safe. i want to do right by him.