Well, I promised stories and I have stories! Today amid a flurry of packing for Brian’s sister’s upcoming wedding, we ran a ton of adoption-related errands. Perhaps the biggest accomplishment for us, however, was getting a packet of reference letters sealed by the Secretary of State’s office downtown. We agreed to be guinea pigs in a new process for our agency which helps streamline the process of sealing and authenticating and cuts down on cost for adoptive families. If it worked, we’ll have helped set a new precedent. If it didn’t, well… we’ll be back to square one on a few forms. I went into the city this morning with a stack of dossier documents, not really knowing how many of them, if any, the State would deem valid.

We were in luck! After finding the Smallest Office in the World ™ on State Street, home to apostilles and certifications for the State of Illinois, I submitted my forms and took a seat in the tiny room, hoping that they would take pity on my terrified look. After I submitted five documents, the only problematic form that came back to us needing revision was our homestudy. Apparently, the way the document was notarized and stapled by our agency made it impossible to seal; luckily, the lady behind the window was kind to me and was able to separate the two forms in order to make both legal and valid. So hurrah– all documents thus submitted to the state have been sealed. We still have another stack to repeat the process with, but the ones we sealed today were the most troublesome.

So why the reason for the post title? Well, while I was sitting around waiting for the State to approve the forms, I witnessed no fewer than 10 folks come up to the window, many of whom barely spoke English, and have their forms rejected– and for good reasons. The poor guy behind the window actually had to list off countries to one gentleman who didn’t speak any English in hopes of finding out what country he needed certification for (correct answer? Venezuela!)  Another woman struggled to explain that she just went to the bank to have a certain form notarized, and she couldn’t understand why the form wasn’t being accepted though the banker made an error in the process of notarizing. ( I don’t write this a a knock against those whose language isn’t English, but wow, watching the language barrier try and bridge bureaucratic red tape was painful!)

I couldn’t help but think what a tough job being at the counter for this type of government work actually is. Sure, it’s a desk job, and it’s 9-5, but there were a ton of people angry that these folks were just doing their jobs.  Heck, I came into the office knowing full-well that there was a significant chance that my documents wouldn’t be sealed for any number of reasons, and even I felt a little riled up when the problems with my documents were presented to me. I’m sure that there are some less-than-stellar employees out there sealing (or more appropriately, NOT sealing) documents, but I was incredibly fortunate. I got a smile from both the employees even after they were chewed out by a 20-something that brought in a xeroxed birth certificate they wanted certified.  I saw that xerox, and I could have done a better job printing it on a $20 Lexmark. So thank you, State of Illinois, at least for this round. I feel like I should buy you a drink or something. You’ve clearly had a rough day.

In other equally exciting news, we are pretty sure that Brian’s medical paperwork is done, complete with blood work and tests. The Village of Woodridge is currently writing up our police clearance letters as I type, and we even wrapped up our notarization (for now).

Now, with all that said, I believe it is time once again for a family wedding! This time, Kelly-Forney style!