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When she walked into the room with her case worker she looked angry.  I wondered how a two year old   child could look so– well, jaded.  Her curly hair hung in ringlets framing her face and two large blue eyes darted from one corner of the room to the other.

Suddenly, she took off running and started swiping her arm across the shelves full of toys and manipulatives. The Montessori school I worked at was filled to the rim with hands-on activities and she apparently wanted them all to be on the floor.  We scooped her up before she could do any more damage and the case worker looked at us and said, “She’s all yours!”, turned and walked out of the room.

This was my second summer working for my cousins at their Montessori day school.  Mostly, we had farm kids from the surrounding area and last summer I had been the full time helper for a child with Down’s Syndrome.  This summer, my charge would be this energetic, hurt and angry two year old girl whose foster parents had chosen our little country school to be her world for the next few months.

That summer changed my life.  Tory changed my life.  It was the first time I had ever met a child like her and though she cursed at me and bit me, I loved her and she knew it.  In fact, by the end of the summer Tory was progressing and I was already beginning to see the fruits of my labor of love with her.  Ironically, we both returned to our normal schedules—she to her birth family and I to my high school.

I was seventeen that year and I decided then, because of that child, that I would someday adopt a child like her.  I still think about her now and then and wonder where she is and what she is doing.  I can’t even remember her last name but I hope I made an impact on her little heart.  I hope that no matter what happened to her later, she always remembered that someone out there loves her.

Tonight, when I kissed my daughter goodnight, I squeezed her extra hard and extra long and thought of Tory.  In my heart I thanked Tory for the gift she gave me.  Without Tory, who knows if I would have ever been open to adopting from foster care.  Without Tory I may have never known it was possible for a child so hurt to turn around and love someone back.  Without Tory I don’t know if there would have been a Rose or a Gabriel living under my roof and soaking up my love.