Parenting on Purpose

I examined the little card. It had two red flowers cut out of paper, with Fathers' Day greetings written in both English and Chinese. A simple card, ordinary in many ways, and probably one of the many made by children around the world for their fathers on this special day. But this card was different. It was found in the school bag of a child who probably doesn't fully understand the meaning of the words "father"; a child who has had his whole world shaken up when his birth parents couldn't take care of him and when he ended up first as a ward of the state, and then as a newcomer in a completely different household.  The card belongs to K, the scared little boy who first entered our home some seven months ago. And I am his foster father. What does the word "father" mean to you? This is a difficult question that many foster fathers struggle to answer. I remember that day in November last year very clearly. We had been ready for another foster placement fo