Woah, you're actually interested in fostering?

I caught the attention of someone on the subway today when I got snippy about the HUGE CROWD OF PEOPLE right by the door when there were many many open seats. People should realize that sitting is sometimes a good-thing-to-do, just as standing for someone who needs a seat is a good-thing-to-do. So I barely was able to get on the train, then stepped on a guy's bag nearly falling into the crowd of people, and then said a little louder than I meant to "there are seats, why is everyone crowded by the door?"

It turned out that I actually know the person whose attention I caught. Well, let me rephrase.

She knows me. Her boyfriend lives in my building but more to the point, I've met her at shul. Apparently. Still haven't a clue but we had a great conversation about how she's having 17 people over for Shabbat dinner tonight and I'm having a 17 year old over for Shabbat dinner tonight. (If she comes home. Last week she didn't get home until after I left at 6:30; I thought she'd be home by now, but she's not.)

Well, after she expressed shock that I have a 17 year old (in casual conversation I call her "my 17 year old" as opposed to "my foster daughter"--if I can avoid the fawning over how wonderful I am, I'm a happier girl), and I explained that she's my foster daughter, and she did the requisite fawning, she said that she wants to be a foster parent!

Her mother died when she was 16, she didn't have a relationship with her father, and until the last minute no one in her family was willing to step up, so she almost ended up in foster care. It turns out that the relative who did finally step up stole her social security* so she thinks she would have been better off if she had been in the system. And now she wants to be a foster parent, too. If I ever figure out her name, I'll have to keep an eye open for a two bedroom apartment for her.


* As I type this, I wonder if the relative used that money to pay for the added expenses of raising a teenager. But probably not, given how the story went.