By Tom Walker

The overstuffed shoebox lay long forgotten in the back of a closet in my mother's apartment, I ran across it while looking for something else. When I opened the shoebox, out poured more than I ever could have imagined.

Inside were letters recording four years of correspondence (1958–62) between my parents and the North Carolina Children's Home Society, an adoption agency. The letters ended in February 1962—the month of my birth and my adoption. Four years of expectation and hassle, of yearning and hard work, of dutiful preparation and burgeoning excitement—all documented in that little shoebox.

Four years before I was even born, my parents were hard at work preparing a place for me. Even before I received my name, before I was baptized in our small Presbyterian church, before I could respond with the words "I love you," my parents cared for me. In that shoebox was a history of love and grace that preceded any action on my part.