This was a weird day.
This picture was taken in June of 1993. The women in it had just met for the first time. Twenty four years earlier, one of them gave birth to me. Twenty days after that, the other adopted me.
As time has gone by, I've looked for examples of birth parents reuniting with their children with positive results and, aside from my own example, have found none. Zero. I've collected a dozen or so examples of people tracking each other down with disastrous results. There appears to be no limit to the number of ways that can go wrong. Which means, and this is really just further evidence of it, I'm as lucky as they come.
If early 1970's America knew how honestly and transparently my parents were raising two adopted kids (my brother is also adopted), they might have been recruited for a lecture series. I don't want to knock anyone who tried to conceal an adoption from a child, but I don't really understand the utility of it. An adopted child, properly informed, has this whole head start toward understanding what families really are. I mean, which is easier to explain to a four year old: what an adoption agency is, or human reproduction?
If early 1970's America knew how honestly and transparently my parents were raising two adopted kids (my brother is also adopted), they might have been recruited for a lecture series. I don't want to knock anyone who tried to conceal an adoption from a child, but I don't really understand the utility of it. An adopted child, properly informed, has this whole head start toward understanding what families really are. I mean, which is easier to explain to a four year old: what an adoption agency is, or human reproduction?
Other perks:
The story of me being put up for adoption isn't mine to tell, but there's one part of it that I'm going to share without asking. Because it's awesome.
My sister (guys, I got a bright, funny sister out of this too) actually grew up with a suspicion that her mother had put a child up for adoption. She based this idea on nothing other than seeing an old photograph of her mother holding hands with a small girl which, obviously, wasn't me.
At least I hope it wasn't me, otherwise I won't be allowed to pee in North Carolina.
So, imagine having this information, waiting for an appropriate time to share it with your daughter, but being relentlessly accused by her of hiding that very information and accosted with a narrative which was completely imaginary. And then imagine the day when all the cards were flipped over. I'm envisioning, based on my front row observations of mothers and teenaged daughters, a tidal wave of "I knew it"'s and "No you didn't"'s and the various whirlpools of statements that are "technically true" and "technically wrong". I'd love to have a transcript of that. I was too young for Watergate.
Seriously, though, the enormity of what it takes to carry a child to term and place it for adoption was sort of lost on me... IS sort of lost on me. I can understand it, but not feel it. And I've had the privilege of seeing the public's opinion of adoption become less judgemental over the past four decades. I get a little cloudy when I really consider the emotional and societal things she had to overcome, driven by an a prioi devotion and with the hope of getting me into the hands of someone who would be as good and right for me as my mom.
My mom, on whom I've vomited and wiped my nose, to whom I've lied and broken promises, with whom I've presented the aftermath of a few dozen catastrophes indicative of an adult not having his shit together, and by whom I will always be humbled and honored -- due to the fact that she insists to anyone who discusses the topic of adoption that she considers herself to be, get this... the lucky one.
If I began thanking these women today, I'd never overcome my deficit. The sun won't burn nearly long enough.
- You get to be an elementary school student with a mysterious past. Woo-OOO-ooo...
- If your grade isn't too hot in the public speaking course required by your stupid school where your studying your dumb major, you can work a big, shameless "and that adopted child was me" crescendo to the end of your mid-term presentation and score a couple of, as far as they know, "bravery points". Ditto: middle school art projects. Ditto: high school English papers.
- You can quietly imagine that you are a genetic relative of a bunch of people who really just don't understand math for the first eleven years of their lives but then... boom. It all becomes clear on their twelfth birthday. And you can just keep adjusting those numbers to serve your needs.
The story of me being put up for adoption isn't mine to tell, but there's one part of it that I'm going to share without asking. Because it's awesome.
My sister (guys, I got a bright, funny sister out of this too) actually grew up with a suspicion that her mother had put a child up for adoption. She based this idea on nothing other than seeing an old photograph of her mother holding hands with a small girl which, obviously, wasn't me.
At least I hope it wasn't me, otherwise I won't be allowed to pee in North Carolina.
So, imagine having this information, waiting for an appropriate time to share it with your daughter, but being relentlessly accused by her of hiding that very information and accosted with a narrative which was completely imaginary. And then imagine the day when all the cards were flipped over. I'm envisioning, based on my front row observations of mothers and teenaged daughters, a tidal wave of "I knew it"'s and "No you didn't"'s and the various whirlpools of statements that are "technically true" and "technically wrong". I'd love to have a transcript of that. I was too young for Watergate.
Seriously, though, the enormity of what it takes to carry a child to term and place it for adoption was sort of lost on me... IS sort of lost on me. I can understand it, but not feel it. And I've had the privilege of seeing the public's opinion of adoption become less judgemental over the past four decades. I get a little cloudy when I really consider the emotional and societal things she had to overcome, driven by an a prioi devotion and with the hope of getting me into the hands of someone who would be as good and right for me as my mom.
My mom, on whom I've vomited and wiped my nose, to whom I've lied and broken promises, with whom I've presented the aftermath of a few dozen catastrophes indicative of an adult not having his shit together, and by whom I will always be humbled and honored -- due to the fact that she insists to anyone who discusses the topic of adoption that she considers herself to be, get this... the lucky one.
If I began thanking these women today, I'd never overcome my deficit. The sun won't burn nearly long enough.
Happy Mother's Day.
No comments:
Post a Comment