Because we always think we have more time….

Because we always think we have more time….

May 6, 2019

My dear childhood friend Nancy was admitted into hospice today. 

Regrettably this isn’t news that surprised me. I knew cancer had attacked her lungs and brain and had become increasingly aggressive this year. We spoke as recently as last month about the extent of her cancer, her increasing weakness, her anxiety and fear.  She waffled from optimistic and nervous during that two hour conversation. My stoic Nancy cried when she told me she had given her beloved pup to a neighbor because she could no longer care for her Pookie. That red flag alone told me more than any words my beloved friend could ever have said. Then I cried.

Stubbornly I continued to hold on to the hope treatment would fix her. The doctors said she might still have three years she explained. But she also complained of not being able to read any longer or enjoy the simple things we all take for granted. Still I chose to believe a miracle would happen.

It was a lifetime ago in Biloxi Mississippi in 1957, we were feisty eight year old girls, all elbows and knobby knees, walking home from school. Each of us lugging a clarinet case along with our book satchels. One of us, not sure which one now, made a snarky comment about the other’s clarinet case. I secretly envied her case. It was red and white, mine a drab brown leather. We started calling insults to each other and before she turned off towards her home we were close to blows.

I remember I was infuriated by that tall skinny girl with the red bouncy curls, her cute dress and her smart aleck ways. Didn’t like her at all, but I was covertly in awe of her gumption. Years later she told me she had been a bit intimidated by me, the short, serious girl with the dark wavy ponytail, her blue glasses perched atop her nose.

Not sure how but the next day walking home we began speaking civilly to each other and found a common bond, maybe a dislike for some other unfortunate classmate? Who knows?  All I do know is that that day began a friendship that has stood the test of time in more ways than either one of those small girls could ever have imagined.

We became inseparable all through the school years. Countless sleep overs, hundreds of hours of phone calls, Sunday school, parties, trips and holidays filled our years. We grew up together from giggling over coloring books to ogling Seventeen magazine, from school text  books to secreted copies of Lady Chatterly’s Lover that we read aloud to each other sprawled across Nancy’s bed.  Oh how we marveled at the risqué graphic scenes.  We grew up together from the Toni perms our mothers forced upon us to ironing the waves from our long hair, growing insanely long mod bangs that all but cover our mascara caked eyes.

Once at a Christmas Service we sang a duet, Oh Holy Night, in our church choir, oh what I would give for a video of that.  We were in school plays together and shared a love of drama, show tunes and musicals. Together we grew up from girl scout camp out songs like Kumbaya  to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.

We discovered boys together, practiced hairstyles and makeup together, double dated the whole time we were in high school. Experienced alcohol for the first time together. Smoked our first forbidden cigarette together.  Together with our third musketeer Julie, we experienced the excitement and the angst of those teenage years. We played Ouija board late at night and decided we had been sisters in our past lives or maybe we had been witches in Salem. Always the drama queens, that was us.

We even survived teenage pregnancies together. Nancy was one of very few people who knew about me giving my baby boy up for adoption. Later that same year Nancy married and gave birth to her own son. She stood with me as my maid of honor at my own ill fated first marriage to the wrong man.  She and I both knew even then he was not the one for me. We both endured bad marriages and later divorces. Though I moved 2000 miles away, we flew back and forth to visit each other countless times over 50 years. Thousands of miles never keep us apart.

Years later when Nancy met the man who would be the love of my life, my Gene, she immediately loved him and said to me. This is the one for you. As always, she knew just what I needed.

Completely different lives and careers did not make a hill of beans. There was never a time we did not connect the minute we talked over the phone or when visiting. We discussed our husbands, or sons and our careers, always advising and instilling confidence. How many times she consoled me, how many times we saved each other I cannot count. Now my chest literally aches because I know there will be no more calls.

What a path our lives took us down. I could write a book about those intersected paths. In my memoir Nancy is an important character and in the process of writing I have realized even more so what a beacon of light she has been throughout my life.

Shane, Nancy’s incredibly kind son informed me that my dear Nancy stopped talking two weeks ago. She and I had tried to have a conversation over the phone, Shane holding her phone on speaker as she slurred words in a weak voice that wasn’t hers. Me, on the other end of the line, trying to be optimistic and upbeat and failing miserably.  After our conversation, Shane tells me she completely stopped talking. To anyone.

They say our loved ones completes us. And I know this is true. I would not be who I am today without my friend, who never once failed me. Who taught me what a true friend is. Our history is long and full of joys as well as traumatic sadness and countless experiences. My gratitude for Nancy in my life encompasses me. Never once did I question my love for her or hers for me. Never ever.

Letter to Stranger at the Book Launch

Letter to Stranger at the Book Launch

Apr 8, 2019

Dear Kind Sir,

After I finished my reading from Secret Son at the Shaking The Tree book launch,

you tapped me on my shoulder.  I turned quickly, expecting to see a friend or family member.

I didn’t recognize you, but your shy smile sent me smiling back. Your eyes were misty as they

searched mine.

You quietly thanked me for my reading. I was flattered and thanked you for your kind

words.

“You see, I was adopted in the sixties too, just like your son.” You explained. “My folks

said that the girl who gave me up had been a young unmarried girl and couldn’t keep me.

Maybe she didn’t want to keep me.”

When you shrugged and looked down, my heart felt your pain.

“Well, it’s hard to relate to now but in the sixties it was difficult for young unwed

teenage girls to keep their babies without a husband or family’s support. Being a single unwed

mother marked you as damaged goods.  There were no resources to counsel and guide those

girls as there are today.  No support at all. Your birth mother may not have had much of a

choice. Nowhere to turn.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Were you born here in San Diego?”

“No, in another state. I don’t have any other details about my real mother.” You

glanced at me and I saw such sadness in your eyes in those few minutes, as you continued,

“Nobody has ever looked for me.”

“Oh, you can’t be sure of that.” I reached out and touched your shoulder. “It was so

difficult to look for birth children and birth parents before the internet. You could hire a

undercover detective if you had the means, or put your name on long lists and hope your

adoptive child or birth parent put their name of those same list. It was a shot in the dark, at

best – especially if you were thousands of miles apart. Most states had sealed adoption records

and it was impossible to break into them. Actually, in many states records are still sealed.”

“Really? Why?”

“Well originally it was to protect the privacy of all parties involved. Hey, you

don’t know. Someone may be searching for you right now and just hasn’t found you yet.”

You shrugged your shoulders. “I just don’t know. Should I look for her? What if she

doesn’t want to find me or doesn’t want me to find her?”

Others started walking up to us and some attempted to speak to me. You looked

anxious until I motioned for my friends to wait and turned back to you.

As you were stepping away, head down, I caught your arm. “Have you ever done a DNA

test? I don’t know if my son and I would have found each other without the DNA tests.”

“No. You think I should? Isn’t it expensive?”

“Ancestry.com has the DNA kits on sale often. As low as $59. Sometimes. It’s so worth it,

my friend.”

Your face lit up revealing a brilliant smile.

“I think I’ll do just that. Do you think she might have done hers? She may want me to

find her?” Your face fell “Or would that disrupt her life?”

“You never know until you try. I do know one thing. It is the best thing I ever did.

I can’t promise you the outcome if you do find each other. It is worth a try though.  She has not

forgotten you. I do promise you that.”

“Thank you. You give me hope. By the way-I loved your story.”

“I’m glad. You made my night. Just start there with the test.” I handed you my card.

You nodded towards my friends as we clasped hands. Then you were gone.

***

That is probably the last time I will see you, but I think of you often.  Good luck my

friend, I hope you submit a DNA test and pray you find your birth mother and I hope she is as

ecstatic to be found as I was when my son found me. I hope someday you put your arms

around her and hold her, like she has dreamed of for 50 years.  I don’t know her story, but I do

know how a mother who has held you under her heart for 9 months has not forgotten you.

You are her and she is you.

With love and best wishes,

Laura

Laura L Engel

Author of Secret Son in the anthology  Shaking the Tree: brazen.short.memoir

www.lauralengel.com 

The Cord

The Cord

Mar 12, 2019

My son Richard (everyone calls him Ray) reminds me of my other three sons, Dustin, Marc and Ian in so many ways.  Same chin, similar bone structure, same quick humor, sometimes sarcastic, bright, and extremely competitive.  His three half-brothers have a different father of course, but I see mostly me and my side of the family in all of my four sons.

Perhaps because that is what I look for?

Another family trait is that we are all communicators in some fashion.  I am one of those fortunate Moms.  My grown sons, two in their 40s and two in their 50s still find time to connect with me.  For the most part, at least every week there will be a call and several texts from each of them.  I love that. I never want to be the ‘nosey Mom or Mother in Law’ pushing my way into their or their wives’ busy lives of career and raising children…their business. I cringe when I hear stories of mothers trying to control their adult children.  I am always here if they need me, but my sons are “men” after all, no longer little boys who demand their Mom’s constant attention, worry, or advice.  I raised my boys to become men, not Mama’s boys. 

I can see a difference sometimes in the way Ray communicates in comparison to the way my other three sons communicate.  Is this another Nurture vs Nature moment?  Or just his way?  He is not as quick on the text replies, or even  call backs. In the beginning of our new found relationship, it worried me to no end.  My squirrely insecure brain would jump into over drive.

Did I say something wrong? Does he still want this relationship? Did I offend him? Did he not get the voicemail? The text? Was it too good to be true?

I know, I know, I sound like fourteen year old girl with a crush. But I speak the truth, when I say the experience was very similar.  After all I had fallen in love with this secret, now found son. About the time that I would start worrying that I had not heard back from him,  and that big insecure place in my head was consuming me ..ding!  A text. Or a return call.  All was fine, he’d say, he had simply been busy. After all, he like all the sons, had a full time career, wife, children, obligations… well, a life.

Of course, my rational brain would make me smile at my silly worried self. Also, intellectually I would realize, our relationship was working itself into a normal healthy one, no longer the frantic honeymoon it had been when we first reunited.  I breathed a sigh of relief.

But, I cannot lie.  There is nothing much better than getting that return text or a heartfelt one filled with loving words from any of your children. They validate us as Mothers. Those texts are the adult equivalent of the handmade valentine your 6 year old crafts with squiggly printed letters, and extra glue and glitter smashed on top of those beautiful intense words.

‘ I LUVe YOU MOMmY …You are the Best…’

Does that ever get old? Never, from any of my sons.

Since I lost the chance to raise Ray, to see his first tooth push through pink baby gums, his first tottering step, his first day of Kindergarten or graduation from college, every visit, every call and text are amazing to receive. Every milestone I didn’t live through with him still weighs heavy in my heart and any communication we have slowly heals that.

Sure, Ray and I have missed all the hard stuff too, like discipline, frustration not seeing eye to eye with your child, or restriction because he didn’t obey rules and curfew as a willful teenager. ‘All those things that happen naturally so that you are ready to cut that cord when the time comes,’ the old saying say. But are we truly ever ready to cut that umbilical cord? I think not.

That cord is for life, no matter the circumstances, no matter the distance.  This I know is true. That invisible umbilical cord continues to serve it’s purpose, no matter the miles apart, or the years that pass. And my greatest joy is that now, I am connected to all four of my sons as it was meant to be.  Always.

What will people say?

What will people say?

Mar 5, 2019

One of the most humbling experiences I have ever had in my life took place in October of 2016.  That month the son, I had been forced to leave and relinquish for adoption, 49 years before, emailed me and reunited with me through the miracle of Ancestry.com DNA.

The exquisite joy of my son finding me left me giddy, fearful, and beyond walking on air for months after. I can honestly say, it was one of the most exciting and miraculous times in my life.

The dilemma was that I had given birth to this secret son, while a teenager in an Unwed Mother’s Maternity Home in New Orleans, Louisiana. I had been allowed to give him the crib name, Jamie, and only been permitted to hold him twice. I was told once I left him, I should forget that this unfortunate and sinful experience ever happened. We unwed teenagers were made to feel like criminals, damaged goods. In the sixties the stigma and shame of having a baby out of wedlock was cruel and unrelenting. 
Six months later I left my childhood home filled with shame and guilt, married to the first man who asked me and moved to California.  I was determined to leave my old life and begin a new life.
I held the truth of my son close to my heart and tried to forget the whole experience. I began creating a new me. I became the mother of three more tiny sons within seven years and my life revolved around raising them and proving to myself and the world that I was worthy of being a mother.  Life continued in its splendid chaos. Over the long years I divorced the wrong man I had married simply to escape the south, became a single mom, started a career, married the right man gaining 2 more children through marriage. Our children grew up, we became grandparents and my life was full and purposeful. I could not have asked for more.
Could I?
The truth is no matter who I became, I could never forget that baby boy who had grown inside of me for 9 months. He was part of me and I can only compare it to losing an arm, a leg, or a chunk of my heart. A day did not pass that I did not mourn the loss of Jamie. Yet I continued to hold that hard kernel truth within me. He was imprinted in my very being, invisible to all but me.

Hence the problem.  My son had been my complete secret for 49 years and now here he was healthy, happy, and successful. He was married with three children. He was kind and did not resent me or blame me for leaving him. He had been raised by loving and devoted parents, decades older than the teenage girl who had given birth to him. He was real. He was my son. I was smitten, in love, and filled with the joy that a new mother feels when she first holds her newborn and looks into his face.

On Oct 9, 2016, I was still living with the buried sadness and shame of having to have given up my baby, as if I was still 17 years old and the year was 1967.  The next day on Oct. 10, my son, who had been named Richard after his adoption, was no longer a secret. We were reunited and within hours I wanted to shout to the world, “My son has found me. I have another son.” It was a glorious miracle he had found me yet daunting as to how I would go about shouting out this fantastic news.  I quickly devised a plan with my husband. Thankfully I had confessed my secret to him 36 years before and he had honored my choice not to disclose it.

The plan was to tell our other children first and next tell family members and close friends one by one.
I wanted was to see my son and be with him quickly but first I had to announce his ‘birth’.  The most beloved and important people in our lives deserved to know this story about my past and his birth before anyone else.

Through many tears, some hard to explain confessions, and a lot of hope, I weaved my way through the telling of Jamie, who was now Richard. Here is where my humbling and renewed faith in mankind took place. 

My adored three sons, and beloved two step children all handled this news remarkably well after their initial shock and sadness that I had lived with such a painful secret. I was grateful and proud of my tender and loving adult sons. They would welcome their new sibling with open arms. I had never loved them more. Other family members received the news with shock, love and good wishes for the reunion of myself and my son. Our friends were unbelievably kind and full of love for me after they assimilated the shock of my story.  I had never dreamed possible the support and love they showered on me. As I said, I had wrapped myself in that quilt of shame from the sixties for decades.
Out of at least 30 of my dearest friends I told the story to only one person, and I can honestly say I wasn’t surprised because of who that person was, gasped when I told her my story and whispered in a concerned horrified voice, “Oh, no. What are people going to say?”
It was the sixties all over again.
In her defense, I like to think this was said with true worry for me and my feelings. I quickly steeled myself and blurted out, “I don’t give a damn what people are going to say.  My son has found me and nothing can take this magnificent joy away.”

A huge boulder was released. Relief flowed through me like golden honey. It was in that minute that the shame, the guilt and the horror I had lived with melted a little.  Forgiveness for myself begin to slowly warm me. Intellectually, I had known this was a different and less judgmental society in 2016. Intellectually, I had known I had no choice in the matter of giving up my son as an unprepared teenage mother with no support. Yet, hearts are mysterious and splendid muscles and heart memory had held me hostage. 

In finding me my son, Jamie/Richard began the process to set me free. Slowly but surely my heart began to mend as I tiptoed out into the world, shouting to whoever would listen.

I believe in miracles. My son is a secret no more and life is good. Life is great.

Today is a special day…An Anniversary (A letter to Ray)

Today is a special day…An Anniversary (A letter to Ray)

Feb 14, 2019

Was it only two short years ago that I received that email from you on the night of Oct 9, 2016? Or was it so very long ago that I received that email from you on the night of Oct 9, 2016?

In the cosmic scheme of time it seems like a blink of an eye, yet so much of life has happened in that short time, it is as if I have known you forever.

Time is funny like that.  I missed you for 49 years.  Some of those years were harder than others. Some I was so busy I could barely catch my breath. Some long and traumatic, some fast and furious. But always, I missed your face, your presence. I didn’t even know what your voice sounded like.  Or what exactly your face looked like.  What color was your hair? Your eyes? I ached to know.

I yearned to hug you, to hold you close, to wipe your nose, and wash your face.  To hear you call me Mommy.  To put a Band-Aid on your boo-boos, to sing you lullabies to watch you learn to ride a bike, fly a kite, kick a soccer ball, to teach you how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, to draw a cat.  To take your photo on your first day of school, to argue with you about your school work, to feel sad when you stopped believing in Santa. To reassure you as we signed you up for sports teams, clubs, and fun events. To cry sad tears when I realized you were growing up. To worry when you learned to drive a car.  To feel your pain when you had your first girlfriend break up with you. To go with you to order your first tux for Prom. To cry happy tears when you graduated from junior high school, high school, college. At your wedding.  It was so hard.  I missed all of that and more. They told me I would forget you, but I never did. I couldn’t even if I tried.

When you first emailed me and I was found, I was deliriously happy, amazingly fearful, and giddy with anticipation.  Here was the son I thought I might never see…well, actually  thought I would never see up close. It was too long of a stretch to really believe we could connect.  Too painful to think you would reject me, hate me. I was convinced you were in Alabama somewhere oblivious to me, your life journey never to connect with mine.  But always.. always.. there was that tiny flame that held on to the belief that we would meet.

Because of that flame I wrote in my journal and on my lists of things to do, ‘Find Jamie.’  Even as I wrote it, I wondered. Would I?

I gave it up to God. I was weary. God and the Universe might know something I didn’t know. I had to have faith.  I had to know that something would happen someday and I even thought and prayed just let me know he is all right.  That he has a good life and is healthy.  Please just let me know that. Give me a sign.

Then one evening when you were not on my mind. I was tired. Weary of the Presidential Debate on the television.  Eager to head to bed and read my book, I got that sign.  Ping…an alert on my phone. An email from you! YOU. And you were all grown up, 49 years old with a new name that I would have never known. And still living in Louisiana, for God’s sake, why had I fantasized for all those long years you lived in Alabama?

Here you were. My boy. My first son. What did I ever do to be this blessed? I almost fell to my knees. I thanked God profusely through out the night. Scared but I knew I would face the fire and I would answer you, regardless of the outcome.  I would welcome with open arms the son I had relinquished during the most difficult period of my life, if he would have me.

The son who I had mourned secretly and cried about alone to myself, for almost 50 years.  If I had not believed in God’s goodness (I like to think I already did, but ..)  This, THIS.. was proof positive.

The shame I had suffered, the loss of my baby, the anger and hurt I had hurled upon myself and my parents, all was snuffed out the first time I heard your voice.  I was proud of you, with a mother’s pride that I did not even deserve to feel for you.  I had done nothing to help you grow into the man you were. I was absent that whole time. But still I adored you from the first email and was full of pride for you from our first conversation.

Now two years have passed…some months went fast, some slow. We have been lucky enough to fly to see each other and I have come to you 4 times and you to see me and your new family twice.  Seeing my sons together for the first time was one of most powerful joys of my life. Whoever would have believed this?  It is incredibly beautiful.

I have gotten to know my amazing grand children along with you and your wife. Not once have I taken it for granted, how you all welcomed me with open arms.  Was this possible?  Am I not dreaming, I asked, because this is as akin to Heaven as I believe it must be.

We have learned so much about each other in these two years, but there is still a life time of things to learn about each other. Things have mellowed. You are busy with family, work, and I am now an extra branch to hang on your busy ever-growing tree of life. I accept that and am grateful for what we do have. I sometimes feel needy and admonish myself. I can’t ask for more.  I am the luckiest Mom in the world and I count my blessings.

I used to think your life would not be good because I wasn’t there for you. Such a conceited thought I guess, but I am being honest.  I thought that because you were missing in my life and no matter how good my life was it could only have been better if you were in it. 

Today when I awoke I realized that even if I died today, I would be happy and fulfilled in the knowledge that you are good. You have a fine life and fantastic children and wife. You did it all and did it well even though I was not there to hold your hand. 

But I am there now.

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