An Adopted Adult: Life Turns on a Dime: Leaving Home Again

I’m back in the state of misery, ah I mean Missouri. The lack of content here has been due to my family’s trip to lovely (no sarcasm) northern Virginia and lovely (some sarcasm included) Washington DC over the last ten days. The primary purpose of the trip was so that my wife and kids could meet my brothers and sisters and their children (and of course so I could see them again), but we did a fair amount of seeing the sights as well. I hadn’t actually been into DC since sometime during the 1980s, so that I was a fun thing to do with the family. The 1000+ mile drive was somewhat painful, especially with the two little ones in tow on the way out. We left them there for a couple of additional days with the grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins so they didn’t have to ride back in the car. They are flying back later in the week.

The trip/visit went very well. It wasn’t long enough, but for me no matter how long it is it will never be long enough. My little ones got along well with their cousins, and the ratio of boys to girls was nicely evened out by their presence. Previously the breakdown had been four girls and one boy, leaving my one nephew feeling very outnumbered (and often stuck playing Barbie). My oldest son has seized power as the oldest of the group, at fifteen he is about four and a half years older than the next oldest and seems to play the roles of spiritual leader and odd man out in equal measure. My little guys, at 6, are solidly in the middle as the others run the ages of 4, 5, 7, 8, and 10.

My wife, unsurprisingly to me at least, fit in very well. She fits in with me, so I wasn’t expecting a problem. She especially appreciated my youngest brother and his dry wit. He is funnier than I am, but the sense of humor is the same, so I wasn’t surprised with that. I don’t think I’ll have a problem persuading her to go back.

I of course had a great time. That was not unexpected, nor was it unexpected that the time would fly by and I would feel like I was leaving almost as soon as I arrived. The feeling of being home had not changed since my last visit. The feeling of leaving home when we left hadn’t changed either. I’ve spent a lot of my adult life moving from place to place and job to job trying to find somewhere to belong. I didn’t know that was what I was doing for all that time; I just knew that nothing ever seemed quite right. Some places and some jobs were better than others, but nothing made me feel even remotely like I feel when I am at home with all of them. I suppose that is how one is supposed to feel around family, but other than with my wife and children nothing has ever even come close to this before. Even with my wife and children something has always felt like it was incomplete. Now I know what that something was.

There were a lot of good moments over the visit, way too many to list out or try and describe. I got to know my siblings a bit better. I hope they can say the same about me. My favorite little piece was the hour I spent in Starbucks with my oldest sister. That may seem strange to pick out as a favorite thing during a week plus long vacation, but I really felt like we got some time to learn things about each other and bond a little bit. It was just the two of us, none of our children, no other distractions. In a house with so many people, and especially so many children, it is very easy to have conversations interrupted or run off course never to get back on. That wasn’t a concern on this little outing and at least for me that made it really special. I feel like I learned some important things about her. First, despite all the struggles she has faced in the last eighteen months she really is incredibly kind, empathetic, and an eternal optimist. She is able to see the best in people and find potential positive motivations for words or actions that may not seem positive to the average observer. This ability doesn’t come off as being naïve at all, just a manifestation of her optimism. It also seems vaguely familiar as I was, many years ago, able to do the same thing before I was ruined by two decades of direct involvement in the criminal justice system. I call myself a “realist”, but there is something kind of sad about realism that I sometimes wish I could move away from. She is also still hurting quite a bit. Not as much as a year ago perhaps (I wasn’t there so I have no frame of reference), but still quite a lot. The prehistoric lizard brain that we all have just wants to hurt whoever is responsible for hurting her, but of course there is no one to hurt. There is no one to be angry at or to blame. My more logical brain understands that of course and just wants to comfort her in any way that I can.

I’ve never been anyone’s big brother before, but as I understand it one of my roles is being there to provide comfort, understanding, advice, etc. to my younger siblings if they need or want it. Until I came wondering into her life a little bewildered my sister was the oldest and therefore didn’t have an older sibling to fill the role for her that she was filling (in theory at least, I’ve not been around long enough to know the actual dynamics) for her younger siblings. When the oldest is the one that needs the “services” that he or she usually provides the dynamic doesn’t always run as smoothly in reverse. That seems to be especially true when the crisis, whatever it may be, affects everyone in the family to one extent or another and especially when children are affected. I don’t know whether she knows it or not, but I feel like she really needs someone to be concerned about her and how she is doing. Not someone who is concerned about how her children are doing (although I obviously am), or concerned about if and/or when she is going back to work, or concerned about her relationships with other people, or concerned about her finances, or concerned about any number of other issues related to her life. I think a lot of people mean very well and show concern about things that make her feel like most people have forgotten her and how her life has not gone back to normal.

I hope that despite the distance between us at present I can make my physical presence in her life a semi-regular event. I hope that each time I manage a visit we can squeeze out an hour or so to spend “alone together” and get to know each other, provide the support we both need, and I can make sure she knows there is someone she can count on to be concerned primarily with her and how she is doing and he doesn’t want anything in return other than in time to see her smiling more and more often.

I realize the last couple of paragraphs make it sound like I’m some sort of altruistic saint thinking only of others. I'm not, I should point out that she is doing a lot for me as well, perhaps more than I could ever do for her. She has made me feel very welcome in the family and the conversations we have had about my issues with adoption and where and how I fit in general have really helped me. It is definitely a two way street. I suppose that is how family relationships are supposed to work, but again, I lack a frame of reference. I can only offer her my thanks.

So, nine days and I spent quite a bit of time talking about an hour at a Starbucks, plus (though I didn’t mention it) an additional half an hour we spent in the driveway later in the evening talking. Why so much time spent on such a short period of time? I feel like it was the most important hour and a half of the visit. I will end the writing here, but I’ll add some pictures from some of the other trip highlights. No doubt I will be back again soon, though not soon enough for my tastes.