First Day of School

In the process of writing and publishing, then traveling for the weekend for a wedding, and everything generally moving at the speed of light, it hadn’t occurred to me that my co-workers, many of whom are also friends on social media, would see and be reading my posts.

            I feel that it’s important to reiterate that I’m an extrovert by nature, and not afraid of people or public situations. Given my union activism, it would prove difficult to speak to officials and lobby for education if I were. I will often read a situation before responding, but when I do, I tend to speak my mind—about educational issues.

As for my personal life, and the events that occur outside of school, I don’t share much with people I only consider colleagues. In terms of my personal life, I prefer to be well into the shadows, out of the line of sight. Given the past few years, and all the awkwardness with my mom and dad’s divorce, then the insanity with my mother’s love life, a painful breakup with an ex last year for me, I don’t feel the need to share with everyone what’s going on with me for good reason.

Additionally, there have been times when at the lunch table where conversations have drifted toward questions about LGBTQ+ issues, and, as the resident member of that community, I’m the default spokesperson. While there have been moments of genuine interest or concern for me, I’ve also seen people literally shut off, turn away, or disengage when I speak about what it’s like to be gay. Or when I talk about going on a date. Or, if I speak about anything that involves something which makes them uncomfortable, which, as it turns out, is a large swath of my personal life.

That judgement is why I don’t love talking about my personal life or areas that overlap with my personal life with people with whom I am not close.

            Therefore, walking into school Monday was difficult. Again, I struggled with the idea that people were staring at me. But, the students didn’t know what was going on. And I walked into my room without anyone around. I was being paranoid.

            Except this time I wasn’t.

            I started my morning routine and walked into the teacher’s planning area. It felt as if everyone who was there stopped what they were doing and started staring at me. Some weren’t. But some were.

            And then began the conversations...

“Oh, I read your blog…”

“That’s so crazy!”

“What’s going on? What blog?”

So, first thing on Monday morning, I had to recount everything I knew about my current situation with work colleagues I largely don’t see outside of the building once I leave for the day.

It would be rude of me not to acknowledge that everyone who spoke to me mostly did so in a way that shared concern for my situation, and not entirely out of probing for lurid details about my life. Mostly.

Like much of this experience, knowing that people cared was comforting, even if I did have to articulate my pain a few hundred times. Ok. It wasn’t a hundred—it just felt like it.

At least I wasn’t entirely crazy for thinking people were looking at me anymore.

Getting into my typical daily routine was also helpful, and teaching was a welcoming distraction. Students would learn, and I would teach them, and that part of my life would progress as normal.

And then lunch came.

I was dreading it. Stuck in close-quarters, with no escape from people who would want to talk about it. Except, no one did, as the people I eat lunch with who I’m also connected to on social media were absent that day.  No one knew…yet. Small mercies.

I made it through the day. It was going to be ok.

Day two had fewer comments from co-workers, and I began to feel that I would be able to revert to some sense of normalcy.

Until I got to lunch.

            I walked in and saw a mostly full table, which meant everyone who typically came to eat lunch was present. I heated up my food in the microwave, and sat down. I was taking my first bite when my coworkers finished speaking about something. And then it began.

            “Jonathan… Wow. Just wow. How crazy to be going through all of this!”

            Now, more than ever, it felt as if a spotlight had zeroed in on me.  There was nowhere to hide, no corner to slink into.

            “Uh… Yeah. It’s all pretty crazy.”

            There’s no way I didn’t look like a deer in headlights; I certainly felt like one.

            So, naturally, those who I’m not connected to via social media started asking the obvious question… What’s up?

            Such a little question. Yet, obviously so loaded.

            I couldn’t ignore it, so I did what I’ve been doing in all of this—I met it head on and began to explain.

            Everyone was naturally dumbfounded and offered their support and concern, but I’ve never felt more naked or exposed in my life. To not only have colleagues know something so intimate about you, but to be placed in a precarious position by being prompted to tell them—it was beyond difficult.

I was still wrapping my head around the insanity of my situation, so to try to casually discuss my life with people I solely see within the confines of the school building, and then act calm, cavalier even, about my adoption was almost more than I could handle. I wanted to scream at them, to lash out, but that’s not fair.

Then again, what part of this process has been fair?

I would like to again point out that I know that my co-workers are, overall, kind and are sympathetic to my situation. These people, especially, were shocked and genuinely amazed at what I’d discovered.  I do not blame anyone for their desire to know about my situation, given that I’m also publishing it online. I’m continually reminded about how many people are showing caring, at least in their way. However, this lunch still taught/reminded me of two things.

First, I am not someone who enjoys pity. I enjoy comfort, or support, or sympathy, or empathy to something I’m going through. I do not enjoy having someone look at me and, with a slight smarminess, ask me “How’s it going?” knowing full-well that nothing for me is going well, and implying that everything for the person asking is fantastic. It’s rude and unkind. Every one of us has struggles; some people’s struggles just are bigger than yours some days. It doesn’t mean that you are above anyone else because tomorrow might be the day your karma is checked.

Second, I have also learned to be careful about when I ask anyone about something personal, lest I inadvertently overwhelm or hurt them with my attempt to show concern. Compassion, as well as tact, I continue to find, are things in short supply these days, and are often overlooked because of good intentions to offer sympathy, whether real or feigned.

After I divulged my story, I inhaled my lunch (gotta love the 25 minute lunch breaks of a teacher, especially when in this case I was left with about ten…), and returned to class, my fears revived that everyone was staring at the new adoptee, because after that spotlight session, they were.

A few deep breaths, and I reminded myself….

I’m fine.  It’s fine. Everything’s fine.

Maybe one day soon, I won’t just have to pretend that this mantra was true.

Road blocks and dead ends...

Saturday, I traveled to Washington DC for the wedding of my best friend C’s sister. The bride and groom have become close friends of mine over the years. I was so excited for their wedding, and especially glad for a reasonable excuse to not worry about anything about myself or adoption-related. We became friends while I was in college, so neither the bride nor groom had any knowledge of my adoption. Therefore, I felt calmer knowing I’d be around their friends and family, none of whom had any connection to my past, other than C and her husband.

It was incredibly liberating to walk into the service because I had begun to have the uncanny feeling that people were staring at me everywhere I went. Have you ever felt the sensation that people are looking at you, even though you know, rationally, that they are not?  I legitimately feel as if people are often pointing and saying “Look kids. It’s the adult-adoptee! Can you believe he had no idea? How ridiculous!”

I fully realize this is not actually happening. In fact, I can even say that I am confident that I do not believe that everywhere I visit that people are even looking at me. But, with so many people who were apparently in on the secret about my adoption, it’s confounding and, frankly, has induced paranoia in me. I feel as if, in retrospect, many have gawked at me in silent horror or abject amusement, and now strangers were joining in too.

So naturally, in writing the blog, I increased my level of distrust, believing wholeheartedly that people were in fact pointing and laughing even more than the concerns I had already developed.

But, in attending a wedding that was in no way connected to anyone who should know about my situation, I felt intense relief.

That is, until mutual friends of the bride and groom, who are also friends of mine, came up to me to express their support. I’d forgotten that I’m connected to quite a few of the bride and groom’s friends through social media. One kindly expressed how heart-felt my first post was. Another simply stated “So, I hear there’s a blog…”

Then, at the beginning of the reception, two of my cousins called from the UK.

So much for an afternoon of anonymity, forgetting what was happening.

Don’t get me wrong—the call from my cousins was great. It was good to hear their voices, to know they cared, to share their support, and to tell me I’ll always be their cousin. That’s huge.

As for the mutual friends who saw me spoke to me, I want to express how much it meant to me that people who aren’t in my direct circle (or even indirect circle for that matter) had read and were expressing their own kindness and support.

And then the wheels in my head began turning… I’ve personally told C and her husband… and at least two have read the blog and told me so… So that’s a confirmed four who definitely know what’s going on with me… Do others… know? Is that why they’re looking at me in that way?

Then the slight (read: intense, core-encompassing) fear began. Should I have waited to publish the blog until after the wedding?

Surely, I’m not doing anything to upstage the bride or groom… right?

I mean, I will still be adopted tomorrow. I could’ve waited.

I’ve clearly made a terrible choice because I’m an emotional wreck. Will my friends understand? Was I a terrible person? Had I ruined the wedding?

So, in writing this, I fully acknowledge the heavy amount of crazy that I am radiating in this post. I can practically smell the weirdness, and I’m the one writing it. Remember, rationality meets irrationality.

As someone who is generally in charge of his faculties and reactions to most things, having intense emotional outbursts is not only out of my comfort zone, it’s out of my realm of understanding. I make plans, move forward, act and react. I am not often the one having to react to decisions out of my control.

But, I think we are all aware at this point that there is nothing typical about this situation. It, sadly, even makes sense that I have constant feeling of people looking at me, while feeling depressed that my presence is the downfall of whatever event in which I’m participating.

I can’t say that I’d fully realized that I was just starting my decent into my own personal emotional chasm, but let’s say that my toe was definitely in the water.

Eventually, I got over my moroseness and had a wonderful time. I stayed in DC that evening with a kind and gracious friend. We planned on getting brunch in the morning, after we walked to American University to look through yearbooks. He lived a few blocks from the school, and suggested we check it out. Maybe we could find pictures of my biological parents?

So, after a quick stop to get coffee, we made our way to the American library. I didn’t realize how excited I was—I might see what my parents looked like!

We walked inside, found the yearbooks in a range of years and started skimming through. I tried to tell myself that this was a long-shot, as they were likely grad students at the time I was born, but the adrenaline took ahold.

They weren’t in the first one… Maybe the next… Or, the third…

After thumbing through eight or nine yearbooks, I started to accept that they either were not students at American University, or were grad students, who are not photographed for the yearbook.

I released a breath, both literal and metaphoric, I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.

I was no closer to finding out anything about my parents. I was exactly where I was two days earlier… when I thought it would be so easy to find information. Now I was treading the waters of despair in realizing how difficult finding these people was proving. No birth certificate, no school records… just nothing.

I cannot say that I was devastated, but I was more than a little dismayed by this turn of events. It was another defeat of my plan to find out where I came from. And another tiny tendril of sorrow took hold. If I had a job that I could leave at the office when I clocked-out, or didn’t work with my union many evenings of the week, then maybe I’d have the time devoted to tracking down these people.

But I didn’t, and still don’t.

How was I going to find these people? I knew the university was an unlikely possibility, but it was the last thing I had. Without a confirmation of my mother’s marital status and last name, or an address for where my father lived, I have very little information to search, and it felt like even less now.

What was I going to do now?

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

The next week at school was fairly uneventful, and as Friday approached, I became increasingly excited to begin unraveling the mystery surrounding where I came from. Once I got my original birth certificate, I would have more specifics about who my biological parents were, and would hopefully have more information about them. Perhaps it may include their address at the time I was born, or maybe their birth location—both things which could prove useful in finding them.

            As the low-key excitement built all week, I did receive the letter from my father. It arrived Wednesday, but I didn’t feel the need to read it right away. I wasn’t ready.

            Even having expressed how I felt, albeit briefly, that his previous letter was really about him, having my father acknowledge that something was amiss, I was concerned what he might say. My immediate go-to, as a cautiously optimistic person, is to believe the best in people. This means my default with any issue with my parents is to attempt to blindly trust them when there is a problem.

Almost every time, that reaction has not served me well, and I’ve been incredibly hurt, expecting a different outcome from what occurred. Mostly, what I’ve wanted is to have a parent approach me when we have had a problem and address it in a way which models appropriate behavior, such as apologizing, because he/she was the parent, and I was the child.  

Instead, I have had to almost unilaterally approach my parents to apologize for any wrongdoings, even if I was the not the one who initiated or exacerbated the problem.

Every. Single. Time.

It’s just one of the many ways in which I’ve played a part in my relationship with my parents which was tantamount to a role-reversal. I needed to move past the issue at hand, so I’d be the one to apologize so we could all move forward. I was willing to acquiesce and concede, as a parent traditionally might, to keep the peace.

It amazes me that this pattern of behavior, which began long before I was able to drive, I considered normal. I’ve been repeatedly hurt by this by both of my parents for so long because I was always willing to believe the best in their intentions. But after all of this information about my adoption, I was wary to allow myself to feel any type of acceptance or relief from anything my father said in his letter.

What he wrote might be wonderful, or it might ignore the issue. But, knowing him, there would be, at best, an infliction of pain, even if unintentional, no matter what he said.

So, I waited. I didn’t need to read it right away. It’s what many friends counseled me to do as well. Just wait a few days. It would be fine.

After sleeping in on a Friday holiday, I was ready to begin my journey in literal self-discovery in a few different ways. First of all, I decided that today would be the day that I began to publish my blog. I had started writing and editing the first few posts over the past week, and was ready to begin telling the world what I had found out.

I wasn’t entirely sure what response I would receive, or even if anyone would read it. But either way, I knew that I needed to share my experience. If it helped anyone deal with their own experience, it was worth it. But, it would be even more worth writing if it helped me find my biological parents.

So, hours after the first post published (timed posts are a wonderful feature to this site), I got up, made coffee and breakfast, and then sat down with my roommate, R, and his girlfriend, D. I decided I needed to meet things head on, which meant reading the letter from my father before getting my birth certificate. However, I didn’t have to do it alone.

This time, there were only two pages, but those two pages were still predominantly about him, though, he did repeat the phrase “It’s all about you!” numerous times. That’s growth, right? Except most of this letter still wasn’t really about me. Was it that difficult to ask for an apology?

I thought about this as I got ready, hopped into my car, and drove to the local Department of Health and Human Services. I found my way inside, and filled out what I assumed was the appropriate form to get a physical copy of a birth certificate. I waited patiently for the front office person to finish a call before I pleasantly smiled at her and explained what I was there for—an original birth certificate with my biological parent’s names.

“Oh, I’m sorry. We don’t have that. Actually, the original probably doesn’t exist anymore.”

My stomach dropped. “What do you mean?”

“Well, once someone is adopted, the adoptive parents become the child’s parents. Their names go on the birth certificate, and the original is destroyed.”

I couldn’t believe this. “Destroyed?!? With no original record of it?”

“More than likely. Though, you could try calling the main office in Baltimore—they might have it there, but they probably don’t.”

“Oh… Ok. Thank you.”

Remember how I was hopeful and thought my minor super-sleuthing would help me find my biological parents so quickly? I suddenly realized how naive I was.

Given the peculiarity of the situation, why did I think that anything about this was going to be easy?

By early afternoon it became apparent that people had read the first post. A lot of people. Many of them began to comment on both the post and on my Facebook, or send me a Facebook message, or text me, if they had my number. That made things more real somehow; it also made everything incredibly more daunting.

I started to read posts and comments, which ranged from the previously mentioned “We didn’t want to say anything” and “It wasn’t our place…” but now included few new additions—specifically many people who said “Oh… I thought you knew.”

            I knew that sharing my story would be a risk for many reasons. So many people know my family, and would know details that I still hadn’t been told in entirety. I also knew it was a huge exposure of my soul to people I both know and don’t know. However, what I was not prepared for was the vast number of responses from people to whom I haven’t spoken more than a greeting in years. I was not ready for their opinions, for their views of the situation, for their misunderstanding of what was driving me to write. I was especially not able to comprehend the lack of compassion so many people had for this situation, which is my situation, and not theirs.

           

            Having so many more people reach out and let me know just how many of them knew about my adoption was painful. How could so many people, those who were at one point active participants in my life as well as essential strangers, know something about me that I didn’t know? And, more importantly, why would they feel the need to weigh in on my adoption, as well as my reaction to it? Most everyone who knew have known for years (many of them for 33 years, in fact) where as I hadn’t even had 33 days to process this. What did they expect?

Additionally, while it was nice to have people reach out, having to write out a response, or verbalize one, was exhausting. I felt annoying saying to people “Just keep reading. More information will be in the upcoming posts” but I couldn’t rehash details with people I’d barely spoken to in days, if not years. Furthermore, knowing that I planned to keep writing, I didn’t want to have to keep explaining the same thing to people, over and over.

It was, and still is, exhausting, physically and emotionally.

            Yet, even though I felt drained, I had to remind myself that anyone who had a reaction ultimately cared about me in a way that was greater than I had anticipated.  The outpouring of support, love, and kindness was apparent in the vast majority of these posts, and, as a result, I felt that I had done the right thing and needed to continue writing, even if it took much of my energy.

While parts of the day felt like I’d taken a few steps backward, I had taken one giant step forward in publishing my story. Eventually I’d find things out, even with a minor set-back like not being able to access my original birth certificate.

I mean, I didn’t see how there would be any other additional problems. Surely, I’d met my quota of them for the year.

Why do I tempt fate so easily?