The United Nations of Goodsons

Rozelle

            My grandmother was born in 1920. The day after Rozelle was born, her mother died. Her father was a traveling salesman, and an alcoholic. He took her with him as he traveled from town to town. This is how she grew up, traveling on trains and staying wherever her father found a place for them to spend the night. No childhood home. When she was a little older her father got married to a woman who had two sons herself. This was the first experience Rozelle had with a family. Her mother was Catholic, and her stepmother was Episcopalian. While growing up her stepmother made sure Rozelle went to Catholic school and crossed herself at dinner – the only one required to do so. Although this was her step mother’s way of making sure Rozelle held on to her heritage, Rozelle began to resent this. Later she would joke about being raised a Catholic by an Episcopalian who later became a Southern Baptist.

            Eventually her stepmother left her father and they divorced. Again, Rozelle found herself without a family. Her father would step out of her life. She would hear nothing about him until over twenty years later, when he passed away. At thirteen Rozelle made a way for herself, going from family to family as a nanny or housekeeper. It was a high school teacher who told her she was good writer. He encouraged her to extend her education. She worked and she saved, and finally had enough to go to college. At twenty-three Rozelle met Carl. They fell in love, got married and began their family.

The United Nations

“Every time our family gets together, it looks like a meeting of the United Nations,” joked my Aunt Char at the last family gathering, “all we’re missing is an Asian.”  Looking around the room one might not realize the three Hispanics, one Native American, one Irish/Scotch/Native American, one bi-racial African-American, and cousin Lauren (we don’t know what she is) scattered among the other eight grandchildren come from my Irish-British grandparents.

Rozelle and Carl Goodson had five children. Those five children went on to have a collective fifteen children. Of those fifteen grandchildren eight are biological. The remaining seven are adopted, or as my mom likes to say – the chosen ones. My sister and I are two of the chosen ones. Each of us seven has a different story. Each has a different reason for being part of this family and becoming a Goodson: teenage pregnancy, being taken away by the state, drugs and alcohol, poverty, infidelity. These are the things that distinguish us from another; these are the things that tie us together.

Us chosen ones have only vague, superficial tidbits about our biological pasts given to us through lawyers, adoption agencies, and foster homes. These tidbits have become our inside jokes to each other. When I broke my leg snow skiing, the response of half the family was, “you should have known better.  Mexicans are not snow skiers.” We use these to accept our unknown past, but not dismiss the known present. My sister, who is Native American, comes to visit and comments on my unkempt room, “I would think you’d be better at housekeeping.” I respond, “Go make it rain somewhere.” No matter our knowledge about our biological parents or ethnic heritage, we never lose sight of the family we are actually a part of. All of us have become experts of balancing this.

Cousin Jennifer is a product of teenage pregnancy. Both her biological parents were athletes. As a kid, Jennifer played every sport imaginable. To this day she does 5ks, marathons, triathlons, and other such things that just make me want to nap. Her competitive nature is fierce and evident. This is something, someway for her to connect to the parents she never knew. Jennifer also has four kids of her own and is in the process of adopting a fifth. My twelve year old daughter, Karmyn, has plans to attend Brown University; become a pediatrician; marry a neurosurgeon; have five children – two of which she plans to adopt. The legacy lives on. Adoption is our norm.

You Look Just Like Your Dad

Of course adoption is nothing unusual. In our family it is a household word, a completely open subject. Never talked about with shame or sadness. I remember going to my dad’s work when I was a kid. A lady in his office exclaimed, “Oh I could tell you were one of Lynn’s the moment I saw you. You look just like your dad.” My dad and I gave each other knowing smiles. He then said, “She doesn’t have my balding hair and belly yet, but she’s working on it.” It was our inside joke. It was a rare occurrence when I remembered, oh yeah. I share no DNA with this man I call dad.

Maybe that’s what is unusual – how much we don’t think about it. Sometimes I’ll ask if any of the other adopted ones want to try to find their parents. The answers are always the same, “if they wanted to meet me, but otherwise not really.” Only one of us has attempted or actually got in contact with their biological family. It was my sister, Heather. Admittedly, she only did so to get a Native American scholarship for college.

Her biological father still lived with his tribe, Otoe-Missouria, in Oklahoma. Heather met him and his sister, her aunt. Her biological parents were engaged when Heather was conceived. But they broke up when his parents didn’t approve of the marriage, because she wasn’t part of the tribe. He enlisted in the Navy and was stationed away. Heather’s mother never told him about the baby. She gave Heather up for adoption and three months later, our parents adopted her. When her father came back to Oklahoma, the couple went on and got married and had another daughter. Only after their divorce did she tell him about Heather. When he asked Heather if she wanted to meet her mother and sister, she replied, “No. I have a mom and sis. I don’t need to meet them.” The father and daughter correspondence was brief, with only a few letters and phone calls after meeting. He died a few years ago. My sister didn’t go to the funeral. What Heather does hold onto is her heritage and her tribe; her tidbit.

Three Days

What I know about my biological parents reads like an incomplete fact sheet:

·        Mother: aged 25 at time of my birth. Married, but not to my father.

·        Father: Mexican, all other facts unknown.

·        Siblings: one, a brother who is seven years older than me.

·        Socioeconomic Class: really poor.

I was born in a Houston hospital on a Monday in January. My mother told the nurses she needed to put me up for adoption. This was the same hospital my dad worked. Someone on the nursing staff heard about my mother and knew my parents were looking to adopt another baby. Three days later I became Lynn and Mary’s second daughter. This is all I know.

            When I was in elementary school and through middle school, I would go visit my dad in Houston after my parent’s divorce. My mom, sister, and I moved to Arkansas. But, Heather and I still flew to Houston every other weekend to see my dad. On Sundays we had a routine before our flight back to Arkansas. We would wake up early, go to a restaurant and have brunch, and then stop in the Hispanic district of Houston. This was on the way to the airport. They had outside floral shops on the corners of multiple blocks. My dad would let me and Heather pick out a bouquet of roses to take back home with us. I remember walking through the rows of flowers and looking at the Mexican men working there. My mind wondered, looking for any physical similarities I may have with one of them. I liked the thought of being connected to them. I liked feeling a part of this culture.

            I had to take an upper division foreign language course for my major requirement. I decided to take Spanish Composition. I’m not sure why I took the course. I think a part of me thought I’m half Mexican. There’s got to be some natural ability to speak the language. There was no natural ability whatsoever. After the first day, I had no idea what was going on because it was all in Spanish. I just smiled and nodded my head all semester. In fact, I did so bad the professor actually emailed me after my final to congratulate me on making a ‘C’ on the exam, which brought my final grade to a ‘D’, which was good enough to pass.

            Every once in while, when I glance in the mirror I’ll wonder: who gave me this mass of ridiculous curly hair? Whose eyes are mine shaped after? Who gave me this mole above my lip? Whose nose is this? Who is responsible for the fact my bra size at age 32 is the same as it was at age 12?  I wonder about my father. It is doubtful he knows of my existence. It’s a surreal feeling knowing there’s someone out there with my genes, with my face, and my mannerisms. There’s someone out there who’s a part of me and doesn’t know my name, or that I have started my own family. I thought of this a lot with my kids. They will make a face or lift their eyebrows a certain way that reminds me of myself or their dad. It used to freak me out. It was my first experience with something like that, with an inherited physicality. My kids have knowledge of their background I never had.

But that’s the extent of it. My wonderings are mostly of the physical, nothing more. My day goes on. Other things occupy my mind. I used to feel guilty about this. I used to think what I felt was indifference. How heartless is that? Isn’t it heartless to feel nothing for the woman who gave life to me? But, later I began to realize ‘indifference’ is the wrong word. It is peace. I am at peace with who I am and the decision she made.

Although, as I’m writing this I remember once when I was thirteen a boy in my class and I were talking. Somehow my adoption came up. He looked at me sympathetically and asked softly, “You know what being put up for adoption means don’t you?” I looked at him like he was an idiot and replied, “Well, yeah. Since me and half my family are.” The idiot looked at me surprised and said, “It means your mother didn’t want you. It means she didn’t love you.” This angered me. Never had I thought of my circumstance in that way. “That’s not true. She did love me. She stayed with me for three days. I was in there for three days, and even though she was discharged the day after I was born, she stayed. She stayed all three days until she knew I had a home to go to.” I have more to hold on to than I thought. She had a son to take care of, and husband who knew I wasn’t his, another life to live; but she stayed with me all three days.

Grandmom

            I visit my grandmother in the nursing home. At 90 years old and 10 years of battling dementia our conversations begin the same.

She’ll say, “Oh, it’s so good to see you. I never get to see you. How are you?”

My reply, “I’m good. I’m graduating college soon.”

“Good, good. I’m so proud of you.”

“Thank you, I hope so. How are you doing?”

“Oh, I’m fine. I’m old, but I do okay.”

Then we pause and she looks at me as if seeing me for the first time. The conversation is repeated, sometimes two or three times.

            But, then she looks over at her wall to her left. It is filled with family pictures of all the children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. The family she started. At the top of the other pictures is a black and white photo of her and my grandfather, Carl.

     She smiles, “I do miss that man. We had a lot of good years. Sixty years I think.”

     I smile back, “It would have been sixty-five years last April, grandmom.”

     “That’s right. My goodness, that’s a long time. You know he didn’t like me at first. But, it didn’t take long until he came around.” 

     She goes on and tells me how they met, how it was snowing the night he proposed, she tells about their quiet ceremony and where they lived after. Rozelle tells me this with perfect clarity. It is a story I have heard a hundred times. I look at her face which bears no physical similarity with my own. Her eyes are a faded blue, her skin is pale, and her nose and chin are different shapes than mine are.

            I sit and listen to her and drink in every word. Her story is my story. Her past is my past. This is where I came from, this is who I am.