Everything that came before ——— everything that is to come

She's a hummingbird, she's a sprite, she is beauty, she is light. I wrote that line about my birth mother the day we met.

Thursday, April 6, 2018, I walked into the lobby of the Millennium Harvest House in my hometown of Boulder, CO, where Shirley and Arthur were staying after a 15-hour drive from Shreveport, Louisiana, and my life was forever changed. There is a line that exists now. Everything that came before ——— everything that is to come.

The thing about meeting your birth family is, how does one prepare? Anything might happen. There is no rule that says you will identify with or love them, or they you, just because of your shared blood.

I have forged my identity on the very idea that blood is not what matters, that family is who you choose, what you create. I still believe that. And yet, I was entirely unprepared for the wonder, the utter, complete, boundless awe of holding my blood relatives in my arms. The body knows things the mind hasn’t caught up to yet.

Dwayne

After the excitement and flurry of emails and phone calls, the reality of face-to-face contact was intimidating on a great deal of levels. Something stirred in me; in the deepest reaches of whatever makes me me when my older brother Dwayne and his family drove from California over the Rocky Mountains. Colorado-bound for one day, just to meet me.

That initial hug, how to describe it? Awkward and profoundly sweet.

We sat in Lisa Bell’s backyard at her black metal garden table with a pitcher of water between us, shyly wondering how to begin.

His wife Rose, their children, my nieces and nephew, all staring back at me with these open, curious faces. I stared right back.

Dwayne pulled out two photograph albums he’d brought, and I sat rapt as he talked me through them, slowly, deliberately, so insistent on bringing me up to speed on his childhood.

“This is me with my Mom, wait, no, OUR Mom,” he kept correcting himself each time he referred to Shirley. The acceptance of me as his sister, so beautifully inherent in that small gesture, pulled at something deep in my chest. Oh, that tug at my heart as he told me.

“I didn’t know of your existence until a few days ago. If I had known, I would have looked for you, I would have found you.”

Staring into each other’s eyes, seeing all that was similar, and all that was different. Both of us wordless with wonder at what may have been, at what was.

Then Thursday and my lunch date. Rolling up - Heart thump thump thumping...

When Shirley came through the hotel lobby and threw her arms open, the clichéd expression about thinking your heart might burst turned out to be completely accurate.

She’s tiny and bubbly; we looked at each other and just laughed. Immediate, helpless, recognition laughter. She made me feel comfortable immediately, so clearly and warmly, herself, wanting to give me everything without overwhelming me.

Her husband, whom I’d been calling Arthur, is a miracle of a man. Tall, lanky, effortlessly funny, with a Louisiana slow drawl that is warm maple syrup. I don’t know why I found it surprising that they are both so funny. He charmed me thoroughly within minutes and pronounced himself my stepdad from this day forward. I later learned I’d been calling him by the wrong name entirely.

“I didn’t even know my first name was Arthur,” he told me, in that delicious drawl, “until I was in the sixth grade, since no one called me that.”

Randolph. His name is Randolph.

Our first meeting at the Oak on the Pearl Street Mall stretched to three hours without either of us noticing. We switched between her memories and mine, her childhood and my growing up in Boulder, trading stories like we were trying to make up for lost time because we were.

She broke my heart a little when she spoke of going to the hospital to sign the adoption papers and how she cried the entire way to the hospital, how she couldn’t bear it, and also couldn’t see how to take on a fourth child without the father present, already aware of how hard it was to provide for the three she had.

That she loved me so hard and wanted the best for me was profoundly moving. That I had been loved, missed, and worried about. I felt something that had been rustling through my everything finally rest.

It felt imperative to assure her that I turned out fine and that it was all for the best, that I like who I am, and if anything had been different, I would be another person entirely.

The love that poured out from the entire family was almost too much. It felt so from the beginning. How can they love me so unconditionally with no knowledge of who I am, but look at me feeling the same way!

After lunch, Shirley insisted I drive her car, which I found both touching and slightly alarming, and we headed to Chautauqua Park, one of my favorite childhood spots. Our curiosity for each other’s memories was insatiable. We chattered and laughed and giggled ceaselessly all the way up the hill. On the way, she stopped to buy us matching bracelets from Nepal, pressed one onto my wrist, and kept one for herself.

In the car, we dove deeper. We talked religion. She’s a devout Baptist, and her religion is central to her life and who she is. I told her I’m a meditater, that that was my prayer, and that I had been thanking my ancestors compulsively over and over for a year before I found her. Thanking them for the opportunity to live this life, for the tools that they had passed down to me to forge it the way that I have.

That evening dinner with Lisa, her husband Steve, and my beloved brother-in-law Richard was a remarkable experience. There was a moment at the table when every eye was wet.

If love were visible, the light surrounding that table would have been incandescent. My mother was so vulnerable in her openness, in her truthfulness, in her love.

Lisa Bell, Steve, Richard, Randolph, me, and Shirley.

As I mentioned last time, I realize that not every search ends so happily, and really, I knew also that there would be bumps on the path ahead, but oh, how the very marrow of me felt new.

The Scariest Gig on Record

The next evening, I performed at the Highland City Club.

Full house. Spoken word and songs, NoteSpeak and Hippie Tendencies material with some covers woven in, with the most beautifully prepared band, guitarist and bandleader Chris Malley, the groovalicious bassist Eric Thorin, drummer Christian Teele with his discerning, elegant stylings, and Lisa Bell elevating everything as she always does. Marco was back in Italy, which was simultaneously frightening and liberating. Stepping out from beside someone who has been my musical home for years.

And front row center, Shirley and Randolph.

My birth mother. Hearing my voice for the first time on a stage. The day after we met. Watching her watch me in that warm, intimate space…something in my heart opened like a gift.

I have performed in many rooms. That one I will never forget.

It was as if I’d been content all my life to peek on tiptoes through lighted windows from my place out in a snowy winter’s night, happy with my fortitude and resourcefulness, only to be invited in to sit by the fire.

Just listen to the joy! Especially that last song

The Hummingbird

When I got back to Italy, I did something I had never done before. I got my first tattoo. A hummingbird, small and precise, on my finger.

Because that is what she is. Tiny and busy and iridescent, hovering and then gone in a flash, leaving you blinking at the space where she just was, amazed that someone so small could move that fast and be that beautiful.

She’s a hummingbird, she’s a sprite, she is beauty, she is light.

I know. I know how lucky I am.

Next up, the Conference on World Affairs, where I fell in love with approximately twenty people, jammed at 10:30 in the morning, and finally figured out where home is.

P.S. The story behind those birthday cards!

P.P.S. Inspired by Natalie Lucie , I thought I’d add the song from the voiceover intro. I wrote it before I met Shirley, and you can hear the searching within it. My brother Miles’ voice coming in around 3:50 will give you chills, I guarantee.