Adoption Be-wareness Month

Check the bloggers I have linked to learn more. I dont have anything really brilliant to add. Just dont buy into the sunshine and puppy dog stories about adoption put out there by the media. I still have blogs to add so stand by.

What is Rejection???

Business is slow, so I have been wallowing in somewhat deep thoughts. What is rejection? Am I rejected since my nmother cant/wont tell anyone about me. I have sporadic phone calls from her, so I guess I am not totally rejected. Is being ignored (as in never responding to emails) rejection? I feel rejected. I know other adoptees and a few nmothers who had total outright harsh rejection. I guess there are varying levels of rejection. My middle dd B who is 11 feels rejected by my nmom. She makes comments about how her grandmother doesnt want to know her, and she has cousins she will never know. Thats the hardest part. B even asked if S was happy I was alive, I didnt tell her about THAT conversation with S. I searched to answer questions knowing I could be hurt/rejected. I didnt expect my kids to feel that way. Ed doesnt say much about S, he's happy about my ndad wanting and being a grandfather to them. Every now and then he will ask about if I have heard from S. It makes him more angry than sad (a guy thing maybe?). When he sees me working on the family tree, he says I shouldnt bother since we will never get to know S side. Then I wonder about C, she's six now, so pretty much she has lived through and with my search and reunion. As she gets older, will she be like her sister and feel rejected? Or is she going to accept things as its just the way it is. Hindsight, as they say, is 20/20. If S had told me in the first call, that there was no way she could or would tell anyone about me, I would have not been so excited and pass the excitement onto my kids. A few of you know what I mean. First contact (when its positive of course) is a total high. I was floating for two days. Then I got worried as I didnt get an email or a call. It still gets me depressed when I think about the huge extended family I am missing out on (hey they are missing out too). When my ndad was here he referred to S as my mother, after a bit he realized that I refer to her as S. So he picked up on that and started calling her by name. I guess calling her S is a way to protect myself.

Morons

Well I am enjoying another day at the bookstore. Its offset though by the fact some asshole(s) decided to play arsonist. Currently there are several brush fires burning north of us. People are now being required to evacuate. Most people dont think of Hawaii having a drought, but this part of the island has been under a severe drought for probably a year. We wont have the catastrophe of Southern California, but its still sad that such jerks have to ruin things for others. I just had to show a tourist where the roads are closed so she can avoid getting stuck in that area. To top things off, my 11 yo dd managed to slam her finger in a door at her cousins. The smashed it big time, and the door frame sliced right across the finger pad (ouch). She was so upset (refused to ice it) that hubby had to pick her up. I havent dared call home to see how she is, hubby cannot handle this kind of stuff at all. Well back to "work".

My Favorite Place

I'm at one of my favorite places, its not home, or the beach, its The Bookstore. Its a small used (and a few new) bookstore. I will be "working" here for the next two weeks. In the same two story building we have a video rental place, a pet store, upstairs is a reggae music place and one of Dog the Bounty Hunter's office (we get a lot of folks who take pics of his sign, and no I dont ever see him). I've been a customer here for a few years and then I offered to help out when the owner was going on vacation and couldnt find anyone to help. Its great, before C started school she could hang out all day with books. The older two kids love it here too. I have always loved books, bookstores and libraries. My afam thought I was odd because I would rather read than do most anything else. During the long hot Arizona summers, my aparents would drop me off a few days a week at the library. I would bring a lunch and stay all day. My aparents didnt restrict my library card to "kids only" books. In school, my favorite place was the library. I have lots of books at home, I collect cookbooks and of course have my "adoption issue" library. My kids have my love of reading (hubby isnt a reader, opposites do attract I guess). My 11 yo dd's nickname last year was Reader Girl. When I found my nmother, one of her first questions was about hobbies. Her favorite=reading. It was so great to know that I got her love of reading and in turn passed it on to my children. So for the next two weeks I will be breathing in the smell of books and enjoying myself. Books, the internet what more could I ask for?

Back into the Fog

My internet was down for a week. From Friday to Friday. It was interesting. I couldnt access my adoptee sites, blogs etc. A forced break from how awful adoption is. I could feel myself slipping back into the fog, even thinking "happy adoption" thoughts. How easy it is to distance yourself from the reality of the pain adoption causes, how much pain the adoptees still searching are going through, the pain of the rejected or ingnored adoptees, the lack of support from the general public and our own significant others. A week of being blissfully ignorant of the current adoption legislation, which for the most part denies adoptees basic human rights. It was easy to see why so many adoptees are still in the fog. It hurts and doesnt go away once we confront the reality that is adoption. Sometimes I miss the fog............

Funeral Part Two

Well after reading my previous post, I dont think I should blog after a funeral and especially after a funeral and a few glasses of wine....lol
Anyway, Bill and I hadnt planned on attending the burial of his cousin's ashes. We ended upgoing and I am so glad we did. The "ceremony" (cant think of a good word for it) was even more moving than the funeral the day before. Bill and I got up to the burial site early, to help arrange the flowers around the grave and decorate the table that the ashes would rest on before being poured into a lauhala basket (woven by a family friend). Around noon, the horses and riders arrived. There were 29 horses with 28 riders, the riderless horse carried the ashes. Charlotte's father explained the history of the site (a cliff over looking a beautiful valley) and how special the place was to his daughter. Several people spoke, then Charlotte's daughter poured her mother's ashes in to the basket, it was then covered. People threw flowers, lei etc in the grave. It was then filled with dirt and covered with the sod that had been removed. A stone from the beach area was placed on it as a marker. More flowers and lei were placed. It was amazing the amount of flowers. We all then toasted to Charlotte and headed to the mountain house for food and company. Charlotte's father told the riders to make a "thundering noise" and gallop past the house when they arrived. It was quite a site seeing the horses come by. All in all a very moving day.

Funerals

Today was hubby's cousin's funeral. It was a typical family event. There were about 500 people, the same you see at the baby parties, graduations and marriages. There is a consistancy here. The Lanakila church does the catering (a big fundraising for the church), the same entertainment and the same guests.
I dont recall any funerals growing up. I was told that when my adad's mother died I was alone with her for many hours. Her death created a huge rift between my adad and his father. The day before she died, she witnessed a terrible act of violence on my adad's part. My amother had loaded the kids up in the car and attempted to leave. Adad shot out the windshield. He then forced us to line up and hold still as he shot (live bullets) around us. Apparently, seeing this is what caused his mother to have a stroke. Many years later, I was 15 and confronted my aparents with this memory. They were stunned that I remembered this.
I have gone to many funerals now living here. Most are really "celebrations of life". There is some sadness but mostly hope that we will all meet again. Today was beautiful. There were several posters of Charlotte and her loved ones. Most of us laughed remembering the parties or events we had shared with her. Yes we were sad. But we were happy to have known her and had her in our lives. So tonight I say I fond Aloha to Charlotte. I will miss you but hope to see you again someday.