Sunny sky for our fair weather daughter

So, in the spirit of being honest, I'd like to share a recent search event. For the record, being honest is something I take seriously whereas fun and interesting I'm aware is a matter of personal taste. Call me boring, but don't accuse me of being dishonest.

So in another rare moment of being alone in my home Monday I decided to try calling my biological mother's phone number again. It wasn't quite as frightening this time, mainly I think because I didn't expect her to answer. She did. It went quite smoothly actually. She let me know she was on the other line to which I replied I wouldn't keep her long, that I was just wondering if she'd received any of my messages. Turns out she had received my very first Christmas card and note and had replied via email, back in January. For whatever reason, who ever really knows what happens in cyberspace sometimes, I didn't receive the email.

To my surprise, she told me that she was planning a trip in the fall and had been considering stopping in my city, if it could work out that way. Huh...what?!?!? To say this surprised me would be an understatement. I replied that although that might be interesting, wow, she didn't HAVE to do that, meeting her wasn't what I was after, that I really just wanted to have some communication and some questions answered, to let her know I had no intention of outing her to her family or of showing up some day on her doorstep, that I'd done quite a bit of digging around on the internet and had found pictures, obituaries and other various online morsels of information about her and her family. Having not really expected her to even answer the phone you can imagine how the mention of meeting up out of the blue would be freaky...yes, *blush*, I think I used that word on the phone...sigh.

Ironically, I thinks it's irony, when I said I'd let her get back to her call, she told me it had been her daughter on the other line and that she'd hung up now. I gave her my email address again and she said she'd try it and I could mail her back if I got her email, which I quickly did saying I'd send another longer one shortly.

I wrote a mail outlining my attitude toward our whole situation, relayed some of the things I'd be interested in knowing, thanked her for making contact and described what a relief it was to me to no longer worry that she was worrying about me disrupting her life. I was happy to have been given the opportunity to explain my motive in initiating contact. I explained in a bit more detail what I'd found out about her on my own and told her that although I was surprised at the possibility of meeting her so soon, I think it's something I'd be ok doing.

So, there are the facts. I'd like to add a couple of things to this post, the first being she made it clear again in her short mail that nobody ever knew about me except for her deceased husband and she would like to keep it that way for now, although if her husband were still alive, things might be different. I reassured her that I have no problem with this and told her I have genuine compassion for her situation.

The second thing I'd like to mention is that when I sent her the second, longer email, I didn't hear back immediately. This left me wondering if she'd gotten either reply email. I waited two days to see if I'd hear back and when I didn't I sent a very short mail asking her to please let me know if she'd received them when she had a minute. I heard back almost immediately that she had and that's all her email said.

I see much written about mis-communication between reuniting biological parents and their grown children. I think it's important to give each other the benefit of the doubt. It's important to realize methods of communication (email, voice mail, snail mail) can fail and that we don't know each other in the slightest. We don't know each others habits or thought processes, each others moods or life experiences.

My plan is to remain patient, respectful, compassionate, realistic and honest. Is that interesting or fun? Not so much, I know, but hopefully it will serve me well in my journey as an adopted person who's possibly been given the opportunity to have my curiosity satisfied and perhaps meet the person who gave birth to me.