Red's Wrap
Happiness. It's relative.
Tag: adoption
Find Her: A Reflection on Lion
I don’t give advice to adoptive parents. I don’t tell them what I know or even what I suspect. I keep my mouth shut. It used to be that I figured their experiences would be different and, indeed, everyone’s experiences are different. Easy or… Continue Reading “Find Her: A Reflection on Lion”
Hard Truth
“Your daughter says your family has more conflict than average.” It’s wasn’t my first IEP meeting*. I knew the drill. But it was the first IEP meeting for this child who at the time was a 13-year old going into 8th grade.And it was the first… Continue Reading “Hard Truth”
Finding My Son’s Mother: Not My Riddle to Solve
I thought I’d found my son’s mother. She had the right name. She was about the right age. She was born in his country. And she looked like him. I enlarged the photos of her on Facebook, studied her face. She was stocky like… Continue Reading “Finding My Son’s Mother: Not My Riddle to Solve”
The Rusty Chain
Not everything about abandonment is sad. Take this beefy blue bike, for instance. One person might figure Beefy Blue was junked, its chain too rusty for locomotion. Another might see the same old bike as an opportunity to sail down the street with a loaf of bread… Continue Reading “The Rusty Chain”
Grab Them and Run Up the Hill
We sat in beach chairs facing the Pacific Ocean. Our teenage kids jittered around us, the change in their pockets rattling, their eyes darting up to the hill that held San Juan del Sur’s business district and the town’s only internet cafe. They weren’t… Continue Reading “Grab Them and Run Up the Hill”
Part 3: National Adoption Month
I do have regrets but I’m not sorry. Sometimes I think I overreached. Often I believe I underachieved. I cast myself as an heroic mother but I was an ordinary mother posturing. I spent months and years renegotiating my expectations of my children and… Continue Reading “Part 3: National Adoption Month”
Part 2: National Adoption Month
The great ruse of adoption is that except for the fact that an adopted child isn’t biologically born from the person mothering them everything else is the same. It isn’t. The Hallmark cards with the beautiful cursive verses that talk about a child being… Continue Reading “Part 2: National Adoption Month”
Play the Short Game, Sugar
My friend had just ordered a second glass of wine. At lunch. No second glass for me. It drove up the price of lunch and it was my turn to pay. The wine drinking at lunch was new. It seemed very evolved to me.… Continue Reading “Play the Short Game, Sugar”
From One to One of Many
I watch from afar. A grandmother does that. But as I watch, I remember the formation of my own family. I remember when my own daughter went from being one to one of many. She was graceful and helpful about it but looking back… Continue Reading “From One to One of Many”
Snow Door | wisconsinacademy.org
Listen to Jan read her essay “Billy” presented on WUWM’s Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “At the Breakfast Bar” on WUWM Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “The Parish Hall,” on WUWM Lake Effect
“Fury Cannot Touch Me,” Modern Love, NYT, 9/29/11
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