Echoes and Currents
From youthful days
If my father had not been so embarrassed by me, the path I chose may have been very different. My mother deferred to him in most of her decisions, but was truly torn about this one. It’s a story as familiar as the setting sun. A young woman in the throes of pleasure finds herself expecting a child.
A child she wants to raise and cherish. “Hank, we can do this,” I heard my mother say during my seventh month along, when I came downstairs in the morning. It appeared they hadn’t heard my descent so I stopped on the second stair and listened to them. “Marcie, another family can handle this problem,” the word problem so painful for me to hear. My daughter flipped over within me as if she felt the pain of the word too.
“Chrissy has her whole life in front of her,” he said, and the discussion ended. My mother’s resistance to my father’s decision to put my daughter up for adoption sputtered out.
On a hot day in June, I gave birth to Fiona, and within hours she was taken from me. The anniversaries of her birth have stayed with me like echoes from the past, haunting and filled with grief.
You would probably hate me for saying I never told John about Fiona. It was as if my father reached into my heart and closed down a part of it that’s been under repair ever since. My courtship with my…
