Happy Birthday

Today is my son's birthday--or so he's been told. It wasn't uncommon in 1970 for adoption agencies to tamper with details like birth dates. Sometimes, when the amended birth certificates were generated, changes were made and searches were thereby hampered. But I hesitate to make these accusations because it could be that in my effort to put my son's birth behind me and begin anew, I may have confused his due date with his  date of birth. Giving birth to my son was a secret event known only to my parents and my boyfriend and when I emerged from hiding, I was supposed to forget and move on.

I've heard that this confusion is not unusual among birthmothers.  Dates might be forgotten, but never our babies.

Buy a Chinese Baby

This blog has been languishing much like the effort to unseal adoption records in many U.S. States.  Writing has kept me traveling since my last post, and many of the places I've traveled through and spent time in have variations of the adoption laws I've commented on.  It was depressing to belabor the point. So far in 2009, I've spent time in Vermont, New York, Maryland, Minnesota, Iowa (where my son was adopted) Nebraska & Oregon.  Only Oregon has open records.  I've driven through Nevada (where gambling & prostitution are legal 24 hours a day) Utah & Colorado.  It's a big country and the prospects of birth parents and children reuniting are sparser than opportunities for a gourmet meal along the interstate.

Meanwhile, what I had envisioned as my personal contribution to the struggle--my book about my experience of relinquishing and reconnecting with my son--has languished too, as I put more and more effort into finishing my MFA.  However, an article in the BBC news this morning got me going.    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8130900.stm

The writer in me hatched a dastardly plot:  Adopt (buy) a Chinese baby and then give her back to her parents.  Of course, one would have to know who the parents are.