Boy, did I preach me up a storm today.

*sigh*

It is exhausting.

I was talking with a very interested man from the ACLU, I mean he was interested once we established that NO, I am not asking the ACLU to find my parents for me, NO, I am not concerned that AB372 will LET adoptees get their birth certificates, quite the contrary, YES, I am sure that my birth certificate is sealed, and YES not to everyone but to me, to my natural mother and father but NO, NOT to my adoptive parents. YES, it is different for those adopted in Marin County vs. San Francisco, Orange Vs. Los Angeles. NO, it doesn’t make a lot of sense.

We had to go through the whole thing about how does this relate to civil liberties. I find when you use the word discrimination, one group, through no self-selected behavior of their own is denied what everyone else enjoys, that is more understandable. I mean to me the idea is obvious, but then I have lived with this my whole life.

I had this really awesome teacher in grade 7, and I always remember her saying that when you are giving someone new information on average it takes seven repetitions for them to be able to understand it. It didn’t take this guy that long, but hey he works for the ACLU. He was very sympathetic and gave me some direction for their organization. The guy I talked to in Philly said that the ACLU was in the process of coming up with national policy vs. the chapter by chapter stuff, but then again I also had to inform him that the ACLU had in fact supported discrimination against adoptees.

I talked to a couple of other people, one a very smart guy with a lot of activism experience, another a very smart guy with a lot of adoption experience. They kept saying the same thing, “you guys have no money” which we don’t. Am I aware that there are 2 wars, 27 bankrupt states, people with real problems? Yeah, I am. I do notice.

I swear to God, I mean for crying out loud, all day long I deal with negotiations, money, business, I am all about efficacy. I bring that idea to my activism, the economy of resources. I don’t know why people don’t understand that about me. Professionally, people don’t question me, and my clients tease me about being a soft-spoken ball-buster.

Though, my demeanor has been a something of a detriment, I am soft-spoken and bubbly in real life, that can create the perfect climate for a sucker punch however. It is not translating at this point for me in my activism life.

When I was speaking to one gentleman, trying to glean what I can from his experience and he was telling me about the big bad world, don’t tell anyone, but I actually live in it. At one point anyway, I could feel the tears in the back of my eyes, I don’t know if he could see them. Not the kind that fall or even make your eyes water, but as he was detailing obstacle after obstacle.

I said, quietly, becasue I really try to avoid the personal in activism work, “Yes, but there are reasons that people are activists, there is a personal story that fuels the passion, I have one of those. I have no choice. I know this may be impossible, but I still have to do this.”

He agreed with me.

It sucks that I can’t convey, the truth of the matter is for me, denying someone their own birth certificate is telling them their life doesn’t matter as much as the next persons. Oh that is just my feeling, not cold hard fact so no need to argue me that, that is another reason you can’t bring it up, it doesn’t translate.

It is weird, it is as if I have this debt to pay. If I can just do this one thing, or not even me, I don’t need to do it. If I can just help right this one injustice, I feel like I could walk away from a memory with the satisfaction that I tried to make it right.

Oh, I know I can lose. The thing I am referring to, my friend’s suicide. I have blogged a lot about suicide becuse it has been a big part of my life. There is one in particular though that I blogged about just a couple of posts ago. The other part of that loss, which I don’t think I have blogged about. Is that how I came to know that guy’s story. Cara brought him to me, she told him I could help him.

I never said I could. I never claimed to be the adoptee -helper -makes- your- hamburger- make- a -great- meal. Still I tried. I could listen, I could care. His mother was not like my mother however, she was awful. I can’t change that. I lost.

I am not trying to say adoptees are suicidal or paint us as pathetic. This is one story of a million adoptee stories I know, it is just this is the one that makes me feel like, goddammit. Goddammit, I tried and failed and the only thing I can do now is get your goddammed birth certificate unsealed, because your birth was not a crime, you were not a crime you were just as worthy as any other bastid with married parents.

It sucks.

I call my mom, she good with stuff like this. She bounces things back to me, “oh that was just glib” on his part. “You should write a cover letter”

“How do I make a cover letter short enough?” I ask.

“Practice and editing” she retorts.

I call one of the most sparkly bastids in the universe across the miles. I complain about being told today again that if a contact veto can get 98% of bastids their birth certificates, who am I to oppose that? Who am I with my cozy, cooperative mother who would call the NCFA if I asked her to. That the NCFA really believes they are protecting her, I have a hard time believing that, but still. My mom would totally go to bat for me and her, and she has.

She tells me the counter that I have heard so many times before but she says it better than anyone else. “Okay, what if we let 98% of women vote? If their husband isn’t okay with it, he can just send a note.”

I laugh, “Well you know it may cause problems in the marriage if she votes, He may have to drive himself into a lake” Thinking, if that is the case, I’d like to be the one to warm up the car for him or the beemommy who can’t get her crap together.

She made the point, there is more equality in states that allow zero access over tiered access.

Yes, I know there a problems that concern the general population that seem much more pressing, I know that compromisers tug tremendously at my heart strings but I still cannot find it in my heart to participate in discrimination against myself or my poor old dead friend, because guess what?

He would have a contact veto.

I am bouyed by the wonderful people in my life. “I love you” my adoptee friend says, “I love you too” I respond and it warms my heart how much she feels like my tribe.

I remember the saying from the artworld of the 90’s “the personal is political”

I got asked today, “Do you know this is a movement that bakes its own babies?”

Yes, I know. I have been baked myself so many times that I can’t keep track. If I cared more I would create a widget, if I knew how to create a widget and archive all the personal attacks against me.

All I can say to those who know better, who can do better, please do. The only thing you will get from is heartfelt thanks and perhaps one of those awful David and Co. gift baskets. You have direction for me? I am happy to follow it. I want results. It is 2009, I was born a long time ago, even though I have had my birth certificate, if I want another copy I have to go through my adoptive parents. Remember though, doing better means no one is left behind. No one gets a redacted certificate.

I don’t WANT to be doing this.

I finger my mail, which of course has the holiday beg from one of the only charitable organizations I support AFSP, and can I just say it is rude of my mom to laugh at the birthday card I get from them every year?

I pick up the phone again and dial, “Hello, yes, my name is Joy XXXXXX, I am calling to talk to…Yes, I will hold”

The short days of November have not been kind to me. Sometimes the lack of daylight is exhausting.

Yesterday though, yesterday was a good day. I worked at a clients office with some other people. One is this man who insists on calling me, “baby doll” I had decided yesterday that if he called me that one more time I would hit him.

So he came in and shouted at me “Hey baby doll” and I looked into is guileless face and smiled. “How are you doing?” I asked, ” You know me, I am hanging tough” he answered. Which always strikes me, how much so many people have to deal with.

I went home, Saturday is my date night with my SH, but I saw on Caller ID that my mom had called. I have been in avoidance mode somewhat so I called her back. That was at about 5:00 p.m.

She answered with that excited voice that she has. A voice deeper than mine but on the same spectrum. I actually love to hear our voices, and she does too.

So we talked, in not in this particular order about Quakers, Faith and Practice, Science and Health by Mary Baker Eddy, which I read in High school. I have read some really random books. Pedagogy of the Oppressed which we talk about it seems like once a year with her always telling me how it is the same idea over and over and yes we get it already– which reminds me so much of me. Tight dresses, Doll House brand shoes, that I used to wear to Quaker meetings, inappropriate. Sex, men, Saul Alinsky and why I don’t think his rules work. Of course, I am not the only one, Randy Shaw and the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, when did Army street become Chavez street?

When I mentioned that people wonder what country I immigrated from when I am in certain neighborhoods she wanted to confirm that I remembered my heritage, because quite honestly, my ancestry isn’t that interesting to me. Which she also knows. She told me about insights she had driving all night about the universe that struck her so strongly. It is weird sometimes when she describes things I so know what she is talking about I feel like I am a part of the memory. I can feel it in my body, on my skin.

We talked about politics, which she claimed to want to avoid the nastiness but really politics are just relationships on a broad scale, just like business, it is about building relationships. People don’t get that though, they create rules and rituals that don’t work with people and how they operate. It is like human beings are always forgetting our humanity, like communism. You know beautiful idea but doesn’t take into account our natures. Which we also talked about.

We talked about oranges and lemons and how one of my favorite Danish idioms is the use of lemon for false friend, because you know it does look similar to an orange. The difference between Swedish people and Norwegians and how people love to hate their neighbors.

At one point when we were talking about an ex- man in my life, I said well it was weird because he was always pining for me. Which I can absolutely not relate to.

She said, “I can relate to pining for you, I have spent a lot of time doing that”

Which made me very sad, but I had to be brave and act like it didn’t make me want to cry. Besides there was so much chattering to be done.

Sometimes my mother and I fight, people who read our blogs know that. There are other times too. There are times where three hours float by on the telephone, where I say something and she picks up the other end of it. The way our minds work, the natural sympathy between ourselves, the private world we enter into where everything else disappears. We are so connected. It is as ethereal as we are.

She also wanted to know if I liked this video she sent me. She thought I would wonder why she sent it to me because of all the things we talk about, this stuff isn’t really part of it.

I didn’t tell her but I know why she sends me stuff like this, she wants me to know she is thinking about me.

It is so well done

And then a beloved friend stopped by as a surprise, he is an anthropolgist. He wished me happy adoption day, and we laughed and he indulged my Alinsky ramblings and brought up some very good points of his own. More about that later.

Yesterday was one of those days where you feel really taken care of by the universe.

Here is a video of two famous adoptees

Not by a long shot.

I may be quiet for a while.

My mother is not reading my blog anymore.

She would rather have the relationship with me in real time than react to my blog posts.

After the blog I made about the painting that upset her so, which I can understand, but a lot of good came out of. Particularly from Kim.Kim’s comments, which we both appreciated, Kim. Kim is a treasure. Still, I think I understand.

I used to read my sister’s blog, the daughter that my mom raised. I liked it. I didn’t read it for very long, and I couldn’t find it if I tried now, so don’t even ask. I didn’t read it for nearly as long as my mother read mine. Not even a fraction of the time to be more accurate.

Anyway, Ezzy’s blog, while sweet and interesting, I was interested, am interested, was incredibly triggering. I saw so much of myself in her. Her in me, I came first after all. She didn’t have the same intensity or locus however. In a way it was like seeing myself not-adopted. Which isn’t entirely true. I have a lot of my dad in me, and her dad is in some ways the inverse of mine, they have some similarities, but mostly I think about the differences.

I read my mom’s blog still. She is like me too, but different. I am not religious, everything doesn’t tie back to God for me. Actually, maybe it does but I am such a fanatical agnostic that since I don’t know what God is, am not willing to tell other people about Him,Goddess, Buddha, whatever. My only real religion is try to be a good person, try to be truthful, try to stand up for those who can’t stand up for themsleves, and don’t worry about it.

Back when I was on drugs, actually even before that I read the Bible as a little girl. My amom laughs about that still. When I found out there was a Bible, around age 8, I was all, ‘well, let’s read it then’ I told her wide-eyed that Jesus was Jewish and she laughed a sweet and appreciative of my curiousity laughter.

Then before Tomtom was born and I was all “yay cocaine” I read it again. Only this time, I underlined passages. I have since tossed those worried with pink highlighter books and can’t remember exactly what they said.

One of the ideas that stuck with me so, though was of Jesus saying that he could not even begin to tell us about spirituality, that something about we were barely on a mother’s milk, and not ready for meat. If anyone knows what I am referring to, please enlighten me.

I thought that was good enough for me. I am happy in my unknowingness, I think it is humble and spot on and in alignment. Whateverthehell that means.

I still read my mother’s blog and would be very sad if she took it away. I can check on her, I can see her, or at least parts of her.

Sometimes, I don’t agree with her, sometimes she hurts me, other times she gives me big hugs and love.

It is like I have her all the time though, and I can’t express what that means to me. Even as I cringe about her telling everyone in her community about how she gave me up and it makes me think I don’t want to meet them then. I don’t want to be the weird, angry, sad, bastard give-away that I am.

Did I ever tell you why I started blogging?

I think I did.

My friend shot his head off. My in real life adoptee friend shot his head off.

No one knew for like a week.

Can you imagine the bugs?

When his body was lowered into the ground, his amom shouted, “Why did that bitch mean so much to you?”

We all knew who she meant.

I thought, “how many more of us are going to die?, how many more until we have some justice? How many more before our stories are told?”

I didn’t know what to do but tell my story.

I don’t know why I care. I don’t know why I rent movies or see movies like “Milk” about social change, just because I think there is something I can glean from them– just because I think there is something I can learn and apply to our rights. Why when the Dan White character visits the Harvey Milk character. The Dan White character is drunk and says, ‘you have your issues…’

and the Milk character says “NO! we are fighting for OUR LIVES”

That is exactly how I feel.

We do. This occurred to me yesterday for the first time really.

I was having a discussion about compromise with a large powerful religious organization who is anti-adoptee rights to our own personal information.

I started in my normal calm way of thinking and discussing this matter. I was going to point out that we are not “partners” in this with the Catholics, you know this isn’t an agreement that we made with them and we have to give a little and they have to give a little . We are not partners with a common goal. We don’t have to be fair or consider them. ( I realize that those dealing with them probably have a very different take on their motivations) but that in fact we are a class of people that have been discriminated against.

So instead of making this seasoned reasoned argument, I said instead something to the effect of “Fcuk Compromise, we deserve a goddammed apology” and then it didn’t stand out enough so I added a 70 point font.

It was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen when I was done.

It made me wonder though, why aren’t we asking for this?

Why are we playing so nice with the specious argument of “birth mother” privacy. What a crock that is. If anyone is so naive to believe in it. Trust me no other laws are written to protect the weak. Ever read employment law? The lawmakers are influenced by money and power not the disenfranchised.

How ridiculous, and please while I do have sympathy for any person who has difficulties in their lives, and that would be pretty much anyone– I am not the beast of that burden.

There really is no nexus between whatever trauma my mother experienced in her life and my identity. That is an invention to protect agencies and attorneys. Otherwise why is where I was fostered protected under the guise of my mother’s privacy?

Most people experience trauma in their lives, one of my good friends super-genius dad was killed by the CIA when she was 8. It turned her idyllic privileged world on its ear. Where is the government intervention for her protecting her from her own life? What about soldiers who have combat-shock? Are they not allowed to contact each other by government order when they return home? After all they may engender difficult memories.

Is there any evidence in any other arena that suggests that good mental health results from lying about one’s life? This flies in the face of conventional wisdom.

Are we willing to let state legislators make decisions about our emotional well-being, personal life, and privacy? Why are they considered qualified?

Adoptees as a class have been discriminated through no self-selected behavior. We have been wronged, stigmatized. We have been burdened with a shame that doesn’t belong to us.

I want to say, dear Catholic Church, take your shame, shove it up in your ass and rub it around a little. I am not the cover for your sins.

Get out of the way, give me my own birth certificate and a very public apology from the state of California. I deserve it.

In other news I have recently discovered early Adam Ant is grossly underrated, at least by me.

I noticed they are having a new carnival at Grown in my Heart. I have read many of the entries. I have become kind of fascinated in spite of myself on the different entries, for the different topics.

If for nothing else, it demonstrates how differently people can see the same situation.

The latest is your favorite “adoption picture”. My first response is what?

Adoption picture?

What is an adoption picture?

I have pictures of my ancestors, I have pictures of my adopted ancestors, who influenced me as well. Their customs, personalities, heritage made an influence on my sense of self and how I was raised. In a lot of ways culturally, I have some claim to them in how my personality was shaped.

Other than that, I have pictures of my sisters, my brothers, my mothers and fathers.

I have a picture of my mother as a teenager not long before she conceived me looking very unhappy. I have pictures of my amom running through the yard as teenager with her baby nephew on her back. I have pictures of me in frilly pink dresses with rosy cheeks playing with a truck. The dresses were my choice, never forced on me, and the trucks were my choice too.

I have pictures of my first car, pictures of me as a pouty teenager. Pictures of my boyfriends, who I also adopted. Pictures of me in girl scout uniforms, pictures of birthday parties and fantastic Christmases. Pictures of me staring in wonder at some trifle, pictures of me looking pensive. Pictures of me looking blurry, pictures of me looking like Suzie-Chapstick. Lots of pictures of me looking very happy. Pictures of my wedding, pictures of my baby.

Professional well-done pictures of my adoptive family looking fab and stylish and oh so thin. Pictures in Hawaii, on ski slopes, on our frequent vacations.

I think you are *ahem* getting the picture. Sorry, love bad puns.

Adoption isn’t really a before and after for me.

I did have one picture that was really an adoption picture, or maybe it was three, or two, or I don’t quite remember. Pictures that my mother had sent me right in the very beginning of our relationship.

I remember my grandmother telling me, “oh your mother carried your picture around for years” as if I would find that comforting, and maybe on some level I did.

Comfort wasn’t the only feeling that accompanied that bit of information though. It also stung, as if I should be grateful that I mattered at all, or surprised, or maybe I am just not comfortable enough to know exactly what shot through my body when I was told that.

I see I am avoiding the other picture (s). There was a picture or pictures I was given of brand-new baby me. I am surprised how hard this is to write about.

Okay, little baby me. If it was really me, which I have doubted that it might not just be some other random lucky chosen baby—I looked a lot like Tomtom.

My mother refused to sign her TPR unless she saw me one more time. So she saw me, or at least they told her it was me. Who knows? My grandmother was with her, I guess my grandfather went to work like any other day.

I was told by my mother they were polaroids, that a special camera had been purchased so that no pesky film developers would be aware of the shame of my birth. That would have been truly awful.

The pictures I received didn’t look like polaroids perhaps they were copies. I kind of hope so, not that I would necessarily ever want to see them again. My mother’s face is not in them, an added precaution. Her long hair is, over my baby face.

Even after all these years thinking about the pictures upsets me.

Pictures of the most painful event in my life.

I didn’t want them, I didn’t want the pictures of my mother giving me away to an agency.

I suppose if I was a different person I could see that they were the only pictures of us together, before we were separated.

The reality is though, that we were already separated, albeit not legally. I was in foster care, if that was me or not me. There was some lady handling me, some strangers giving in to my mother’s demand even though they said it was against her interest.

I didn’t look at them with rose colored glasses.

I looked at them for what they were. A mother, a young mother being cowed into signing away her baby. Me. Me losing my identity, my connection, my me-ness.

The biggest horror-show of my life caught on film. Whatever good things and bad things followed, nothing has matched that so far, and I pray nothing will top it.

When I was 22 I burned them. It made her upset. It was the 90s though and there was this theory going about that if you burned something it would release the negative energy or whatnot.

Doesn’t work if you are curious. At the same time am kind of grateful that I burned them, along with my OBC, six-point inspection et al. I would hate for them to be around to pull out and torture myself at low moments with.

Is it at ‘he was a difficult child’

http://www.kqed.org/epArchive/R910261000

I have to get my parking tickets punched with their purple numbers and letters all the time. It is kind of a pain in the neck but when that black and white striped bar lifts and you get out for free, it always gives me a bit of a thrill.

I know, I am easy to pleasy.

It doesn’t always work though, the other night after going to the market I ended up in a frustration that cost me $5.00 to go to my grocery store for about 5 minutes. It was more expensive than those sex lines that are advertised on T.V. Grrrr.

About an hour later, I was talking to some adoptees on line regarding fogged-up adoptees. How they can be annoying and you know they don’t annoy me. Really, not in the least I am not swayed, impressed, concerned with them. There is nothing, no influence they can have over me.

Without thinking about it, I said, that I have no opinion about them, they don’t annoy me because no one can threaten my experience again, I am too validated. No one was talking about being threatened by them, and later I thought maybe I shouldn’t have said that. I realized I went there so quickly because I used to be threatened by them.

I mean most adoptees like myself are basically gaslighted their whole lives. We are told we are nuts, ahem *deluded* we must be defective for feeling the way we do ad nauseum. Hairdresser’s cousins come pouring out of the woodwork wielding hot curling irons and fake smiles, like a Greek Chorus singing “we love being given away and adopted we just wish it would happen more often.”

I can no longer be intimidated by these happy adopted cousins, they have lost their sparkle for me. I am neither threatened or even mildly interested. I don’t feel pity or annoyance. I just feel my attention being pulled elsewhere.

Having this blog has changed me in ways, I never thought possible. Talking to other adoptees, even though we are all different has been invaluable. A friend recently commented to me that she had seen a huge change in me the last couple of years. A friend that doesn’t even know I am adopted.

“You used to get really torn up when you talked about your mother, you used to be a lot more vulnerable” It made me squirm a bit. I didn’t say that I am free of soft-spots or flaws, am not. Still progress is relief.

I was talking to someone close to me recently and she started to tell me what sounded to my ears like a big fib. It was being told in response to something I said. Kind of a defensive “me too” including others. I didn’t buy it. It sounded completely implausible.

She later admitted she was inventing. I thought about it, I am of the belief that usually people who lie have a reason to lie, people warming themselves with denial are protecting themselves from what they simply can’t face.

I don’t have to deal with that, I don’t have to fool myself.

I am not perfect, have more than my share of flaws, but I don’t have to pretend about this.

She admitted that she struggles with self-esteem issues, and made the comment that everyone does.

“No, not everyone does, lots of people don’t. I don’t.”

Which I can only hope opened a door for her. As much as I have struggled with adoption there was always a core of self-esteem and self-respect that seemed to just come with my body.

I think I just inherited it from my father who is fond of exclaiming “My name is Joy’s Dad, and nobody fucks with me, man”

While I find his self-expression juvenile, I understand the sentiment. It crashes out of me like a wave at times. It can make other people very uncomfortable because its true not everyone feels strong enough.

I can’t help those people though, and there is no denying that the bar has been raised for me and I am free to go.

I have always identified with the fool and the rushing in that expression.

We did a lot of things with our company, so it is not just like we had this one conversation about my personal adoption. After the initial explanation about our current situation and the difficulties it is fraught with my company decided to help me out by educating me about the bright side of my adoption.

It is so interesting when you talk about adoption. There was so much that I didn’t say that they seemed to have perceived me as saying. I see this on line all the time. For a lot of people if you say anything except exaggerated gratitude and strange platitudes the implication is that you are saying you wish your adoption never happened, that it was a total wash and you don’t appreciate anything about your life.

Naturally since they care about me, they didn’t want me to see my life as a wasteland so they decided to school me. Again these people have known me pretty much my whole life. They knew me when I met my mother and I told them about it. I believe they met and liked my father. I know there was at least one Christmas where they took me to my father’s house for a visit.

Their first tract was telling me to be thankful for my son who would have never been born if I wasn’t adopted. “You don’t know that” I responded. Sweetheart reiterated what I said, “You don’t know that”

This went on for just a brief while. I got the abortion argument thrown in for good measure, then I was asked if I could not see ‘anything’ good coming from my adoption.

My brow furrowed, sometimes my body busts out with comments that bypass my mind, and sometimes I am glad for my body’s wisdom. My mind started to say, ‘ you are putting words in my mouth, I never said that.’ Suddenly, I heard my mouth fairly calmly declare, “fuck-you, I am not sitting here listening to this shit anymore.” I got up and went outside to have a cigarette and cool my jets.

Which I did, it didn’t take long.

I rejoined the party. We were having a glad and gay time, the woman though, she is an inquisitive curious one that sometimes doesn’t know when to quit. What can I say, ya gotta have sympathy for a sister in that way. She starts to let me know that other people have problems too. Which doesn’t get to me, despite the fact that I have never exhibited any behavior that suggests otherwise. Despite the fact that I have been very supportive to her through some real tragedies of her own, the loss of a child, the loss of a brother to addiction.

Did she think I didn’t take her sorrow seriously? I don’t push it because I recognize the line of thinking. If you have any difficulty with adoption, you believe you are the only person who has ever had any difficulty in life. This is a common and bizarre theme. “You know bio families have problems too” Yes, we know that. How could adoptees not know that? If our bio familes hadn’t had difficulties we wouldn’t be adopted for feck’s sake Seamus! (my favorite Stewie expression).

That doesn’t discount the very peculiar difficulties of being adopted. Is there any other situation where people feel compelled to say such absurdities?

If someone tells you their wife left them for the pool-boy, do you say, “Pool-boys have their problems too?” or “That sucks, I’m sorry, if you want to talk about it I’ve got an ear?” I mean honestly.

I indulge her I talk a bit about sealed records, reform, etc. Then she confronts me with, “Well if you feel this strongly about these things, why don’t you DO something about it instead of ‘wallow’ in it”

This time my head is spinning and my mouth starts to sputter. The beginnings of sentences come out, ‘run a forum, organize a national protest, found a…” but then my body and my mind cut me off. Since it worked so well the first time, I repeat, “Again, I am not going to sit here and listen to this shit, you don’t know what I do, you forgot to ask” and spin up and out of my chair.

My sweetheart says cooly, “You have no idea what she has been through” Which shocks me. My sweetheart reminds me a lot of John Stewart only funnier, quicker, and a bit more subtle. Granted he is not on T.V. and maybe that is why John Stewart delivers on the heavy side.

This time he isn’t like that though. He doesn’t joke to diffuse the situation. He hates talking about adoption and most of our discussion around it comes in the form of him sighing “great” when an obvious trigger is delivered to me, or even goading me by saying the thinks this video is “cute”

He got Tomtom to go along with him…:P

But when it really mattered to me, although I would have been okay without his support. He who hates the drama of adoption was there calmly, completely supportive of my downright surliness. I have never talked to these people like that before in my life either. I am too adroit and cagey in real life to come off with such a lack of argument, a lack of caring whether or not they understood my side.

I have done it on line to be sure. I have had people want to argue their point on my blog APs and NMs, with the purpose of denying my experience or having me perform gymnastic feats to get them to maybe consider my point of view and I have said, “bug-off, I don’t have to have your approval, you don’t have to approve of me or like or understand me. This blog isn’t for you, wanker”

I haven’t done it in real life, well granted I don’t talk about it much in real life. Still I have never done that. My mind told me I wasn’t polite, there was a better way to handle it, I could have been more sensitive.

My body said, “no way, that felt good goddammit, that felt excellent. I will not be a party to degrading my experience or toadying up to them just because I love them.”

They needed to step-off and I made that as clear as possible. I am not going to console them or bouy them up regarding my adoption shit. They had better learn to respect it if they want to talk to me about it.

Part of what got my back up, is this woman has known my me for nearly the entirety of my life. When have I ever sat and wallowed? My personality has always leaned toward action. I was the kind of kid that jumped in the swimming pool first, I was a teen mom and finished college to get three ridiculous degrees, for the most part on my own, have been involved in a lot of political action, organizations, volunteer work, creative projects including literally building a freakin’ school and now she is suggesting I am just a lay about crying about my birth certificate.

I know others have done more, but scratch your average adoptee and I am no slouch in the “up with adoptees” movement.

Most of all, even though I could certainly work on my delivery, it made me feel free and secure in myself that I didn’t need to justify or apologize for my experience to them. The only way I can describe it is the ability to stand strongly on my own two feet for myself. I wasn’t going to be knocked over or cowed. Even if that meant being impolite.

It can’t have been to hard on them, I got an enthusiastic thank you card for a fabulous time, fabulous was underlined twice. They are teh awesome.

My sweetheart’s unblushing support was just an added bonus.

It made me think for the millionth time, I don’t give him enough credit.