Traveling Back in Time

One of the things that kept on oddly occurring to me as I drove to Massachusetts the other week, it was really more of a feeling actually…was that I was driving back to save myself.

I traveled alone by plane the first time. The agency mailed me a shuttle ticket. NY to Boston and I had a friend, Diane, drive me to the airport. My mother would’t take the time off from work, but also forbade me to tell any of my friends  so she thought I was taking a taxi. I got there by myself them just as I got there by myself now, though this time I paid for the travel myself too.

I thought a lot about my first trip there. Seeing Boston for the first time, being fascinated by Cambridge and Harvard, watching and being thrilled by the rowing on the Charles River. It was the only time in my life I was met at the airport by a driver holding a sign with my name on it. Something was glamorous about travelling to an unknown world to do this sacrificial act. What can I tell you..I was a Goth chick after all..first generation really.

I felt, in a surreal way, for that girl, who I was, and her travel. How she walked into situation and thought, with adoption, she had found the perfect way out. She was just trying to live, do what she thought she should, make decisions like a grown up, do crazy and dangerous things because she could.

Even having a relationship with him, Max’s father, was just so insane. And she knew it, yet based on what she looked up to, she was doing what she should..what she should want to do. For years Cosmopolitan was her guide, and in the glossy pages would be tales of antics with office relationships and tips on how to get his to be interested, the older, mature, better moneyed man. How exciting when it happened to her…unbelievable really!

What makes me the saddest now, is that no one saw though it all. Not one person asked a question of me. It was like the invisible time of my life. I was sinking in a black hole and not one person in my life tried to pull me out. Heck, I don’t think they even noticed I was gone. No one questioned me, no one cared. They blindly accepted my steadfast answers, but no one asked me why…or even what *I* wanted..

And before someone starts on on personal responsibility and how I made a choice, I am not BLAMING anyone, it just makes me sad. And it should.

I had friends  family, co-workers, classmates, more family..my mother,my grandfather, my uncle, Laura .oh so many friends…and they all went,

“Ok Claud..bye..go to Boston and have a baby and give it away”

Because that is the most normal thing to do and people do that all the time, right?
Wrong, they had no idea wtf to do, coz it had never happened to them before either. They froze like deer in the headlights, too. So no blame, just sadness..I guess more because many of them were the grown ups. I was really, still just a kid. Thinking I was oh so worldly, but totally clueless. I just expected more of them, those grownups.

I Needed to be Saved, yet No One Saved Me

So driving back, I felt like I could save myself.

I was now the grown up and I was going back. And it felt like, in some way, she was back there, still 19, waiting. Hoping for someone to save her, get her out of the jam, make it OK  make it better. And I could. I could give her back her baby.

I was going to go and find him. For me, for him, for her, for all of us. And the terrible separation would be no more.

And we all know I did, and how great it was..and it does feel like a great beginning.

I found my son.

Feelings Post Reunion

So now I am home. I went two more days or so with the mostly brown and blondish “normal” hair and bugged out. Rye and the kids have been requesting the return of the red. I had a jar of Manic Panic Vampire Red and just let that all sink on into my bleached out, damaged tresses.
The color is amazing, and with my darker roots, it does not look too flat or cartoony. Plus I figured out a new way to style it that even Rye likes. That’s pretty impossible.

Of course, the color is very close to that color I was when I conceived Max. That was Poppy Red, a bit more pink, but still very good.

I find myself feeling very.. nostalgic, but in a different way. Like I feel even more open. Like my hair is wild, the new tattoo is on my arm, and can be seen with short sleeves. I cannot hide that I am tattooed any longer. I feel almost more comfortable in my own skin, that I can shout out who I am.

And not just about adoption. I can talk about adoption all day really. If I can bring it into a conversation, then I will. In fact, I gather that sometimes, I can be a bore. Like I am open enough about adoption all the time..so like when I had customers leaving tonight, they asked if I did something else..and I tried to explain what I do here ( lol hard)..and they asked why, and I told them that I “lost my first born son to adoption”..Which lead to a whole conversation, or maybe presentation on my part, about what the issues are in a nutshell. But the thing is, I have been doing that for a long time now. So the openness extends more than just adoption talk.

Maybe I am just happy? But like the other day at work, the “new mix” of MP3’s was all great 80’s stuff and just great classic rock and roll. And it made me so thrilled. I bobbed around all night singing to myself.

Now this AM, Rye and I somehow ended up watching VH1. And let me tell you..it was great! All these excellent videos from back in the day, when MTV was still using a rocket ship as the symbol of coolness, just paraded across the screen. Somehow I ended up fiercely dancing around with the dog, annoying Rye with my bad singing, as he showered. I found it terribly amusing and thought myself hysterically funny and witty.

It’s not that I feel younger, though I am acting younger. I feel complete again.

I Lost Myself 19 Years Ago

Like there was a part of me that did really get lost with Max. A sense of joy, a hope, a belief that was unsure, a dream..that I forgot about. Some part of me, that I lost touch with, forgot how to feel some things, just quieted inside. Like I have definitely HAD happy times in the past 19 years, but there was always something else, some dark spot, where the sun would never shine, no matter how great life was, I would always know, even without thinking, that it was not quite right.

It feels right again.

Happiness no longer must work around that blackness to reach though me to the other side, now it just shines though..it is like I am made of glass. See me, I am full.

I can’t go back though time. I can’t really save myself. There was no pregnant girl looking like me, standing around, waiting, on the streets of Newton when we drove though. Not even a ghost.

But on coming home, yeah, something did come back with me.

I can remember what it was like, before the blackness came, and I can dance again, with the dog, be silly, and be more of me.

So maybe I couldn’t save me then, or even the girl from then, but maybe I can still save me?

It feels good. I can tell you that. It feels good to dance.