"Someone Margaret Chose to Love"

I just watched an episode of Bones, a rerun; one I had never seen before. Called "A Boy in a Bush", it involved a foster mother and her three foster boys, one of which was the victim of foul play.

The premise of this series is that there is an elite group of research scientists (labeled "squints" by the FBI -- great nickname, wish I had one that cool) often called upon by the FBI for use as forensic specialists in peculiar cases. Thing is, the FBI is getting accustomed to calling on the "squints". The main characters are a very emotive Special Agent Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz) and the clinical Dr. Temperance Brennan, aka "Bones" (Emily Deschanel). They are perfect foils for each other, and in the three seasons it's been on I have delighted in how their relationship has become more intense and complicated, yet remained steadfastly platonic. The other characters are amazingly complex and compellingly intwining, too! I love this show. Damn this writer's strike. (I wish those fat cat execs would cave and and give the creative class their just due. And anticipate it, the next freaking time, will you please? Save us all the agony of so-called "reality tv". There's nothing real about (>snort< heavy derision) 'The Donald's' hair.)

As it turned out, The Bad Guy had some old dirt on the foster mom and was using the two remaining foster brothers (who were blood brothers) to hurt her by hurting the one foster brother.

The title of this post is the quote that Bones' character said to one of the foster boys as she was trying to find the bad guy. It totally worked.

Not just on the character. Not just according to script.

I'm adopted.

This is the first time in all of my TV watching days I've seen anything like this in any kind of drama or sit-com type of show. (I'm not in the habit of watching reality TV. Perhaps it happens there; I'd rather not know. I'd feel completely betrayed if it happened there.) Not since Sesame Street has something moved me like this.

OK, 'Brennan's' parents were killed when she was young (we find out in later episodes only her mother is dead and her father is on the lam) and she spent her young life in foster care. So she was, in (engineered, make no mistake) rare fashion, able to connect with this child (and therefore this viewer, who spent part of her first 9 days in foster care -- apparently a blissful experience, if my babybook-preserved letter from my fostermother is true testament) and get the name of the unsub from him. Case solved!!

The gut-punch, though, was the quote, "someone Margaret chose to love". Margaret is the foster-mother.

Because that describes my parents. Mom & Daddy couldn't have kids because of their own biology. They had to rely on someone else's "cast offs". I was the first cast off they took in. That was June 14, 1968, the very luckiest day of my life. Whereas June 5, my birthday, has historically been my most UNluckiest, regardless of the year. Later years confirmed for me my birthday's curse. (Robert F. Kennedy Sr.'s family may agree with my judgement.)

It all boils down to my being very happy with being an adoptee. (I am.)

I know that it must have been torture for my bio-egglady to give me up. 9 months incubation time? It must have been very difficult to give up whatever baby came out, let alone: I know what kind of cookies and cheesecakes I can bake. (Please don't think I'm trivializing things. I kick all kinds of arse in the kitchen.) And my creative mind? Also, I've been preggers 9 times. Sadly, I can't make it past the first trimester. Maybe Rick and I will give it another go; maybe it'll be this year. It needs to be soonish. I'm a little skittish about going into double digits. But that's my cross to bear. Not hers. (though perhaps her biology? Still: NOT her fault.)(Hmm. As far as genetics knows...)(NO!! Not her fault, no matter what!!)(Sorry, whoever you are!! You don't deserve that! It's the petrie dish, not you.)

ANYWAY....

I LOVE MY PARENTS. My parents are the people who raised me. They are English-German (specifically Prussian) (Mom) and German (Daddy), whereas I am Swedish, Scottish, Irish, English, and Apache. I was born in Montana. I was adopted from the city of Helena while my parents were teaching in a small mining town near British Columbia called Libby. I learned that my egg-woman was a nurse in Helena, that she was blonde, blue-eyed, and tall, and that the sperm guy went to seminary for 5 years, and there is no information aside from that about him in my file at Lutheran Social Services. To call the egg-woman and sperm-guy my parents is an insult to the folk who have been with me through every skinned knee and miscarriage and college, not to mention my divorce.

I miss my mother more than I can express. I lost her to lung cancer 3 years ago. There is no replacing her. Nor am I seeking to. I am grateful that I have my Daddy still. He's a rock. And a very devoted grampa to my niece in Atlanta. He and my husband are amazingly good friends -- it's neat to see them together. I deeply appreciate that. More than either of them will ever know.

Hearing that line, "someone Margaret chose to love" was the most healing, nurturing, and wonderful thing I've ever heard on broadcast TV. It truly expressed what my parents and all adoptive parents do: they CHOOSE TO LOVE the children they are given, long before they are ever given that chance. Sleepless, tearful nights are spent in prayer before any hopes are given (and, often, as easily ripped away -- multiple times before a child is ever granted to the couple!) of ever becoming loving parents.

Now change it to "Someone Kenn and Joyce chose to love" and you'll have me. You'll have my brother Matt, too! That's us. We got chosen. We were sent, then we were rejected, then we were embraced by a family that gave us both an amazing upbringing. We really hit the jackpot. Not the financial upbringing, but that's a good thing: the rich-born are rarely the well-born. Witness the Hilton Horribles and countless Kennedys (the ones typically NOT sprung-off from Bobby).

I needed to share it with someone.

I realize I got extra emotive. I just needed to get it out while it was fresh.

:-)