Orphanage, Part 5: The Interview

You know how they say that you should take someone with you when you go to an important doctor's appointment, because, when the news is about you, you can't absorb it? That you need that third party to listen and to take notes so that they can go over it with you later? That's how today was.

Kraig arrived at our home around noon. He wasn't anything like I expected, though I'm not really sure what I expected! Cute as the dickens, I think he said he was about 45 years old, and just very easy and casual. I had warned him about our dogs, how they would bark like crazy for the first thirty minutes before they settled down. So he came with a box of Three Dog Bakery dog treats! He had also brought a black screen cloth, two unbrella lights, a tripod, a video recorder, etc.

We visited for a little bit, my daughter and husband showed up and we visited a little more, he set up his equipment and hung the black background on the curtains, attached the mic to me, sat me in a chair, started asking me questions based on my blog posts and on the emails he and I have exchanged, and on the information that he had found and I had yet to know about.

And what information he found! Never in my wildest dreams did I think he'd have this much! Some of it I already knew, some I wasn't expecting at all, and some just blew me away. To say I was stunned would be an understatement. To say that I'm still numb three hours later would be accurate. I'm not an overly emotional person in public, but my heart was beating wildly and my ears were ringing the entire time with suppressed emotion. And that's why I can't tell you about it right now. I've yet to process it.

That bag at the beginning? That's an early birthday gift from Kraig. It contains a book of the history of Lake Bluff, Illinois (with a section on the orphanage), a dvd of interviews with the two nurses who would have been my nurses for the three months I was there, pictures of the orphanage as it looked then, photos of the nursery and the cribs...and two sets of documents covering the end of my mother's pregnancy starting in April 1948 when the unwed mother's home is making arrangements for me to be placed in the orphanage, thru to the one year evaluation of me with my adoptive parents, all the way to "August 31, 1949 Case closed. Child legally adopted."

Some of the things I thought I knew about my birth, my biological mother and her family, were false. Everything I thought I knew about my biological dad was false. Things I knew a little about were elaborated on. New facts emerged about my maternal family, my mother's pregnancy, and my birth and time at the orphanage. Most was good. As soon as I read the papers again, look at the dvd, and maybe look at the video that my daughter took, I will be able to focus enough to make a post about all that I learned today.

For now, let me just say this. I turn 62 on May 15, and I never thought I would get this kind of birthday present at this age. Did I mention that I'm stunned? And that Kraig has got to be one of the nicest people I've ever met? And that he came all the way from Chicago to Ringgold, Georgia to give me the results of this research he did for someone he'd never met, who he only found out about last year from my mentioning Lake Bluff Orphanage in a blog post?

Yes, indeed, I am stunned. (...to be continued)