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Hello,all good fellows from that amazing class 1982.If You were wondering why I did not show myself in any classmeetings and did not make a sound about me since we leave the school,
here is my true story:
In May 1983, I married Bruno. The first year of our marriage, we first lived in San Sebastian and then the Dearfax District and then Via Mala. We moved back to my dad's in 1984, just after the Olympics were here, and after Bruno had an affair with one of the neighbor ladies in Via Mala. She was a drunk and I was way hurt. Bruno's pattern of affairs, drug abuse, abandonments and neglect caused me to majorly fall out of love with him (if I ever *did* love him ... I still was hung up on Japhy). I was still one of those silly women back then, the kind that thinks she's incomplete without a man ... I tried to make my marriage work for YEARS (and for nothing).
In May 1989, I found my birthmother ... living 7 miles from me in Tuwapa. I tried to have a relationship with her, but she was not a nice person *at all* and we parted ways. Her getting drunk at our first meeting should have clued me in. Also, she REFUSED to help me locate anyone else (like my birthfather) or even give me a few clues ... I would later find out that she also lied to me about a whole lot of stuff. Bruno acting like an idiot and telling her he smoked pot probably didn't help matters, either. I felt like he was trying to sabotage things.
In mid-late 1990, we found Bruno's birthparents, Ray and Barbie Jean (YUP, he was adopted, too). At first things seemed to go well with them, where I was concerned, but soon Bruno started hanging out with his brothers more and more, and started not coming home ... with MY car! My friend, Jessie, went with us to a family gathering and told me that Bruno had said something, for everyone there to hear when I excused myself to the restroom, to the effect of "what a bitch my wife is." Jessie told him "If you treat her that way, that's what she'll be." Then she did me the greatest favor anyone had ever done for me ... she told me what he said. People had told me things before like this, but I always took it with a grain of salt or thought them to be exaggerating. But I knew that Jessie was MY loyal friend and wouldn't make up a lie.
I finally got the courage to kick Bruno out in May 1991, and divorced him 4 years later. He now lives in Gladstone, Michigan with his 2nd wife. He found me on the 'net recently and I could tell by his e-mails that I am better off having nothing to do with him. Jessie broke up with her boyfriend (of 4 years) around the same time I kicked Bruno out, so I asked her to move in and she has been here ever since ... just over 10 years now. By the way, "here" is the same house that my adoptive parents brought me home to way back in 1962 -- in North Salwento -- or as Pete Venkman sarcastically called it in "Ghostbusters II" -- "Southern California's Beautiful San Fernando Valley."
In Dec. 1993, I got a phone call from my birthfather, who I managed to get a letter to through the Social Security Administration (I lied and said I was gravely ill and needed my medical background). We arranged for me to fly to Denver to meet him and my younger, FULL sister (my birthparents had married after my adoption, and had another baby 6 years after I was born ... something Betty failed to tell me in '89). I also was to meet 2 of my 3 half sisters (the 3rd is in Florida and I still haven't met her). I was to arrive in early January, but Edward took ill on X-mas Eve '93 and slipped into an irreversible coma. He died 18 months later, having never woken up.
I visited anyway in January 1994 ... and was astounded to wake up one morning to see the Northridge earthquake coverage on TV (what are the odds of being out of town for such an event, especially when you've lived in the same house for practically your entire life?) ... I returned home about a week after the quake.
I went back to Denver in July '94 and my aunt and I drove to Ferbanks, Illinois -- my birthfather's birthplace -- for a huge family reunion that's held there yearly (in Derby, IL). It was the farthest I'd ever gone by car ... from Fraser, Michigan through Toledo and Dayton, Ohio, through Indianapolis, Indiana and then down to Southern Illinois.
I also spent more time with my half sisters. One of them was quite a bit more open to having me in her life than the other. But, despite her desire to be my sister, she treated me kind of poorly at the same time. I haven't heard from the more distant one since May 1995, when she last sent me a birthday card. The other one liked to phone me when she was drunk ... she would dissolve into tears eventually and then if she perceived that I was not paying attention or if I spoke about something other than "us," she would scream "Fuck you!" at me and hang up. Needless to say, I had had enough people screaming and cussing at me as it was, so I was not interesting in having yet another. I do miss my nieces and nephews out there ... it would have been nice to be an aunt. I also have lost touch with my full sibling, as well. The 3rd half sister played the "come here, go away" game with my head, in the beginning by phone and then letters. Then she'd clam up. A couple years later she e-mailed me out of the blue ... then changed her screen name.
But, I did gain an aunt that I still am in touch with and the reunion in Illinois was mind-blowing. I met my great-uncle (my aunt and birthfather's father's brother) who has since passed away, aunts, uncles, cousins ... you name it. For the first time in my life I finally knew exactly "what I got from who," and "how I came to be." I finally felt like a human, rather than an alien stranded in No Ho. I just hope that my birthfather knew I was there during the time I spent with him. I prefer to think he knew, at least in January, but he seemed too far gone to me by July. It was amazing he clung to life yet another year after that.
Maybe I let the sister thing go too easily ... I mean, I *thought* I wanted sisters, but now it doesn't seem to matter. Probably because I grew up, in essence, an only child. My adoptive parents had had 2 sons, but one died. That's why they adopted me. His name was Michael ... when they got me, my name was Nancy and they changed it to Mary. One time in the 2nd grade I came home from school and told my mom I wanted her to change my name to Nancy (the name of a girl at school that I admired) and mom turned white as a sheet. That was when she told me I was adopted and about how my name WAS Nancy. (Maybe the name stuck in my subconscious, after all, it is what people called me for the first 18 months of my life!)
My adoptive parents' surviving son (my brother), Andy is 14 years older than me and about the only things I remember about him was his moving to Berkeley when I was young. I saw him in Berkeley when mom was alive and I remember him coming back here for her funeral. Then I didn't see him again until 1982 ... which was also the last time I saw him. At least we talk on the phone occasionally and he even mailed me some old family photos and films. That made me feel really good -- the fact that even though I'm adopted and we were never close hasn't stopped him from treating me fairly -- he's a really decent guy. Anyway ... to sum up the last few years ...
I somehow wound up working at Hope's brother's messenger service in Hollywood, delivering scripts and other stuff to stars/studios/etc, and other more mundane runs to "common folk" like me. In June 1997, I decided to get a computer (I had used Hope's PCs for about 7 or 8 years before finally giving in and getting my own!). I was starting to think of ways to earn money from home, because my physical limitations and social anxiety (I should be the PAXIL Poster Girl) had made it pretty difficult for me to go out and be "normal."
In Dec. 1997, I started building websites ... they may not be the most perfect, high-tech sites online, but for once I finally had a direction and a goal ... they literally rescued me from my growing depression. They may not be rocket science, but I feel like I am contributing *something* to the world and I now have a creative outlet for my anxieties and sadness, which is very, very helpful. Now I also think I am the happiest I've been since I was 8 and a half ... a lot of the credit goes to Jessie, Hope and my online friends.
Well, believe it or not, that's pretty much the "Reader's Digest Condensed Version" of my life. I've had so many ups and downs (mostly downs) that I actually am amazed I just turned 40 years old on May 22, 2001! I don't know how I did it, but the important thing is, *I* did it ... I mustered up strength I didn't know I had and faced what I had to to finally feel whole. It's a really good feeling, when I feel it, though I do still have bouts of depression and feeling worthless ... but I'm working on it and that's the best I can do. I can live with it now that my past is all really behind me
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