This is a very special birthday for me. A sort of mile stone birthday so to speak. No, not the typical milestones we think of like the "sweet sixteen" or the year one can vote, or even the year one can collect Social Security (that's coming up soon though). No, it's special because it has been nine months, twenty-eight days and fourteen hours since my cousin gave me the gift of knowing who gave birth to me.

For many, many years I prayed that I would find my birth mother; not only so I could get answers to numerous questions, but also so I could thank her for giving birth to me and loving me so much. On my birthday, Mother's Day and many other days, I would whisper a little thank you into the air in hopes that the message would get to my birth mother (who ever and where ever she was) and she would know in her heart that I was thankful. Last night, the eve of my birthday, I was able to look at my birth mother's sweet face and say that thank you.

Thank you Mommy Patty for your sacrifices so that I could have life.

Thank you Mom Juanita and Dad Harold for raising and loving your sister's baby after Mommy Patty went to meet her Maker.

Thank you Cousin T for revealing Mommy Patty to me.

Thank you my Dearest Kim our lives together.

Since Learning Who My Birth Mother Was

It's been several months now since I learned who my birth mother was. Over the past few months I've noticed things that I hadn't noticed before. Simple things that may seem silly. Like, one day I was using my teeth to open a bobby pin and happened to glance in the mirror and saw my guardian mom's chin and lips exactly the way I had seen her open her bobby pins so many years ago. I thought to myself, "oh my god, I have my mom's (actually my guardian mom's) mouth!" Memories of her nightly ritual of sitting on the couch with her bag of bobbie pins "setting" her hair in pin curls while watching TV came flooding back. I chuckled to myself and wondered about what other missed clues about my roots were right in front of me all along. Certainly not the fingers. My guardian mom had the long fingers that were great for piano playing. Mine on the other hand are short and sort of stubby. Hmmm, I thought, I must have gotten them from my birth father. Speaking of piano playing, my guardian mom, with never having a lesson in her life could tickle the ivories quite well. And sing....she could really belt out songs from Billy Holiday and other artists of that time period. Me on the other hand......not so good. When my son was a baby, he used to pinch my lips together and plead "no sing mommy".