A Belated Mother's Day

I awoke to rain on the mountain this morning. A fire of ancient gray oak branches burns in the fireplace—a gift from the forest.

And speaking of gifts….

Thirty-three years ago, a teenager from a troubled home made the decision to relinquish her unborn baby for adoption. She told the caseworker at Children’s Home Society that she believed abortion was wrong, that she wanted to do the right thing for her baby, even though the circumstances of his conception had been partly due to the dysfunction in her family. The boy that was born and “given up” (though I believe the vast majority of birth mothers never “give up” on their children) in 1977 was my beloved son. And what would I do without him? He is my friend, my confidante, my advisor. (Had he not nagged me into it, I would never have attempted to become a homeowner again after my divorce—but what a wise and fortuitous decision it finally was.) The flowers and gifts he gave me for Mother’s Day last week are still displayed on my kitchen table. I am intensely proud of him….

And I know his first mother—the woman who named him “Kevin”—would be proud as well, proud of the man he is, proud of his accomplishments in life… if she only knew.

So I spent some time on Mother’s Day creating a Facebook page with some of this information, then I asked my friends to re-post a link to the page. I figure somewhere in Southern California, there has to be someone who knows something about this woman. My son is bi-racial. His birth mother is white with red hair (or it once was; she’d be 52 now). We believe her maiden name was Parker….

Here is a link to the page:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Finding-Kevin-Parkers-Birth-Mother/208443199189095