23 years ago today, a black sedan pulled into the parking lot of a nondescript brick building. The kind you see everywhere in the suburbs. Built at an indeterminable time between 1975 and 2000, faux columns, concrete stairs. You've seen them before.
The film flickers, the camera shakes, whispers become louder. The driver of the car approaches the rear, passenger-side door. Click. Creak. The camera drops. Now there is talking and shouting.
"It's Joshua!"
"Hold the camera, momma! No, no, take it, Steve!"
Feet shuffle. Nervous pacing becomes spirited jogging. The camera switches to a nausea-inducing view of pavement, but the tape records the laughter and tears and shouts.
You can't plan for moments like this. You think you'll film the whole thing. You think you'll hold the camera steady. But you're kidding yourself.
The moment you meet your child for the first time isn't a moment for planning, composure, and efficiency. It's not a moment that's filmed by Ken Burns and narrated by James Earl Jones. It's a moment filmed by dad and narrated by mom, both raptured a thousand times more than they expected when the back door opens.
The Delivery
This is the story of my birth.
I've watched the film time and time again. I've seen myself delivered from whatever unsure future I faced into the arms of loving and caring parents who wanted nothing more than happiness and success for me.
I've seen the beauty and power of adoption first-hand.
Before I was born, my father was born, in Ireland. Both his mother and father died, and he too was adopted—into the United States. Somehow, some way, out of an Irish orphanage and into a Massachusetts home. Were it not for adoption, I'd never be here.
Before my mother was born, her father was adopted. His mother died, and his father was a drunk who gave his sister away for a bottle of whiskey. Were it not for adoption, I'd never be here.
The Friends
Caroline and I have always had a soft spot for adoption and imagined it was part of our future. And in the last year, we've watched the Seays, the Vogeltanzs, the Joneses, the Lohses and the Hendricks either begin or end the adoption process.
We're beyond grateful to have such wonderful people in our lives—full of love and grace and humility. We believe in them, and we believe in their cause. We believe in their cause because we believe it's our cause and your cause. Adoption matters.
The Plug
Kevin Hendricks recently wrote Addition by Adoption, an hilarious look at adoption, parenting, and life. Kevin is a stand-up guy and a great writer, and he and his wife, Abby, live out what they believe.
So the purposes of this little story and plug are twofold: one, to let you know about what Kevin is doing. And two, if you are considering adoption, I want to buy you a copy. So here's what to do:
Ahem. The instructions used to be to comment, but they were from a previous version of this site where comments were in existence. But rest assured, a lucky soul received a copy of Kevin's book.
