Parallels

Parallels of Life – ART by Lena

The most fascinating thing for me about learning the truth of my family’s origins has been the parallels.  Both of my parents were adoptees.

Both of my grandmothers lost their own mother at a young age.

Both of my grandmothers fathered my parents with a man much older, 20 years older, than they were.

Both of my grandmothers lost their children due to a lack of their family’s support and lack of paternal support.

There are contrasts as well.  My maternal grandmother was actually married.  Her father even signed the marriage license.  Why then, did her husband leave her in her family home after only 4 months of marriage and her 4 months pregnant ?  It is a question I will never be able to answer.

My paternal grandmother had an affair with a married man.  I doubt that she knew he was married when she first began dating him but of course, he knew.  His wife was over 20 years older than him and a private duty nurse.  One can imagine he had the luxury of many nights when she was sitting at someone’s bedside.  My grandmother was self-reliant and took care of the reality that she was pregnant on her own.  He may have never even known . . . but she knew precisely and outed him in a photo album as a breadcrumb for me to discover many decades later.

These parallels may be a coincidence or they may somehow be part of the picture, the meanings, the reasons that things happened the way they did.  I am simply grateful to be able to tell their stories now after 60+ years of not knowing about their actual existence.