Nature Provides

I listened to a message delivered on Mother’s Day by a man from Africa who made the point that Nature provides for needs even before they are needed. He said – When you were born, I did not hear you praying for the breastmilk. When you were in the womb, you were supplied with all of the nutrients you received actively. Receiving that from fluid. As soon as you stepped out into life, that knowing of life went ahead of you and provided breastmilk from your mother for you. You didn’t pray for that. You didn’t decree for that. Life went ahead of you, providing what you needed before you would need it. Before we are born, mother’s first breastmilk contains the Colostrum that is needed to immunize your body. Life goes ahead of you, providing the air you need to breathe.

At some point he said – You cannot pray to God to save you from the storm, when God is the storm. If God is all there is, it includes Itself. The storm is simply what Life is trying to express through you and as you. Don’t tell God to fix the storm of problems in your life.

That has had me actively contemplating what this means in regard to domestic infant adoptions. The infant is denied their mother’s breastmilk (at least in most cases, there are probably exceptions, where the mother does this even if the infant is being adopted). Yet this is a powerful, spontaneous, creative, loving and intelligent universe. It is an ever-giving, ever-blessing universe. Fine tuning Itself. It is all that is, so adoption must be part of that, it cannot be otherwise (as much as it pains me to admit this).

Yet, also today I read this from a childhood adoptee – My adopted parents and I had a terrible relationship. I was an undiagnosed autistic with various sensory issues and special interests, they were conservative Christians convinced my special interests (mainly classic rock & heavy metal) were demonic. My struggles and their parenting clashed constantly, resulting in me being out of the home during most of my 13-18 years. I haven’t spoken to them since early 2016. My birth mother told me two weeks before my 24th birthday last year that she “wished she’d have swallowed me”, at which point I cut contact.

Mother’s Day is a bit hard for me. I was a momma’s boy as a kid, and 0/2 of my mothers care for me, or are proud of me. I wish I had a mom to bring flowers to, and thank for always being there for me, but the truth is, neither of them were. I spent most of my teens in group homes, and most of my big life milestones I went through alone.

My mother in law is amazing, and has been supportive of me so deeply since she has come to know me. I thank her every chance I get. I appreciate her so very much, but still sometimes, it feels like something, no, someone is missing. When my wife is lonely, or upset, or excited, she calls her mom. And when I’m in a whole other state, alone (as my wife is away doing grad school at another program), I sometimes wish I had a mom to call.

Certainly, Life has provided him with places to go. Life has provided him with a wife who’s mother is good to him as well. This is a hard one for me to work through but I don’t doubt the truth behind it all. Life goes ahead of you, providing what is needed, before it is needed. That is some kind of cold comfort that can warm a heart that has grown cold with life’s difficulties.

Attacked Once Again

This always feels personal to me because my sons have ALWAYS been educated at home. Mostly we have tried to fly under the radar so that we can continue to do what we believe is best for our own family. It came to pass that my daughter became frustrated with the school options for my granddaughter in Florida and chose to avail herself of their virtual school offer. She has since acknowledged that she understands the appeal of control and flexibility that homeschooling offers. I would be the first to acknowledge that it is not for everyone. If the parents have to go to work outside their home (we have a home-based business), then it is going to be a real challenge to implement.

One of the more disturbing aspects of educating my children at home has been when a case of child abuse becomes linked to the fact that the parents hid behind homeschooling in order to hide their abuse. This often brings calls from those who’s attachment is to public schooling for more oversight and regulation of those of us who have made a personal choice. I am fortunate that the state of Missouri has good supports for homeschooling choice due to a large population of conservative Christians. I am grateful to them though we are not homeschooling for the same reasons they do.

So today, I read yet again an allegation that everyone dislikes homeschooling because it is a front for abuse as the Coronavirus has forced schools to close and children to stay at home.

Can it really be true that abusers have to wait for an official sanction of homeschooling to cover their abuse of their children ? Or that many people homeschool simply so that they can abuse their children ?

More than once, I have encountered arguments for the advantages of school as required for the socialization of children. It is not the blind leading the blind (children of a single age group influencing their peers to bad behavior) for my sons. They have been socialized to the entire spectrum of humanity – from babies to the elderly. We have often been complimented about how well behaved they are in places where some parents’ children are running around like wild heathens.

In this time of Coronavirus, maybe it isn’t so much about socializing as it is that parents are stressed from being home all day cooped up with their children. We have always valued every single minute of time that we spend with our sons.

One could ask whether schools in the US just “holding cells” for the dependents of people who have to work or so that they can have their days off free to do as they please, until their children are released to come home from school ?

As long as society is so “intertwined” with our government that people become upset that those who chose to do so can school their own children or judge those that do as doing so to hide abuse or that well intentioned people must protect other people’s children from being schooled at home, nothing will ever change for the better in a society of free people.

Honoring My Grandmother

In 1916, Elizabeth “Lizzie” Lou Stark was born to James Coleman and Mabel Irene Stark on this date in Eads Tennessee. It is my understanding that her father was a difficult man and quite old when he began to have children. Lizzie was the oldest and her nieces and nephews called her Aunt Lou.

It seems that her siblings and my grandmother each escaped their family home as soon as they could. One can surmise that my grandmother chose the possible opportunities of the big city, Memphis, to her west. There she would meet an older man who had become both widowed and had lost one of his children not long before. Most likely he was attached to a big WPA project building a hospital in Memphis.

So they married but his children and the mother to whom he was devoted and who supported him by caring for one or more of his children caused his heart to remain in Arkansas. For reasons I will never be able to explain, he left her in Memphis four months pregnant. Whether it was considered an end or a temporary separation can never be known.

What I do know is that my grandmother was sent away to Virginia to give birth to my mom. Most likely, she was an embarrassment pregnant with no husband in sight in a very conservatively Christian community. I suspect she was supposed to leave my mom in Virginia but she could not.

I cannot believe she brought my mom back to Memphis with any intention of giving her up for adoption. Juvenile Court records do show that she reached out for my mom’s father over in Arkansas but he did not respond. In his defense, there began a Super Flood on the Mississippi River the month my mom was born. Refugees poured into Memphis from Arkansas who bore some of the worst destruction. My grandfather was out shoring up levees.

My grandmother found the going difficult in Memphis. The people who had been supportive of her previously were suffering from charity fatigue. In desperation, my grandmother sought temporary care for my mom in an amazing citadel of an orphanage with a storied history. The superintendent there betrayed her to Georgia Tann who was a master at separating children from their natural parents.

After being given a no win choice (surrender your child or be declared unfit – a threat with teeth in it because the Juvenile Court Judge Camille Kelley was good friends with Tann), my grandmother tried to get my mom back 4 days later. But Tann had a paying customer on her way from Arizona by train to pick my mom up and no way would the baby thief give my mom up.

Such a sad story. She never had another child . . .