CHAPTER 7

December 2004

One evening, Dicken is home from a business trip, and we’re sitting in the living room, holding hands and watching Jasper and Grace dance to a George Harrison album. Jasper keeps coming over to touch Dicken briefly, as if he needs to make sure his beloved Papa is really here, in the flesh. It’s already dark outside at not quite five o’clock. I feel warm snuggled up next to Dicken. Harrison’s beautiful, stirring voice sings, “Beware the darkness . . . beware of sadness . . . All things must pass, all things must pass away . . .”

“Do you realize that if I die when I’m seventy, my life is half over?” I say to Dicken.

He smiles dumbly and nods in rhythm to the music.

“When I look back on all my years so far and think that I only have that many again to get to seventy, it doesn’t seem like much time. Not that I want to live in this world forever. I guess I’m just not sure I’m ever going to be able to let go and face the great mystery of death all on my own.”

“The things you think about, wow,” Dicken says, shaking his head. I can’t tell if he’s admiring or disapproving or a little of both.

“Why, what were you thinking about just now?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing? You’re listening to George Harrison’s stunningly soulful poetry and you can only think of nothing?”

“Okay, okay, maybe I was thinking of something.”

“Like what?”

“Well, I have been considering a new hard drive.”

I laugh, but within seconds I’m back to thoughts of death and being separated from my loved ones. Maybe this is just my annual winter gloom, compounded by the recent reelection of George W. Bush, which hit me hard. Everyone knows I get extremely internal in the winter, and that I turn into a dreadful Grinch at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Only this seems more extreme than my usual holiday funk. For weeks I haven’t wanted to see anyone other than my family. I haven’t felt like going anywhere. When I look in the mirror, I see spots and wrinkles on my face and a patch of gray in my hair. I have cellulite on my thighs. My teeth ache. My gums bleed. My appetite is off. Coffee doesn’t sit right. My knees throb. I have pain during intercourse—nothing feels right. What strange watershed am I crossing? Youth into middle age? How dreadful.

“Are you sure you love me?” I ask Dicken, moving as close to him as I can. He smiles and puckers his lips. As I look at him, I wonder how I can ever be gloomy when I’m convinced I am one of the most comfortable, sheltered, loved humans on earth. I watch Jasper and Grace dancing and giggling, smell the lasagna Maud has in the oven. We’re almost able to bring Kevin home; Dicken is flying along in every way, our relationship is better than ever. So why this darkness? This death rattle?

* * *

Like most things in life, the Threshold Choir is not the perfect experience I hoped it would be.

For three months, I’ve been attending biweekly meetings and singing for people approaching death. I get to sing the hymns I loved when I was little, the familiar words and tunes fortifying me as I stand in the face of the mystery. Standing at the bedsides of the dying, I can’t deny old age, illness, decay. I search for my courage, and I find it. I don’t look away. I stand and sing, feeling strong. I know it is a privilege to be a witness.

The singing shakes all scary thoughts from my head and brings me into my heart. Mostly it makes me feel sad, humble, insignificant. I tell myself, Enjoy your life while you’re young and healthy. Enjoy your loved ones while they’re still here. Stop whining or waiting for people and circumstances to change. Keep looking at death and get friendly with it. Wake up to death, and to life!

What I can’t understand is why I’m so afraid of my own aging when I’m just thirty-five. I can’t understand why I still have this terrible sense of foreboding. I thought the choir would make me stronger in the face of death, and it has. But it does not mitigate my terror of personal loss. Rather, it seems to have intensified that terror. The choir brings me close to the terminally ill, but it seems that it’s only their dying I can handle. It’s as if I’m able to face death only when it promises to end the deep, irreversible suffering of strangers: the erosion of self brought on by dementia, the strength-sapping pain of inoperable cancer. Dicken’s in robust health, Jasper positively radiates energy—and I can’t bring myself to imagine them ill or injured. I feel immense gratitude for my life as I sing for these unknown, unknowable people entering the mystery, but then I go home to count the years I have left, to cling to those I love as if my hanging on will keep them here forever.

* * *

While we wait for Kevin, I keep wondering if we’ll have another baby. I know this isn’t the time to consider such a momentous decision, but I find myself obsessed. It is a question I have been struggling with for a few years; Kevin’s impending arrival and my awareness of encroaching middle age have now brought this issue to the fore. Will he be the last child we welcome into our family? Or is there room for a brand-new life, a counter to my musings on death?

I love babies. The year Jasper arrived was the happiest of my life. The joy and laughter he’s brought us are immeasurable, so why would we say no to another baby? Yet I feel hesitant—afraid another child will upset the fragile balance of our lives. I worry about morning sickness and debilitation, and the heavy burden that will shift to Dicken as a result. I already feel overwhelmed by the number of children in the house. There are compelling ecological reasons not to have another baby: overpopulation, the gigantic resource footprint each North American represents. And there are those dark moments when I question the wisdom of incarnating at all, when I see earth as a hell-realm, a place where even the most fortunate among us suffer and struggle, where all of our desires and pleasures are either denied outright or rudely taken away from us.

Like the joys, the demands of parenting can’t be adequately comprehended by the human mind. Mothering brings me some of the most frustrating, humiliating, exasperating, heartbreaking, exhausting, marriage-challenging, dream-killing moments imaginable. At its worst, I could argue that it is relentless, tedious, unglorified, and unpaid work, something that denies me the freedom to pursue fun, relaxation, peace, and my own goals in life. And yet there is an odd, math-defying reckoning that happens, where one glorious moment—like watching my son run to hug my own mother, or hearing him use a word in some humorously misunderstood way, or seeing him rescue a wounded bird and keep watch by the shoe box for hours, even after the bird has died—and all at once the entire weight of parenting evaporates. It’s like the sun suddenly comes out, warming me from the core in a way nothing else could.

There is a gift in the humiliation parenting brings me. I was arrogant enough to believe that I could avoid all the challenges and pitfalls of parenting. I thought I was smart enough and in control enough to figure it out, to be a perfect mother. I’ve come to see that all my best intentions, my master’s degree in child psychology, my giving up everything to focus single-mindedly on my child, haven’t kept Jasper from experiencing the pain of being human. I’ve been profoundly humbled, again and again. Motherhood deepens me, helping me as I try to make peace with myself, and life.

If one child has done this for me, will another mean twice the blessing? I can’t seem to turn off the noisy mental process of reasons for and against. I just want to know. I am tired of waiting for Kevin, waiting to see what happens, waiting for a direction to make itself clear. I want to be able to plan my life one way or the other. I keep hoping Dicken will have a strong opinion and take the burden off me, but whenever I raise the subject, he either dodges it or says something like, “Whatever you want, dear.”

One night I demand a serious answer.

He thinks for a moment, his expression sober, so I know I’m not going to get a brush-off response.

“Well, I can think of plenty of reasons not to have any more. I can see us filling our lives with other things as we move out of the childrearing stage. But I think that’s on a rational, surface level, and when I feel into it a little deeper, I have a sense we’re not quite done. I think we might have one more, a girl.”

“I don’t really want to have another baby,” I say, surprised and a little skeptical of my sudden clarity as I hear the words come out of my mouth. “But I’d do it for you.”

“That’s a terrible reason!”

“True,” I admit.

We’re silent for a few seconds.

“I don’t know why I said that,” I say. “I think I might want to have another one. I resonated with what you said about our not being quite done. I guess I just wish we didn’t have to decide so soon. I can’t imagine having another baby now. I feel so pressured.”

“There’s no big rush, is there?”

“Oh yes, there is. At my age, it’s now or never. This is it. The longer we wait, the more out of the realm of possibility it becomes.”

“So why don’t we think about trying?”

Typical of me and my oppositional streak, as soon as I get a green light from the outside, my internal brakes slam on. I think of Maud, exhausted with her two small children. I think of how I don’t feel all that healthy: coffee addict again, gray hair invading. I’m yearning to write, travel, romance my husband—not change diapers, organize playgroups, go through the pain of separating. How I hated leaving Jasper when he was little. His crying broke my heart, even though I felt I couldn’t survive without breaks. But I love babies. Seeing the joy Jasper gives so many people, mostly us two, and the laughs and the magic and the wonder and the lessons, the growth, the sweetness—how could anything keep us from the amazing gifts we get all the time?

“I’m so confused. This is driving me crazy.”

“Listen,” Dicken says firmly. “Stop thinking about this. We don’t have to decide anything tonight, or even this month.”

“Okay, but I’m not getting pregnant after I turn thirty-six.”

“Fine. That gives us ten months, plenty of time.”

He takes me into his arms and I close my eyes.

The baby is on his way, he’s eight years old, he’s in Costa Rica waiting for us to come get him. He’s ours, he’s beautiful, he’s miraculous, and we’ll go from there.

I fall asleep with an ache in my chest, like a great unknown abyss.

* * *

The next morning our lawyer in San Jose calls with instructions on getting Kevin and his birth mother blood tests, one of the last requirements in the adoption process. They both live a long way from the only clinic in the country that performs the test. It takes me numerous phone calls to line everything up. Kevin’s uncle Bobby promises to arrange to get Kevin’s mother and put them on the bus and buy them round-trip tickets which I will later reimburse him for. I think about them all that day, seeing them on the bus together, arriving at the station and then making their way to the clinic in downtown San Jose, wondering what it is like for Kevin to be with his mother again, to have all those hours alone with her. Does he realize this trip is one of the final steps in severing any chance he might have of being raised by her? And how is it for her? Does she feel any shame in giving up her child? Is she sad? Hopeful? Relieved? Conflicted?

I call the clinic the next morning to make sure they’ve taken the tests. I have butterflies in my belly. We are getting so close to bringing him home! In my basic Spanish, I ask if the Brown-Gallardos made it to their appointment.

Expecting a yes, I hear the opposite: “No, they never showed up. No show, no phone call, no nothing.”

I call Kevin’s uncle a dozen times that day, finally getting through in the evening.

“What’s going on, Bobby? I talked to the clinic, they said Kevin and his mom never showed up!”

“No, we had a big flood, lot a rain. All the roads washed out.”

 

January–February 2005

It takes six weeks to get the Brown-Gallardos another appointment. Christmas comes and goes, without Kevin. I call Kevin’s uncle and aunt every day for a week leading up to the next test date to remind them. This time they make it. The clinic faxes me the results of the report a week after that: the chances that Kevin is Flor Gallardo’s biological child are 99.5 percent. The government of Costa Rica approves the adoption. He is clear to go now, just about.

I book myself a round-trip ticket to Costa Rica and a one-way ticket to the US for Kevin. Our lawyer says four days will be enough time to wrap everything up. We give it two weeks just in case. I end up staying four weeks, spending most of my days in line at visa and passport and embassy offices. One day I stand in line to get Kevin’s Costa Rican passport, finally making it to the window after four hours, only to be told I’ve been in the wrong room the whole time. Another day I’m told by a harried official that I have all the wrong documents. I break down crying. He opens the file to show me my mistakes, only to discover he’s got another family’s file. He doesn’t apologize. When my file is located, I’m told it is complete. I am hugely relieved.

Then they ask me where my husband is. I tell them he’s back home in America. They say he needs to sign the final document before they can approve it. I try to remain calm as I explain what my lawyer said, that only one of us needed to come down to complete this process. They are firm: Dicken needs to sign this last form.

I break down again. I call our lawyer from a pay phone. He doesn’t sound surprised. He says he’ll look into it. I go back to the hostel and watch cartoons with Kevin. When I speak to the lawyer again, he says the newest regulation does require both parents’ signatures on the final decree.

“Can your husband fly down as soon as possible?”

Are you kidding? A last-minute flight would cost thousands. Does he think we’re made of money?

“Are there any other options here?”

“Well, yes. Your husband could go to the Costa Rican Embassy, or a consulate, and sign in front of an official.”

The next day, Dicken flies to the consulate in Los Angeles and signs the document. A copy is faxed to the officials in San Jose. We are done with Costa Rican bureaucracy and sail through the US immigration and passport process. After the weeks of struggle and frustration and waiting in long lines in sweltering rooms, I can’t get over the customer service at the US Embassy. They are so friendly and helpful and organized that for the first time in a very long time, I feel grateful to be an American.

The US Embassy gives us Kevin’s passport entry stamps, meaning he can come home now. I can’t believe we are cleared to go—it seems too good to be true. Then I start to think we’ll never get home, because for days I’ve been trying unsuccessfully to get through to the airline to change our tickets, which have been on hold for weeks now. Every number I try is either out of service or for the wrong department, or I run out of time on the cheap local phone cards I’m using while I’m on hold.

Standing in the hostel in San Jose two nights after our approval, I finally get through to Dicken on a pay phone, techno music blaring in the courtyard behind me.

“Dix?”

“Is that you, Cinda? I can hardly hear you.”

“Yes, it’s me.”

“Did you get my e-mail?”

“No, a storm blew out the Internet connection.”

“I’ve been worried about you. What’s the story with your flight home?”

“I still haven’t been able to reach United to get seats tomorrow. The phone system down here is terrible.”

Kevin is next to me, looking up at me with big, inquisitive eyes. I smile, trying to reassure him.

“Listen, give me the pay phone number and I’ll look into it right now and call you back,” Dicken says.

I give him the number.

“Now, stay by the phone and don’t let anyone use it. I’ll call you back as soon as I know something.”

I cross my fingers and wait, reminding myself that Dicken and his British accent seem to have a way with airline agents.

Five minutes later, after fending off a number of young backpackers desperately wanting the phone, it rings.

“Honey, United has no seats available until late March, because it’s tourist season right now. They’re booked solid.”

I feel like I might break down. We’re still in February.

Dicken continues, “But I managed to get you tickets on American for Tuesday.”

I start to cry. I can feel how badly I want to get home.

“I explained the story to the agent,” he goes on, “and she was so moved she got you seats in first class, no extra cost.”

“Wow, Kevin’s first time on a plane, and he’s in first class.”

“Tell him not to get used to it!”

* * *

Kevin has a million questions as we ride in the taxi to the airport in the early morning. He wants to know how many days the flight will take, and if there will be food and a bathroom on the plane. He wants to know why I’m giving my bag away when I check it in at the desk. He has no suitcase to check; all his belongings fit in the small backpack he’s carrying. On the plane, I give him the window seat. As we take off, I watch his face, pressed up against the plexiglas. He pulls my arm and gets me to look out the window over and over, sharing his amazement at all the miniature things he can see below. Whenever the flight attendant brings us a drink or food, which is frequent in first class, Kevin looks at me with wide eyes and exclaims, “Free?! It’s free?” After we land and the flight attendant holds up people’s coats for them to claim, Kevin’s refrain rings out again: “It’s free?!”

I am pinching myself as we make a smooth transit through immigration at LAX. Then, after two more flights, we finally arrive in Medford at midnight. Dicken and a wide-awake, super-excited Jasper are waiting at the gate. Jasper takes a big step forward to hug Kevin, but Kevin steps back, and the hug looks awkward.

Dicken kneels down and looks into Kevin’s face. “How are you doing? Are you hungry? Thirsty? You must be tired.”

Kevin smiles a little shyly, maybe not understanding Dicken’s words, but clearly feeling his warmth. Then he reaches into his backpack and gives Jasper the chocolate bar he bought him at the airport in Costa Rica with his last colones.

“I’ll carry your packback,” Jasper tells Kevin. “I been to Costa Rica seven times and one time I threw up on the plane so I know it’s a looong way.”

Kevin holds onto Dicken’s hand as we walk to baggage claim.