Thanksgiving: Meeting the Biological Family — A Homecoming of Sorts

My husband, Bill, was adopted as an infant.  When his adoptive mom was 39 years old she asked for a little girl. When the adoption agency called her, they told her they had good news and bad news for her. The good news was that they found her and her husband a child, but the bad news was that it was a cute blond curly-haired little boy. They took one look at him and took him home. He grew up in the Oakland Hills as an only child. His Mom, while a U C Berkeley grad, was a stay-at-home Mom dedicated to this little boy. 

Bill was plagued as a child with asthma and missed some school because of it which followed him until he was about 10. He grew up to be a tall good-looking kid with a penchant for cars. He always knew he was adopted and he knew his family was from Montana.

He joined the Navy after high school and traveled all around the world. In one trip to Monaco, he and his Navy buddy were stopped on the road by Princess Grace and invited to the Palace for a meal to which they went and enjoyed themselves.  Princess Grace loved her servicemen and women from the USA. 

When Bill was a young man of about 22, he lost his adoptive Dad and his Mom never remarried. When we got together, she loved all our family gatherings and my family adored her.

After going to Italy and meeting some of my family, Bill openly admitted that he wondered if he had some brothers or sisters or even cousins somewhere. When we got home from Europe, I was online trying to find someone who was looking for their child or sibling. For months, after hundreds of hours, I searched to no avail.  Pretty soon, it was all but forgotten. 

The adoption issue came back to the forefront on another trip to Europe, and when we got back from that trip in 1996 we went at it with a vengeance. California adoption records are sealed and we knew that. We knew that he was adopted from an agency in Oakland, so we called them and asked them to send the file to us.  They said “send money.”  We did and the microfilmed papers arrived weeks later. 

To our disappointment, everything important was crossed out, like last names and the cities in Montana where his parents lived at the time. What we did know was their professions and that of their parents, their religion, their siblings, and very little else.

What we did do was to file a “Consent to Contact” form in 1996 that basically said, “Here we are if you want to reach us.” I guess we were dreamers to think that we would get any response, but we did have high hopes. As each year passed, our hopes were shattered. Bill always was okay with this because he was secure in who he was. He loved his adoptive parents and really never thought about finding his family until he saw the connection I had with my family in Italy.

In November 2001, after returning from dinner one evening, we had a message on our answer machine that said, “Hi, I think you are my brother.” Bill took the message and came into the family room with this incredible message. That night we were on the phone to his half-sister, his dad, his stepmom and his mother. 

His parents were young and never married. His Mom came to Oakland to live with an aunt and gave him up for adoption while his Dad went into the service. His Mom’s two brothers from a neighboring ranch were his Dad’s best friends. When his Dad came home on leave, he found out that he had a son in California.

Bill’s parents met up at a friend’s funeral a few months earlier and they talked about the son they had in California. His Dad asked his Mom to look into it. When she did, she was told there was a “Consent to Contact” in the file. Had it not been for that piece of paper, we would have probably never met the family.

Bill’s questions were answered. He was no longer an only child. He had brothers and sisters. He was the only one of his friends who loved horses and had a horse, a Tennessee Walker. He loves wearing western boots, and he has always been drawn to country western music. 

I had previously given Bill a surprise 50th birthday party several years prior where I roasted him with a slide show, so I thought it would be a good idea to put together a binder for his Mom and one for his Dad showing Bill’s life in pictures from an infant to present day middle-age adulthood. I told them we would send it and they were waiting with anticipation for FedEx to arrive and “meet” their son. They both loved their binders and caught up on the missing years. I have to say that they both treasured those binders and showed them off to friends and family.

We were on the phone to his family almost daily. His sister said that “Dad will have an outfit for you.” I thought it rather strange and I said to Bill, “They must think we don’t know how to dress in California.” Then, she said it again in another phone call.  I called her on it and asked her what she meant by “outfits” exactly. She said, “Dad will have a car and cell phone at your disposal.” 

Thank God, I thought. Here I was worried about wearing plaid flannel instead of rhinestones! What do I know, I am a California gal. We learned one thing, “outfits” in Montana have nothing to do with clothing.

Bill’s mom had to tell her sons about their older brother and break a family secret she kept for 57 years. We didn’t envy her having to do that. It was a shocker for sure.

That following weekend we had out-of-town guests and although we wanted to catch an immediate flight to Montana, we were committed to entertaining our friends from Washington state, which had been planned for weeks. After our guests left, we flew into Great Falls, Montana. What awaited us at the Great Falls airport were about 30 family members (parents, sisters, brother, nephew, aunts, uncles, and cousins) as well as a videographer and photographer to capture the moment. It was truly awesome.

Bill looks like both of his parents. His Dad jokingly said, “No DNA required here.”  Most of the people at the airport were on his Dad’s side of the family. His Mom, one brother and his brother’s son were on his Mom’s side of the family. We learned that Bill had two other brothers on his mother’s side of the family but there was a sister who had passed away a year or so before. So the only child was not an only child anymore. Yes, he had my four brothers, but now he had three brothers and two sisters in Montana.

After arriving in Montana, we all had lunch together in Great Falls and then we left for Helena to his Mom’s house and stayed a few days with her, meeting with two of his three brothers and their spouses. Then we headed up to Dad’s ranch out of Cut Bank, Montana, a 100,000-acre cattle ranch bordering Canada, near Glacier Park, where we spent time with the family on the ranch. We loved the ranch horses, especially the beautiful offspring of the Triple Crown winner Secretariat, named Eminent Son. Eminent Son sired many of the horses on the ranch. Side note, the horse was fatally hit by lightening several years later. It nearly killed Bill’s Dad.

It was Thanksgiving and we truly had something to be thankful for.  We all ate in the cookhouse with family and the hired men.  It was such a wonderful Thanksgiving for us, and at 57 years old, to spend the first Thanksgiving with your birth parents was truly a gift for Bill and his folks. It made me feel so wonderful to see the joy in my husband’s face. 

A year or so later, his Dad and stepmom came to California. We never told Bill’s adoptive Mom about any of this. She was quite elderly at the time and not in the best of health and we didn’t want to upset her in any way. On one trip, when she was 95 years old, when Dad visited, he wanted to go to the retirement home to see her and thank her for raising his son. We asked him not to say anything to her about that. Bill introduced him to her only as “Bill.” Mom said, “My you two look like brothers.” Then she said she liked his belt buckle. His Dad was only 17 years older than Bill so it was possible that they could have been brothers — the family resemblance was incredible.

Bill’s Mom came for Mother’s Day one year and we enjoyed the Claremont Hotel’s fabulous Mother’s Day buffet. Another time she came to California to stay with us, we were inundated with rain, as it was in December 2005 when it flooded downtown.

They say this is a small world, and when certain things happen, it really makes you believe it. First thing is that Bill was named by his adoptive family and they did not know that his birth father’s name was also Bill. His sister’s name is Billie. 

His father had a cousin in Redwood City and he told Bill to stop in and meet the cousin when he was working over there. One day when Bill was in Redwood City, he stopped by to visit the cousin. In their discussion, the cousin’s wife asked Bill where he grew up. He answered that he grew up in Oakland Hills. She said her girlfriend lived in the Oakland Hills too.

It was not long before it was determined that her best friend was Bill’s next door neighbor. Bill had partied there with this family for years and apparently was in the company of his father’s cousin without knowing it. Then we found out that the cousin’s wife and Bill’s neighbor all went to Balboa High School in SF and were my Uncle Tony’s classmates. 

In October 2006, Bill was itching to go to Montana and I was committed to handling some business that could not wait. Bill had this uncontrollable urge and felt that he had to go then and there, so he ended up going without me. On a previous trip, his Dad wanted to give Bill a beautiful solid gold nugget watch. Bill thanked his Dad but said that he would rather have one of the large rocks on the property to put in our front yard at home. I could have kicked him and maybe I did.  He wanted that rock.  So, he loaded up his flatbed trailer and went to Montana for what I called the “Fxxxing Rock Trip” that couldn’t wait. 

Bill came home with the rock and planted it in our front yard. He had a great visit with his Dad and was glad he went. It was not two weeks later that his Dad suddenly passed away. I guess God had a plan. The sad thing was that they only had five years together, but it was a good five years. His father was a special man, a good businessman, and he was loved and respected by many people but none respected him more than his son.

We have really bonded with these Montana families and we make at least one if not more trips there each year. 

We all need to treasure the time we have with our parents. Mine have both passed. Bill’s adoptive parents have passed as well as his Dad in 2006. Thank God we have his wonderful Mother still in our lives and his fantastic step-mom. It is just unfortunate that they live so far away. We are truly blessed to find these families and are blessed that they are a big part of our lives. 

As this Thanksgiving approaches, we reflect fondly on that very memorable Thanksgiving in Montana with the family Bill thought he would never meet and get to know. God blessed all of us by bringing us together and by letting us spread our love to all of them across the miles. 

I hope everyone finds something to be thankful for this Thanksgiving and that we all pray for those who are serving our country away from their families and their homes and ask God to keep them safe until they can come back and have their holidays with their loved ones again.