Rose-colored glasses...

"Rose-colored glasses are never made in bifocals. ~Ann Landers

At this point he had not asked me anything about his father...and those capital letters did not sit well with me...I was not sure what to do...should I contact his father?...should I tell him that I reunited with him?...would it even matter to him?...the fear of the unknown was over taking me. I called my daughter-in-law (it recently dawned on me that she was not just my sons wife, but she was my daughter-in-law!) and told her that I was feeling so badly about that...not to worry she assured me...Gerard will ask about his father when and if he wants to...right now YOU are enough...
"It's as if something precious that was lost was suddenly found, and you just said...oh there you are. Everything is very natural and Gerard has been so happy", she told me. Later that evening my son called and told me not to be worried there was plenty of time to talk about other people...right now I was more than enough...and after all...there has never been a grandpa peanut...there has only ever been  a grandma peanut! And you do know, that you get most of your genes from your mother...my son the biology teacher said.

I decided that I would locate and call his father...and I did. Now, I could go into what I recall from this phone conversation but, I am learning that I am only responsible for my side of the story. What I will say is that the excitement...the love...the feeling of finally being whole...the feeling of euphoria that I was feeling was not there. I will say that the abandonment issues I have always had regarding this subject with him resurfaced...I will say that I was not pleasant to him when I listened to his words.

In my book, Permission Slip For Your Heart and Soul, this is one of my FAVORITE pages. Probably because I love looking at things in a positive way...maybe because I have a bit (OK a lot) of a Pollyannish attitude! But here comes the glitch...I usually think that everyone thinks like me...that what makes me happy makes them happy...what makes me sad makes them sad...

And what happens is when the reality of that thinking proves to be wrong, I get hurt. Now, is this of my own making?...of course it is, I really don't think that people would deliberately hurt me...But I should never assume that everyone looks at the world through rose colored glasses...I should never assume that everyone looks at the glass half full....I should never assume that what is good for the goose is good for the gander...

Life with all its wisdom knows that this is the way I must live my life...rose colored glasses and all...it has brought me to this day and this place. And as much as I might wish that everyone thinks like me, I know that is not the reality of life. That you cannot make anyone else think...act...or believe what you do, no matter how hard you try...how loudly you yell...how hard you stomp your foot. We each are responsible for ourselves only.

After that phone call, my emotions began to swirl down different rabbit holes because of all the issues surrounding placing my son for adoption that I had pushed...shoved...and buried deep within over the last 42 years...and now they were bubbling to the surface. (I have never liked the phrase "gave up for adoption" it always sounded so unattached to me and that was never how I felt...my son said it best..."I believe that I was entrusted to adoption, till we could be together again")

How was it possible that I was SO HAPPY...and yet SO SAD?