Posts Tagged ‘Acts of Kindness’

The man who bought me my hot chocolate, his name was Russ and he is a flight student in the Navy. I know this now because I saw him in Circle K, and I smiled and said hello and thanked him for his generous gift. We talked for a few minutes and then we both had to head off to our perspective jobs. Russ makes me feel conflicted. He is handsome and generous, someone that in another time and a place I would love to go on a date with and I would be hopeful that a relationship would form, but can you date while you’re pregnant? I’m not sure, but as he hasn’t asked me out yet, I suppose that’s putting the cart before the horse.

With Rob back in town, Mary and I setup a phone call between us and Beth and John. I wanted to do it while he was still out of town, but he surprised me and said that he would like to be there. In an effort to show that I was willing to be accommodating I drove out to his house on the day of the call and they called us there.

It was a strange feeling, that feeling that this house that had been OUR house, was not mine anymore. It seemed a little surreal to be there as a visitor, but I was excited to talk to Beth and John so when the phone rang on schedule at 6:00 I could hardly keep myself from answering the phone like a breathless teenager.

“Hello?” I said, and for a split second I was filled with terror, what if this was Emily?

“Hello, is this Joy?” a woman’s voice said from the other end.

“Yes, yes it is!” I said excitedly.

“This is Beth,” the voice said.

“And John,” a male voice chimed in.

“This is Rob, the birthfather, I’m here too.” Rob said from the phone in the bedroom.

It is very hard for me to explain the connection that I felt to Beth and John from that very first phone call, but I felt an immediate connection. I felt a current of excitement between the three of us immediately. Beth and John started to ask questions about how I was feeling, what my likes and dislikes were now that I was pregnant. I told them about my recent cravings for Crab Rangoon, how during the really ferocious bouts of “morning” sickness my coworkers were bringing me french fries since they seemed to stay down better. I got a sense that Beth and John were happy that I had people in my corner. I told them about feeling the baby, and I could tell they were as excited as I was! I asked about what they do for a living, what preparations they had made, and without me asking they told me about the journey that brought them to adoption.

Rob stayed quiet during the first excited exchanges and then he cleared his throat and said “I have some questions I would like to ask.”

Hmmm, this was news to me.

“What religion are you people?” Rob said.

“We’re Catholic,” John said.

“I guess that’s okay, I wouldn’t want to give my baby to a Satanist or anything” He said.

Nervous laughter erupted from me, and I could tell it sounded off, but frankly, this was as unexpected to me as it probably was to Beth and John.

“I’m Mormon, so Religion is very important to me.” Rob announced.

In truth, Rob was raised Seventh Day Adventist and in college became LDS when he met his wife, well now ex-wife. He was a non-practicing LDS, early on in our relationship I had helped him burn his garments and other things that he was not allowed to wear because of his current Church status. I was a Christian Mutt, raised Episcopal, went to a Catholic School, and attending a Methodist Church – never during the course of our relationship was religion ever an issue – I was shocked to hear it was an issue today.

Rob asked more questions about their educational backgrounds, their relationship, and their family medical history. At this point the Rob was asking questions and John was answering them and I felt like a tub of cold water had been thrown on me. I knew about their education backgrounds and their relationship, all of the questions that Rob asked were in their profile. I also though asking about their medical histories was kind of funny because that was really something we brought to the table more than the adoptive parents.

Finally, Rob seemed out of questions and there was a pause.

“Would you like to exchange email addresses?” Beth asked softly.

“No thanks, have a good evening,” Rob said and hung up.

“I would!” I said at the same time, and then repeated it after Rob hung up, “I would really like that Beth.”

So we exchanged email addresses and said our good-byes. I hung up the phone feeling happy and hopeful.

I left Rob’s house that night a few minutes later. I had nothing to say about his interrogation, because I tried to remind myself that what we needed to feel confident in our decision was different and as long as he felt comfortable and at ease with our decision, it should ultimately make the whole process easier on all parties involved and who was I to say what should be important to him in this process?

I’m somewhat of a creature of habit, so almost every morning I stop at Circle K and grab something to drink in place of my occasional coffee.  Usually I grab fruit juice or bottled water but with Christmas a few days away I decided to treat myself to a nice hot chocolate. I was standing there in line, waiting for my turn at the register,  enjoying the smell of hot chocolate and when I stepped up to pay, Ms Casey smiled at me.

“The man in line before you, he paid for your hot chocolate.” she told me.

“What?” I asked, completely confused.

“He told me to wish you a Merry Christmas,” she said smiling sweetly.

There was no one in line behind me for me to “pay forward” this nice gesture too, so I tried to get out of the door in time to thank the mystery man. I saw him from behind his steering wheel, he was obviously in the Navy – he was wearing a flight suit and his brown hair was cropped into a short military hair cut. He smiled when he saw me, and returning his smile I waved and mouthed “thank you.”

I was shocked that a handsome man had just smiled at me, I was pregnant. Bring pregnant was already becoming such a part of how I thought about myself that it wasn’t until I was pulling into the office that I realized that though I saw myself as pregnant, to the untrained eye I didn’t look pregnant. I hadn’t gained much weight yet, what with all the throwing up, and the small bump that was there was easily hidden under the bulk of winter clothes.

I walked into the office ready to tie up any loose holiday ends. Ken was standing there talking to the receptionist and he looked at me and smiled brightly.

“Today, you’re glowing, ” he said.

I blushed, and made my way to my office, but I thought that today was the first day I was hopeful that there might be more to my life than just being pregnant.

I cannot tell a lie, visits to the ob/gyn are my least favorite doctors visits – they are horribly uncomfortable, so I’m going to gloss over the gory details. My first OB visit went much like every GYN visit I’ve every had, after I endured the indignity of being weighed “in public” (okay in public means by the nurses station where no one is really paying attention but the number is always higher than I think it’s going to be.) I was put into the stirrups where I closed my eyes and tried to send my mind some place more exotic.

The new aspect was that instead of leaving at that point, I was taken to the doctor’s office where I sat patiently waiting for him. I looked at the pictures of the doctor and his beautiful wife and children. He had warm kind eyes and I noticed that his children seemed to have inherited his warm kind eyes. (As someone that is adopted I am always fascinated looking at how biological parents and children are similar.) The doctor bustled in with my file, and patted my shoulder as he passed me on his way to his desk.

“You’re into your second trimester,” he said “and I would say your due date is June 11. We need to get you scheduled for an ultra sound. Are you taking any prenatal vitamins?”

“Over the counter ones,” I responded.

“I’m going to give you some samples of prescription prenatal vitamins,” he paused and flipped through some of the pages in my file.

“You are placing your child for adoption?” he asked, looking up at me.

“Yes,” I said simply.

“I want you to know that I applaud you in your decision, and my staff and I will do whatever we can to support you.”

I opened my mouth to answer him, and I thought I squeaked out a thanks, but eyes started to fill with tears at this unexpected statement. I was moved beyond words.

“We’ll work out the financial arrangements with your attorney, please don’t worry about anything on that front. Focus on taking care of yourself and the baby.”

He came around the desk and handed me my paperwork to take to checkout and patted my shoulder as he passed again. Graciously, leaving me with a moment to compose myself before I left his office.

Perhaps it was my imagination but I felt a genuine warmth from his staff as I checked out and made my appointment for the next month.

Back at work, I talked to the receptionist about blocking out my doctor’s appointment for next month. While we were chatting I noticed that Cathy and her business partner Charlie were out of the office for the afternoon. I still felt rattled by Cathy’s reaction to my news but I knew that I was not going to be able to hide my pregnancy for long so it was time to bite the bullet and tell my coworkers.

I supervised our art department, there were three guys in there. Ken who was the team leader and two years older than me and then Tim and Josh who were both much younger. I walked back into their office and as is often the case with creative people there was some nerf ball rolling across the floor. I glanced at the job board, frowning – a common occurrence in that office, but in fact I was buying time, trying to find the words.

“Guys, there’s something I need to tell you.” I said as I turned to face them.

The radio was turned down, heads popped up from the back cubicles kind of like prairie dogs popping out of holes and Ken leaned around his monitor to look at me.

“I’m pregnant and since Rob and I are hardly able to be in the same room together, we obviously can’t parent a child together, so I’m placing the child for adoption.”

At this point I didn’t think I had any expectations because everyone I had shared this news with had reacted so differently, but I was surprised again by the reaction.

“Thank God,” Ken said to me and then he turned to Josh and Tim. “see I told you there was a logical reason.”

“A logical reason?” I asked, puzzled.

“Yea, for all the throwing up,” Tim said with a slight tone of exasperation as though it should’ve been obvious what they were talking about. Ken and Josh nodded in agreement. “we were worried you were developing an eating disorder.”

“But you didn’t seem to be losing weight,” Ken said with a solemn expression and a twinkle of mischief in his eyes.

My cheeks colored slightly, as I didn’t realize that everyone knew I was throwing up but of course, the walls were thin and the bathroom was rather centrally located so I imagine I had been heard in there more than once.

If you had told me that those three men that I so often thought of as “man children” with all of the toys in the office, late night movies, and long talks about video games would have taken the news so in stride I would’ve been flabbergasted. However, there was a slight shift, as they took me under their wings and tried to protect me. In the days that followed they learned that french fries didn’t make me sick, and so they often brought me some back when they ran to get lunch whether I asked for them or not. I was also presented with ginger ale and ginger candy as someone had read some article that told them ginger was good for upset stomachs. There was, of course, teasing now – after a bout of morning sickness I was told that it was the watery eyes that made pregnant woman seem to glow, but I was touched by their kindness more than I was harassed by their humor.

There was still a coolness that I couldn’t explain between Cathy and myself, but I refused to settle on it for any length of time. After all I was under the advice of my doctor to focus on myself and my baby and the blessings of friendship were far outweighing the small bumps in the road I had encountered and I knew I would still encounter.