So the pictures are done
Oct 27, 2006 Adoption
And it only took an hour and a half to convince Madison that posing with Jessica and her boyfriend wouldn’t kill her. But first we had to do two things: Make Jessica’s fabulous (and oh so handsome) boyfriend step out of the picture for awhile; and then bribe Madison with suckers. I mean like this: Take a picture, give her a lick of a sucker (Jessica palmed it so you can’t see it in the pics). It was hell for the an hour and a half before we figured out that she’d give a smile for a lick of green sucker but the pics were worth it.
When we first came in the photographer reasonably assumed that Jessica and Nate were here to take a family picture with their daughter and so they were saying, “Come be by mommy and daddy!” And that’s always awkward at first but I just said, “She calls them Jessica and Nate” and then it all moved smoothly. I was thinking about this because there’s that whole “I forget my child is black” kind of thing in transracial adoption and I don’t really forget that Madison is black but I do forget that it’s something that matters or comes up for other people. In the same way, I don’t forget that Jessica is Madison’s first mom but I do forget that our family (all of us together) looks confusing. At the beginning I felt very conscious of it (and of our transracialness) but now I forget until it somehow gets brought up. My family feels very normal to me and I forget that statistically, we’re a little odd.
Anyhow, the pictures are done. Jessica picked out the poses and the one of her with Madison is very funny and the one with the three of them is oh so nice with Madison and Jessica looking exactly the same right down to their smiley dents (Madison’s are dimples but Jessica’s are less dimples and more dents). And Nate is just so handsome with these big blue eyes. It was a task well accomplished.
October 27th, 2006 at 5:33 pm
Congrats on getting successful portraits. I take lots of photographs, but only candids. I hate posing people, and it’s a real art, to get people to look at and smile for the camera.
I’m commenting to say that I really like your adoption story. I’ve never really understood how open adoption could really work, in a way that damages neither the birth mom or the adoptive family, and you’re navigating your way through it, and showing me. (completely voyeuristic, since my family is complete, and doesn’t involve adoption).
I’m also commenting, because as I hear your stories, it reminds me of stories from other countries (I am Indian), and how adoption works in them. Extended family relative “adoptions” were frequent in my parents day and age — children would often be fostered off into other households where they would be taken care of, and virtually adopted. I recently heard my dad, and a “cousin” discuss their family history, and it got impossibly complicated, because in addition to complicated blood-kinship, there were a series of complicated adoptive/fostering kinships. The issues of adoption/fostering are more complicated in modern society, because of the legal issues involved — in the olden days, people just imagined that they would make things work, without the benefit (or intervention of the law). But, in many ways, it seems that what you are developing in your life as an open adoption is simlar to the stories I hear from my dad.
bj
October 27th, 2006 at 6:17 pm
Do we get to seeee?? They sound adorable. I want to see the dimples, and try to find the hidden sucker.
October 27th, 2006 at 7:15 pm
Did you not want to expalin the situation to the photographer? I think it would have been good advertising for open adoption, he might have a friend or relative who is adopting and all freaked out about open adoption.
Or is it not appropriate to be that open about it?
I was open about my situation today and it made me feel really uncomfortable after.
I guess adoption is still a bit of a taboo subject.
I don’t think adoption doesn’t damage people, in response to Bj’s comment. I think you have good damage control and a lot of love but I don’t think it’s painless for everyone. I think that’s a myth about open adoption, that it’s ok, that it should be pushed because it’s not traumatic for everyone.
I think it has to be hard for Dawn and her tribe sometimes too. Hard to share I mean. I don’t think it’s painfree at all adoption.
Sorry comment is too long….
October 27th, 2006 at 8:04 pm
Can’t wait to see the loveliness–x3. Your gal, she takes a mighty nice picture!