Today is Biographers Day. Yes, for those of you keeping track of obscure reasons to celebrate, May 16 is the day on which “commemorates the anniversary of the first meeting of Samuel Johnson and his biographer James Boswell in London, England on May 16, 1763, and honors all biographers.”
So why on earth is an adoption blogger even bothering to mention this, much less attempt a thoughtful blog on the topic?
This is an excellent question, and hopefully by the end of the blog there is be an answer.
I think this is worth noting because there is a little piece within each of us that wants to be known. Each one of us wants to be connected to another person here on earth. We want to be seen. We want to be understood.
All of this then connects to our own unique identity.
We identify ourselves by our work, our gender, our appearance, our religion, our neighborhood. We identify ourselves by our family affiliation—mother, father, sister, brother, daughter, son, granddaughter, grandson. You get the idea.
And then some of us find that we are identifying ourselves by means of how our family was created and our role within that family—primarily by the means in which we came to the role.
Confused yet? How many blogs and books are written about “adoptees?” Or “birth mothers?” Or “adoptive families?”
Mother’s Day has just gone by for 2019, and Father’s Day is coming. Were birth mothers and adoptive mothers celebrated equally? Will birth fathers and adoptive fathers share in the same recognition on June 16?
If someone were to write your biography today, what pieces of your identity would be most important? Or would your identity be defined by your roles?
If someone were to write my biography today, I hope they would include such things about me as my personality. I hope they would include how I made the world a little bit brighter for someone else. I hope they would mention my amazing family—including all the quirkiness and brokenness that has strengthened me and given me insight. If the biographer wanted to mention adoption, I would agree to that being a page, because there is no doubt the institution of adoption has played a huge role in both my personal and professional life. Yet I don’t want the title of my story to be Diane, Adoptive Mother.
I think I want the title of my story to be Diane, A Loving Person.
And your biography title? I’d love to share those as well.