Lisa is now officially nine years old. I wasn't there when she was born, but I can put together a picture in my mind, of a young mother frightened out of her mind, giving birth in secret, in a strange city miles from home, to guard that secret. I wonder if she was beautiful, like Lisa is. If she had creamy pale skin and ebony colored hair, like Lisa. I wonder if her heart had been broken by a lover. Was it a Romeo & Juliet type story, or just a puppy love romance gone wrong. I wonder if she was young, a teenager? Does she also look at the date and think about the child she never knew? Has she since grown up and gotten married? Had more children? Will I ever know the truth?
Who held Lisa as a baby, gave her bottles, then fed her mush, like we saw so many of the other babies in the orphanage? Did she cry a lot? Did she stop crying, giving up when the caregivers were too busy with 10 other babies to tend to her right away? Did she have a special caregiver that she bonded with as she grew? When did she first go outside? See a bird, hear a dog bark? When did she take her first steps?
All these things I mourn in my heart. I mourn for all the answers that I do not have for Lisa. Things that she will wonder about as she grows older. I grew up with the stories of my babyhood that my parents and my sister passed along to me. Lisa will have none of that. I grieve that Lisa will always have that hole in her self, a hole that I'm not able to fill for her. I will simply try and do the best I can to raise her to be self-assured and happy, and able to fulfill all her dreams for the future.
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