to MY DAD!!!

Today is the 20th Anniversary of our adoption!! I was going to send my parents something special, but all I could do was call them. They are on a plane heading to Hawaii. They are taking a cruise around all of the islands–a gift from my dad to my momma!! So sending flowers or something would have been silly–as they aren’t home to get them!!

My parents were married on July 15, 1980, but we weren’t adopted until September 23, 1986–6 years later. Looking back my mom just shakes her head for waiting so long–but with a second natural parent in the shadows she wasn’t sure where to proceed. But after 6 years of no interest from the “bio-dad”, she went ahead with the adoption proceedings. He had been out of our lives for nearly 10 years by the time the adoption came around. I think the last time we saw him was July or August of 1980, and before that it had been several years. Plus we had called Dale “Dad” for nearly 5 years before the adoption began–so it was really just a matter of making it all legal!

I remember at the time that the best part of the whole thing was getting to get out of school early to go to the courthouse. We sat on a long, hard bench-strange to remember that. Then the judge called each of our names one at a time and asked us individually if it was our desire to be adopted by my dad. I looked around the courtroom and there was no sign of my bio-father, which was probably good–but we each answered that, “Yes, we wanted to be adopted by our dad. Our adoption records were sealed and we got new birth certificates. It’s kind of cool to have two!!

My mom always said that when she married my dad we not only got a dad, we got our mom back. She had worked full time my entire life, and was finally able to be a stay at home mom after the marriage. But even more than a mom and a dad, we also got a new set of Grandparents, and a brother and 3 sisters, and aunts and cousins that loved us. I never got a birthday card from any of “bio-dad’s” family after the separation, and after 1978 never got a Christmas present–not that that’s the only reason to be excited to get a new set of grandparents–but up until their deaths–my Grandma and Grandpa Sansom never missed a birthday. I have every card they ever sent and every one of them are signed “With Love, Grandpa and Grandma” They had no problem loving and accepting us–something you find hard to believe after being abandoned by an entire side of a family. I have a picture that I treasure taken in 1982 at Christmas. I’m sitting on my Grandpa Sansom’s lap with my arm around him. I’d only had him for 2 1/2 years by then–but adored him. My dad traveled a lot and was out of town during one of our “Daddy Daughter Dates”. I called my grandpa and he came with me. I was 13 years old. The theme was the 1950’s and we danced to old songs. He was quite a dancer. We have video of him at my older brother’s wedding in 1997 and he’s out on the dance floor in his late 80’s, just a joy of a man! He died the weekend before our move from Phoenix to Chicago and I just didn’t feel like I could get away. One of the biggest regrets of my life thus far–I should have loaded up the car and driven the 10 hours home, but I had so much packing to get finished! My sweet grandma died the year before I got married. After she passed they cleaned out their home so that they could move my grandpa in with each of his children. So my parents called me and asked if there was anything from their home that I wanted. The only thing was an octagon shaped candy dish that sat on their coffee table. It was chipped and had been glued together numerous times–but it was always there on their table. I remember every visit I would sit there and wonder if candy was in it. When there was my grandpa would always pass around the dish, and when there wasn’t I would still just sit and stare at it. Well, when I got it–it was broken in half again. So I put it inside a pillow case and took a hammer to it! Then bought a picture frame and used the shards of the candy dish to mosaic around the edges. Then I put a picture of my sweet grandparents in the frame–it is one of my dearest treasures!

My dad is just like his parents. We’ve never had anything but unconditional love and acceptance from him. My parents had a very VERY short courtship, after we met him my mom woke my little brother up and asked him what he thought of this man and my little brother–7 at the time said, “I think he’s just right” and snapped his fingers.

After I graduated from High School my dad gave me a trip with him. I got to fly out and meet him in one of the cities he was working in and then we would spend the weekend there and fly home. I chose New York. I flew into Philadelphia, met him and drove up the coast to New York. We had gone to NYC as a family vacation when I was in Jr. High but the Statue of Liberty had been in scaffolding and no one was allowed on Liberty Island. So when I went with him we got to go out to Liberty Island. We went to the Trade Centers, to the Hard Rock Cafe, Central Park–just basically walked the city. He asked if there was a Broadway show I’d like to see–OH YES THERE WAS!! So he dropped me off with cash to buy tickets and I looked up at this board with all of the tickets available, and looked to see that he had just handed me $200 to get two tickets. Well, I was starting college the next Monday–and he was paying for that–he’d paid for the whole trip–he’d given us so much, and I realized that I couldn’t spend $200 for one afternoon–it was just too extravagant to me after all he had done. So I came back to the car and we headed back to the Marriott. He had “the cookie card” as we called it–regular people know it as the “Concierge Card” but we went up to the concierge and got cookies and soda pop and headed back to the room for a night of movie watching! The next day we drove back down to Philadelphia. We stopped at the Museum to run up the stairs like Rocky did–but holy cow, I had to pee SOOOOOOOOO bad, so we limped up the stairs used the facilities, and then ran down them!!!

When I was on my mission in Japan, I was reading in the Book of Mormon and came upon the portion that described Captain Moroni. I sat there (on the floor) reading and realized–that I was reading about my dad. I wanted to write him a letter–something that was just to him–every letter I wrote was disguised as being for the whole family–but really I was writing to my mom!! So this one I wanted just for him–but knew that if I mailed it home–someone else would read it first–I remembered that the luggage tags on my bags were his business card-and had his office address. So I wrote him a letter and copied down the passages that described him/Captain Moroni and mailed it to his office. Well, apparently his secretary brought his mail into him and said with a smile–”You have something from someone in Japan”. Since my dad’s company didn’t do business with anyone in Japan the statement threw him off and he said, “Japan–I don’t know anyone in Japan”. Then she laughed at him and reminded him that his daughter was in Japan.

I guess you can’t tell from this post yet–but I love my dad!! He took us from poverty and gave us the world (literally). He put braces on my teeth, bought my first car, paid for my education, walked me down the aisle at my wedding. Would have married us, except that he was released as Bishop the week before the wedding. He has been there for the birth of all of my children (born in 3 different states), blessed each one of them (in 3 different states), baptized my oldest and has given Father’s blessings to each of them at almost every visit. He is my hero! He is the model for how I want my sons to grow up and treat their wives and children. He is the dearest gift a child could be given–and I’m glad he was given to me!!