[Continued from HERE.]

The best part about the long-term memory loss of our community members is that we found it absolutely hilarious.

It was a good day when one of us (usually me or one of my parents) would come home with some anecdote or another about being stopped in the street by Mrs. So-and-so to be told that she had seen me walking by her house the other day and just couldn’t believe how much I was growing up to look just like whomever she was talking to, mother or father.

Sometimes, the same Mrs. So-and-so would say the same thing to both parents separately at different times in the year. Whether she thought she was showing her open-minded acceptance of our situation, was a giving a veiled reminder that she does indeed remember that they had adopted me or that my looks were so chameleonic that I could indeed appear to look more and more like both of them, will never be known. Regardless of the motivation, though, we were always quite tickled by the whole thing.

Invariably, such exchanges would inspire my mother to wax lyrical either about bringing me home in a soft yellow blanket she had crocheted and how beautiful I was or about another, not so funny day after church when the mother of a girl my age had said, “Oh look at the cute little adopted baby! Isn’t it great that she can wear her sister’s hand-me-downs? So cute ...”

My mother of monumental memory was mortally wounded, but again, it is hard to tell if it was because the woman had drawn attention to the fact that I was adopted, or because of the reference to my hand-me-downs (which my mother SWEARS they were not) or just the condescending commentary in general. My mother never forgot, though.

Generally, once everybody knew my name and to whom I belonged, it was just an “is” in my village. We, as a family, found great pleasure and mirth in the communal forgetfulness and acceptance ... and it was good.