Something Good

When I was 2 months old, my mother packed my sister (18-months older than me) and myself into her VW Bug and fled from her abusive husband (my sperm-donor).

Through the help of family, friends, and an underground network of battered women's shelters and private homes, my mother divorced her husband, left Illinois and relocated to Missouri where she finished her Masters Degree at the University of Missouri.

When I was three, she met my dad, Al Plummer.

When I was five, she married my dad, Al Plummer.

When I was nine, my dad, Al Plummer, legally adopted my sister and I.

This fall my passport comes up for renewal. Because I'm going from a Diplomatic Passport to a regular civilian passport, I have to provide all kinds of documentation that I am who I say I am. One of which is a birth certificate. And because I also need to provide information for an I-9 form at work, that same birth certificate will come in handy.

I've never seen my birth certificate.

Last week I wrote the Madison County Clerk in Edwardsville, Illinois and requested a copy of my birth certificate.

Tonight it came.

Listed on my birth certificate, my mother, Sheila Y Plummer age 22 and my father, Alvin A Plummer age 25.

Seeing that, finally after 30 some odd years of him being the only father I've ever known made it real.

I've put him thru a lot from stealing the family car and wrecking it, to running away, to getting arrested and being put on probation and having to live in a halfway house, to lieing and cheating, to working for the enemy (George Bush)...but every step of the way he's unconditionally loved me as his own.

He's never turned his back on me, or reffered to me as 'her child', nope, he's taken many major lickings from me and for some odd reason he's still ticking.

As I stare at this paper that states "This is to certify that this is a true and correct abstract from the official record filed with the Illinois Department of Public Healthm," I realize that this paper in his mind is thicker than any blood could ever be!

Thank you and love you Daddy!