Mother of Dreams

He was already at the coffee shop when I entered. In spite of never having met him before, I knew it was he instantly. There was an uncanny sense of looking in a mirror, of seeing myself but with a different hairstyle. He must have had the same sense, because he stood as soon as I walked in and reached out his hand.

“Michael Winston,” he said, a small shake in his voice.

“Elizabeth Alston,” I replied, feeling the sweaty grip of his hand.

“Can I buy you a cup of coffee?” he asked. I nodded, and he went to the counter.

I don’t even know why I took that DNA test. Everyone in my neighborhood, it seemed, was going on about how they were 10% this or 25% that. My Irish husband even found out that he had some Viking and Bedouin blood in his distant lineage. I learned just what I thought I’d learn at first… that I was mostly European with a trace of Asian. After all, statistically, isn’t a large population somewhat related to Attila the Hun?

What I was NOT prepared for—not even remotely—was the email from We Be DNA six months later stating that Michael Winston of West Virginia wanted to contact me because he was 99% sure that we were siblings. SIBLINGS? I had a younger brother with whom I have lost touch. I’m sure he’s a great guy, but I’m also sure that we just don’t have a lot in common except for history and blood. It’s nothing personal, but when you are raised in a family that has little to no tradition or connection other than the empty threat of “Because I’m your parent, that’s why,” or “We have to stick together because we’re family,” it’s hard to stay together—especially when said parents are long gone.

He returned to the table and placed a café Americano in front of me. “I forgot to ask how you take it,” he said, handing me two creamers and a sugar packet. This was, ironically, exactly how I take it.

“So…” I started cautiously, stirring my coffee much longer than needed. “What do you want to know?”

“EVERYTHING,” he said, eagerly leaning forward. “What was SHE like?”

Michael had told me on the phone that he had been given up for adoption as an infant, and his parents—though loving and kind—always seemed to pale in his eyes compared to the mother he believed he had lost, believed he would find someday.

“I know that she loved me and that she was going to come back for me someday,” he whispered. “I never thought I’d be too late to meet her, but now I can ask you what she was like.”

“Well,” I said, hedging my bet.

What should I tell him first? The fact that she was a raging alcoholic who threw daggers of criticism at us every time she had too much red wine? The part where Robin, my younger brother, was the golden child because he was supposed to bring fame to the family but then ran away from home at 17 and never came back? Should I tell him the part where I was currently in therapy to heal my self‑image and part of an Adult Children of Alcoholics support group to wrestle with my own maladaptive behaviors?

I, on the other hand, was expected to go to nursing school and then stay at home to take care of her as she aged. I remembered seeing a documentary on “Sworn Virgins,” an Eastern European concept where, if there was no elder son to care for his parents, the oldest daughter would vow never to marry and would stay home to be the caretaker. I threw up that night, and my mother thought I had a stomach bug and let me stay home from school the next day. As I recall, I wished I’d gone to school because it would have meant I didn’t have to sit home with her all day, watching soap operas and game shows, listening to her complain about how unfair life was, all the while smoking until my own eyes watered.

Would he prefer I tell him how I felt that I’d betrayed her by going to college in another state, meeting Joseph, marrying him, and living my life feeling guilty that I had never looked back?

“What do you want to know?”

“What were holidays like? Did she make pancakes and hot cocoa while you opened gifts? Did she sing carols and tell stories while she baked cookies? Tell me everything. Even the little details. I want to know what it would have been like to be raised by her.”

“Why don’t you tell me about your parents first,” I said, part out of curiosity and part to stall for time.

“They were good. Kept a roof over my head. Supported me when I was on the track team in high school. Put me through college. I always knew I could come to them with anything. I just wondered what my real mother was like. Would she have loved me? Where was she, and why did she give me away?”

“Can you remember what you liked best about them?” I asked, still stalling.

“Dad used to take me fishing. One time we caught a huge carp—I think it was someone’s goldfish that had been released into the lake. We threw it back because we didn’t want to eat someone’s pet. We pan‑fried a couple of sunnies that night and watched the meteor shower over the water.”

remember the night the neighbors called the police because she was yelling at me again. I was 18 at the time, so they couldn’t force me to come with them. I promised I’d keep her quieter, thanked them for coming by, and hated myself for making her that angry again. That was before therapy, before I stopped feeling responsible and guilty for her feelings and behavior.

“So you were on the track team? How did they support you in that?”

“By then, Dad was the manager at the plant. He could schedule himself early so he would leave in time to catch part of my meets. Mom was the president of the PTA and always headed up the bake sales. They were great, but I always wondered who my mother was. Did she love me? Would she come back to find me someday? I’ll tell you something, Susan—it still nags at my heart. Like a lost piece of myself that I never could find. She could tell me who I am. Tell me why she gave me away. Love me now at last.”

I won a blue ribbon at the science fair for my presentation on clean energy. She hadn’t said anything when I told her, and when I pushed, she said, “Of course you did. You’re smart,” and then walked away. When I got accepted into college, she asked why I was running away—like Robin did, like our father had when Robin was nine— and asked me what she had done to make us hate her.

Every time I came home on a break, she tried her hardest to sabotage my returning to campus with some great tale of woe that needed me and only me to fix it. I eventually stopped coming home, staying with friends or sneaking back into the closed dorm. Looking back, I’m glad it was before cell phones, or she would no doubt have called constantly.

“What was Mom like?” he asked, with anticipation and excitement.

I looked him in his eyes, smiled, and said, “She was great. You would have loved her.”

I lived with so many dreams growing up—images of a better life and a more loving parent. Who was I to take that away from anyone else?