The Acceptance of Not Learning More

I wish I could tell you that now that the ice was broken with Mom about who my biological father was, that she opened up and shared countless stories about *Joe. But she didn’t.

The simple fact was Mom was embarrassed, and frankly, she didn’t want to talk about it ever again.

She didn’t ask me not tell my brothers and sisters until after she was gone, but I knew she was worried about that because she kept asking me if I was going to tell them. So I decided after that first conversation, there was no gain in causing her pain by telling them while she was still living. Her time was short, and we all knew that. There was nothing I would gain from it, either. I don’t regret that choice. I had three short conversations with Mom about it all after that day, and it was like pulling teeth to get her to participate.

In one conversation, I told her my memories of Joe were very few, and if she felt like jotting down anything about him on paper, I would love that. She didn’t react at all and pretended not to hear me. I knew she would never do it.

Another time, I asked her whether she thought I looked like Joe or had any of his traits. “No,” she said curtly.

She seemed annoyed that I wouldn’t stop asking her things about it.

I asked her about Joe’s parents. Did she know them? She answered she didn’t know Joe’s mother, but she knew Joe’s father very well because he still puttered around the store back then, even though he had handed it over to Joe to run. She had positive things to say about Joe Sr., saying he was well respected in town. She recounted a funny story of Joe Jr. having to keep an eye on the pickle jars in the store because, near the end of his life, Joe Sr. would sometimes pop open a jar, take a big sip of pickle juice, screw the lid back on, and put it back on the shelf for sale. He was losing it a bit, according to my mother. He died a week before I was born on February 8, 1965.

Her relationship with Joe was something she would never speak directly about. I would piece together their relationship from my own memories and those of my siblings and photos I found after she died.

Our conversations were generally back and forth, with her giving me short, quick answers like the following:

Me: “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
Mom: “Oh, it wouldn’t have helped anyone.”

Me: “Did his wife know?”
Mom: “No.”

Me: “Did he ask about me?”
Mom: “No. But I called him to tell him things.”
Me: “What kind of things?”
Mom: “College. When you got married. When you had the girls.”
Me: “Did he like hearing about those things?”
Mom: “Yes.”

There was little else she would share beyond a few things I already knew. I realized I was never going to learn more, and that frustrated me tremendously.

But one day, on my final try, I finally got something from her. We were sitting casually in her living room, chatting.

I told her I remembered going into Joe’s store and shopping with the little child-sized metal shopping cart that was always there. (Read more about that in a past post HERE.) I reminded her how I loved putting my dolls in the cart and shopping for our cat’s food by myself.

“Remember that little cart?” I asked her.
She didn’t miss a beat. “He bought that for you,” she answered.

My mouth dropped open. I was genuinely stunned. What??

“You mean for all the little kids that came in?” I asked.
“No,” she said firmly, shaking her head and looking right at me. “Just for you.”

She went on, “Once you were old enough to push it, he bought it for you to keep at the store when you came in. Oh sure, other kids used it too. ”

I became emotional hearing this. One of the clear memories I have of interacting with Joe was with that shopping cart. Learning he bought it with me in mind was indescribable. It made me happy and sad at the same time. I would never really know him, and I would probably never be able to publicly claim him as my father. That was the reality of my paternity.

But this small thing meant everything to me. It was the only true link I had between him and me. And it had to be enough.

*pseudonym

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This is my NPE story of discovering in 2015 that my Dad was not my biological Dad. If you’d like to follow along, I encourage you to start at my first post of the series HERE.