Black Trash Bag

I've heard for so long that people always have a choice. They have a choice between right and wrong. They have a choice to overcome their adversities or to become a statistic. They have a choice to follow the path their parents set before them or break the cycle. 

But you know what they don't have a choice in? The trauma they endured as children. No child ever says I chose to be abandoned by my parent. I chose to witness violence that is out of my control. I chose for my parents to be addicts or alcoholics. I chose to be abused....

~I picked my big brother up from the county jail a few months back. He had been in for a probation violation, which has been ongoing life-long battle for him. He typically spends a few months or years behind bars and then gets out for just enough time to get in a little bit of trouble....then back he goes. I am his only life line. So that makes it my job help him as much as I can. After all you never know when it could be the "last time". 

As soon as I pulled in, there he was waiting for me like always, with his black trash bag thrown over his shoulder. He hopped in, we went to visit his probation officer, and headed off to get him a good meal. As we ate he slowly emptied the contents of his barely filled bag. He had a binder full of certificates of the  things he had accomplished this go around. He has always thrived in jail and prison. He's been a barber, a cook, a tattoo artist, a church member, and a leader. His certificates this time were the same. Nonetheless, he was so proud and took them out one by one to share with me.

I spent a few hours trying to find him a halfway house to stay in,  without any luck. He was forced to return to whatever "friend" would have him. It always grieves me to leave him just anywhere because I know it's only a matter of time before he returns to his vice.

As I pulled into a small pitiful little apartment that I knew as a drug house, and watch my brother pick up his bag to head inside, I couldn't help but realize.....There is no way he would have CHOSEN this life for himself. 

He was an incredible athlete as a child. He was the head of his class academically. He was on student council. He had more girlfriends than I could count. He had the most tender heart. And boy was he funny. Mean sometimes, but always funny. 

How does someone go from having it all to having everything he owns at forty years old, wrapped up in a small piece of plastic?  The truth is, it isn't the life he chose, but those who went before him. I could tell you stories for days of the horrific things we have witnessed. Things, out of our control, that he can never escape. And, oh, how he has tried. 

As a society we get so focused on the effects, and rarely understand first there had to have been a cause. We have millions of our family members trying to outrun lives they never had a choice in living. And their most valuable possessions can be gathered by two hands and placed inside a black trash bag.

Nobody chooses that. 

Nobody.

From My Mothers Womb, You Have Chosen Me

Created.

Before you were conceived, you were created.

I learned at the ripe age of twenty six a sort of manipulative truth of my entire existence. A story my mother would have went to her death bed without sharing, and one my dad wanted whole heartedly not to believe.

My son at the time was facing some health concerns. While conversing with his oncologist, he inquired about my family's medical history. I immediately had a flashback of a day I had tried to remove from my mind. I was fifteen and sitting outside on my grandparents front porch. My dad pulled into the driveway, jumped out of his truck, and joined me. He began to share with me, that at one point in time, they didn't think I was his child. After he saw the shock on my face, he quickly retracted. He proceeded to tell me "but we had a paternity test and it turns out, you were mine". And I believed him, never doubting it.

That was until this day, facing the unknown with my child, and this memory was now forefront in my mind.  I instantly realized, how expensive and unattainable paternity tests were in the early eighties. Knowing my parents struggles, it became apparent to me, my dad's recollection was only a half truth. I made up my mind to discover the facts, regardless of the casualties. My sons life was at stake, and that's all that mattered to me.

For the first time, I approached my mom with this information. Like all important things to me, she laughed it off, and continued with the "truth" she had chose to believe for so long. Something came over me and I instantly thought to look for the guys name in her phone that was said to be my father. So while she went in the other room, I did just that. She walked right back in and caught me. When she asked what I was doing, I told her I was searching for this person in her contacts.

"I don't have his name in my phone, but I do have his email in my computer". And that was that. She had been in correspondence with the man thought to be my biological father, for what reason, I will never know! She went on to forward him my email, which opened up a gateway for us to communicate. 

My first messages to him, were of hope. My parents, though I loved them dearly, were not much a part of my life.  I prayed without ceasing for that to change. I never wanted anything more than to have parents and my children to have grandparents. I never stopped, and still haven't, longing for that. I loved my children so much and I wanted someone else in my life to cherish them as I did. So having a potential, unknown, third party, who could fill that void...was exciting to me.

He offered to pay for the paternity test and I obliged. It is something unexplainable, to not know the truth of your own life.  A few days later, the results were in, and there was a ninety nine point something percent, I was this mans biological child. Like I mentioned before, it was a journey I was eagerly anticipating to embark on.

After seeing the proof in black and white, it hit me. Everyone I ever knew, had lied to me my whole life. You want to talk about being crushed. I no longer felt I could trust anyone. Reflecting back, I knew every single person realized who I was, but me. My dark features were a clear indicator I did not belong to the rest of my fair skinned family. They all knew... and didn't say a word! Maybe it wasn't their place. Like my dad, maybe they were just trying to protect me....but to twenty six year old me it was a broken trust that I would never recover from.

I started and haven't really stopped, pondering every little incident throughout life, that pointed to the distrust. I searched my memories, trying to connect my parents disconnect to me, to their deception. And you know the devil really tries to magnify those thoughts in your mind!  I wanted them to want me for so long, and now it was apparent to me why they may not have. Or atleast that's what the enemy was trying to convince me of.

I now knew the truth, but boy did it hurt. It caused more confusion in me than I could have possibly realized. With my new found knowledge, it then became my job, to live in the truth. Which meant telling my parents, really what they already knew, but had concealed from me. We won't talk about my conversation with my mom, because that just brings up anger. But my dad was absolutely crushed. It's one thing to wonder...it's another thing to be smacked in the face with it. It hurt me to see him hurt. I just wanted to take it all away..and I couldn't. I made myself believe somehow this was all my fault. I was responsible for all of this pain. For him. For my own. I didn't realize when I set out on the journey, we would be the casualties.

A few months later my dad was killed in a car accident. We never had the time to process anything, let alone heal. He was a broken man. The fact that I somehow broke his heart more than in was, and he left this world that way, is a burden that I will carry with me always.  

There is a song that our church sings, and everytime I hear it, I weep. Like a baby. The lyrics hit a wound so deep, that I feel I am purging a lifetime of suppressed tears. 

"From my MOTHER'S womb, YOU have chosen me."

It goes on to say, "You rescued me, so I can stand and sing. I AM a CHILD of GOD."

Discovering the truth of my conception, did not set me free, like I had hoped. It left me with more questions that will never be answered. It didn't take my desire away to be wanted and loved. In fact, it made me question why I was even here, or if anyone even wanted me. 

But in the process I realized what matters most..... It doesn't make a difference who my biological father was and is. I am a child of God. He alone fills a void, that no man ever could.

Before I was conceived, I was created. God had a plan for me long before I was in my mother's womb. And out of that he has CHOSEN me. Out of the deceit, out of the lies, out if the pain, out of the distrust.....he has chosen ME.