Glendora Brooks
“I never answer the phone before noon,” I grumble to my housemate. “It’s nothing but bad news.”
“Or, it could be mail!” He retorts.
Just before work this morning the phone rings. I decide to answer it.
It’s Rachel Anderson from the Georgia Adoption Reunion Registry.Even when she has no news or bad news I find her presence, even over the phone, incredibly reassuring and sincere.
“Our private investigators were unable to find anything about your grandmother,” she tells me as I fiddle with my phone in attempt to hook up a recorder to document what I believe will be an imporant life moment. I have no batteries so memory must suffice.
“If you can’t find anything on her can you just give me her name?” I ask. “That’s all I ever really wanted anyways.”
“Let me call you back in just a minute,” she says. “I’ll just ask my boss.”
I hang up.
She calls back.
“Okay, do you have a pen?”
No pen. I try to open up Word. My housemate hasn’t installed it on my new computer yet. WordPad will have to suffice.
“Okay! I’m ready!”
“Her name was Glendora Brooks.”
My heart fills with this unlikely joy as I realise I will know my grandmother’s name for the rest of my life.
She is no longer a cryptic description or vague stereotype. She’s a person with a name.
My grandmother’s name is Glendora Brooks and now that it is known it’ll never be unknown or hidden away again.
I am filled with a deep sense of deep gratitude and fulfilment.
I may never find out anything else about her but I have her name and that’s enough.
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
-1 Corinthians 13
indeed, having a name is very important! in the book of genesis (2:19-20) adam names all living things, a sign of not only privilege/responsibility that God has gifted us with in this universe we inhabit, but also, a sign that everything and everyone is valued. so even if someone’s name is forgotten or discarded on earth, it is never so with God. everyone has a name, and that means, in God’s eyes, everyone’s important, and always will be.
i’m very glad you have “discovered” your grandmother’s name, and that because of that, you know yourself a little better now! grace and peace to you.
Sherry: the long time reader is now a first time commenter! Thanks for rooting for me, friend!
Dolly: My search for lost family began as a search for love and acceptance that I now know I have in my true “chosen” family which will always include you! *hugs*
Dear Nathaniel – I love you dearly and to read this news fills me with joy. As I have lost my grandparent you have found yours. I can’t wait to talk to you in person and celebrate with you in two weeks.
“Glendora Brooks”…..Wow!…A part of the puzzle has now been solved. Good for you, AND your determination.