This month our son Andrew celebrates his 22nd birthday.  

When he was three days old his mother said goodbye to him, gave him to a family she had worked for in Mexico City, and never saw him again. Five days later my wife Harriet and I flew to Mexico to adopt him and bring him with us to the United States. 

In his mind, Andrew tells us, he has always been our child and we his parents, but sometimes, when I try to imagine those first eight days in which he lost a mother and floated on a stream of strangers, I feel an urge to comfort him and the woman who gave birth to him. I wonder, too, if part of the ache I feel is for myself, for the moments in my own life when I felt abandoned and unable to speak. 

When Andrew was still a toddler, I told the story of how we became a family. It's called "Here in My Arms." 

The second part of Andrew's story is below.

[We see a smiling woman, Harriet, and then piano plays “Here in My Arms.” Then a plane is seen landing (and we hear the landing sound). Tony as he is now looks out at us when he first speaks]

Tony Kahn:

Three days after Harriet returned from India, we landed in Guadalajara. Our luggage bulged with diapers, advice books, baby clothes, blankets, a car seat, a portable bed, and a snuggly, all bought or borrowed at the last minute. Back at home, friends were putting the finishing touches on the baby’s room.

[A montage of scenes accompanies this section: A baby’s room (in which hangs a sampler with “Andrew” embroidered on it), the stamping of documents.]

We decided to call him Andrew. The sooner we knew his name, Denise had told us, the sooner his mother, Margarita, could register his birth and say “goodbye.”

I tried to imagine her writing a foreign name she’d probably never heard, and might repeat for the rest of her life. Margarita was Indian, Denise had told us; the father, of mixed blood.

[Next we see a passport, little children’s faces, the exterior of a hotel, the interior of a hotel room, hands unpacking a suitcase, a view of a mother and child on a sidewalk. We hear popular music being played on a radio.]

Any one of these faces could be Andrew’s. Denise met us near the exit and took us to her car. She’d found us a residential hotel a half hour away in the center of Guadalajara, near the court offices where the adoption would take place. There was a bedroom, a small kitchen, and a front room for the baby. We should settle in, she said, she’d be right back with the child.

Harriet unpacked while I looked around. A night nurse would be by in a few hours to help show us how to care for an infant. I wondered if a biological father felt as anxious as I did waiting to see his child for the first time. I knew of one major difference: between us and our baby lay not nine months of pregnancy and preparation, but three years of petitions, paperwork and pressure. I could remember every resistance and doubt we’d felt along the way to earn the right to have a child. And even after we’d found the child, every word of warning we had received to reject it if things didn’t seem right.

“Just make sure it’s healthy,” one friend had cautioned. “Just make sure the adoption is legal before you get attached,” said another. It was sad to realize how stacked the deck was against love at first sight. Even now, all I could feel for sure was the fear with which the world so often meets a stranger. Not just a stranger, but the biggest blind date in my life!

[Next in successive shots we see a door opening to the view of a man and a woman holding a baby basket, then the man’s shoes walking towards us, and then a camera sitting on a table. Sometimes Spanish conversation is heard in the background.]

The door opened, and in came Denise with her father, Carlos, a tall, thin man who carried the baby high in his arms. Harriet rushed ahead and Carlos lowered the baby for her to look. He was as Denise had described him: small, lots of hair, and very quiet. I noticed Harriet had left her camera behind. I didn’t pick it up, either. Like her, I wanted both hands free to hold my son.

[Next we see coffee mugs, documents, and hands “explaining” documents, while we hear voices in Spanish in the background]

The next day, Denise laid out the plan: we’d get Andrew’s adoption decree and passport in Guadalajara and then go to Mexico City for his exit visa to the United States. The paperwork was in order, and a distinguished lawyer stood by to cut through whatever red tape cropped up. With luck, we’d be finished in two weeks.

[Next we see the exterior of a courthouse, followed by the interior of a government office. Much processing of paperwork is seen. Then we see young Tony and Harriet smiling, pointing to Andrew in a baby carrier on Harriet’s shoulder; another photo of the smiling new parents with friends follow. ]

Every day we’d go to the court office with our tower of paperwork, giving them the documents they wanted and filling out the forms they required. The rattle of typewriters and the ring of rubber stamps seemed almost musical. Between court appointments there was time for shopping and celebration with Denise and Carlos, and after every official meeting, a chance for congratulations, pictures, and smiles. It seemed almost too good to be true. It was.

[We see a phone, which rings. Then we see humans profiled in shadow, and a man carrying a huge stack of documents. We hear voices in Spanish and English in the background.]

Within a week, the process bogged down. A court appearance scheduled for Wednesday would have to be delayed ‘til Thursday. A report promised at the end of the first week wouldn’t be ready ‘til the second, or maybe the third. And even though Margarita had signed papers surrendering Andrew, the courts kept interrogating her, wanting to know if she’d been paid or coerced to give up her child.

[We see a newspaper with Spanish headlines folded on a table. Then we see the aisles of a grocery store, laden with packages of cookies.]

The two-week deadline for the adoption now seemed impossible. How long would it drag on? Another week? A month? A year? Then, the news got worse. The newspapers had been full of scandal about illegal adoptions. A lawyer had gone to jail. Though our adoption was legal, two social workers would be coming to interview us in our hotel room sometime that week. Once again, I was buying cookies to speed things along.

[We view cookies on a plate and clipboards full of documents, hands writing answers to questions voiced in Spanish, in the background. Among the background comments, “Es bueno, es bueno.” (“That’s good, that’s good.”) “Yo tengo un hermano.” (“I have a brother.”)]

By now, we weren’t afraid of losing time – we were afraid of losing Andrew. After questioning us, the social workers would call in Margarita. And for the third time in ten days, an official agency would make her re-live and defend perhaps the most difficult decision of her life.

[We next see a photo of a young woman being removed from a man’s wallet. Next, we hear a rooster crowing, and hear a folksong being sung in Spanish. We see a bus traveling from a rural area to a large city. An aerial scene of the city follows.]

What if, after all that, she changed her mind? Denise had given us a little picture of her to show Andrew someday, and often during the next few nights, I’d look at it. She was twenty-one. Andrew was her fourth child, and only the second to survive. Her parents watched over this other little boy in a town hundreds of miles away, and Margarita saw him only once a year.

She’d managed to get some training as a nurse, and had been trying to live on her own in the city instead of as a maid in someone’s house. Things had just started looking up for her when she’d learned that she was pregnant, and that the father was already married with a family of his own.

[In the following segment we see Margarita’s photo being replaced in the wallet. Then we see the smiling woman we saw at the start of this story – it is Harriet.]

She no longer looked like such a stranger. She’d counted on us to raise and love her baby; we’d have to count on her to do what she thought was best. A few days later, Denise called with good news: the court would give us our adoption decree early the following week. Andrew would be ours.

[Joyful Mexican vocal music accompanies the next scene, in which we see cars and trucks traveling along a busy highway.]

It would be safe for me to return now to a job in Boston. While Andrew stayed with Carlos and Denise, Harriet would come back several days later herself to pull together Andrew’s room. Then she’d return for the final phase of paperwork to get Andrew his visa and bring him home.

[We return to Tony as he is now, looking out at us as he speaks.]

Denise told me that parting with Andrew had been hard for Margarita, and she’d cried many times. But all along, she’d known it was the right thing. He would have opportunities she’d never dreamed of and she’d been happy for him: he would be flying to his new home in a plane!

[Here we see a jet plane taking off.]

[To be continued . . . ]

[End of recording]

Transcribed by: Liz Cooksey