SEARCH FOR A STRANGER

INTRODUCTION

We are going to see the relationships that can exist between strangers. Some times we assume that we are meeting a stranger and then we realizes later that this stranger is very close to us in the short story “search for a stranger “ by Gordon .s. Livingston , is actually the search by the author for his mother . He feels that his mother is a stranger since he was adopted and did not know the truth till he was thirty eight years old.

After reading this summary you will able to

Explain how important strangers are

Recognize the fact that some strangers might cause a major change in our lives

Infer that a stranger’s life and ours have some connection

SUMMARY

The author is a child psychiatrist working in Columbia, USA. The author tells us about what happened to him the previous summer. One day his cousin asked him about his work. The author talked about a conference, which he had attended on adopted children. The difficulties faced by adopted children had been discussed in that conference. These children needed professional help to overcome the emotional problems they faced. One of the emotional problems was the feeling of a double identity. If a child wanted to know about his/her natural parents, the law did not help them. The courts usually sealed the adoption records. An adopted child usually felt bad when they could not easily find out about their birth, they feel that there is something shameful about them when they find out that their births have been kept a secret.

The cousin wanted to know why an adopted child should know about its adoption. The author feels that the child should know the truth from its adopted parents. If the child learns the truth of its adoption from other people, that he/she is adopted then there can be psychological damage. The author’s fourth child, Michael is adopted and he had told him the truth. The cousin then asked as to what he would do is he knew that he was an adopted child? The author replied that he would start searching for his natural parents. The cousin immediately asked him to start searching for his parents. The author thought that his cousin was joking but slowly he realized that he was speaking the truth. He was an adopted child.

The author felt very bad that he had not been told the truth for so long. He was thirty eight years old. He could not face the truth. Till now he had thought his adopted parents were his natural parents. He had been thinking that he wad Scotch-lrish. Many questions arose in the author’s mind. He was suddenly experiencing the problems that an adopted child experienced when he/she found the truth. He asked his adopted father as to why he had hidden the truth from him. He says he was afraid that he might have liked to see his natural parents. His adopted parents were afraid of losing him. The author assures his adopted father that he would always consider him and mom as his parents. His adopted mom had died a year ago. The author then starts his search for his natural parents.

The author had been born on June 30, 1938. When he had been adopted, his parents had been living in the city of Detroit. They had come along with their friends, the martins who had also adopted a child. He had been adopted from an agency in Memphis, Tennessee. The author made telephone calls to the martins and found out that he had been adopted from the Tennessee children’s home society. The author wanted permission from the Tennessee department of public welfare to see the records of the children’s home society. Since all adoption records were sealed by law, permission was denied.

The author left his parents to his colleagues and then flew to Memphis. He could not find any record in the Memphis city hall (every American town has a library and a reading hall). He then went to a local newspaper office and asked for its old issues. He found out that the children’s home had been closed in 1950. The director had been selling the children. The children were usually the children of unwed mothers, prostitutes, and mental patients. The author wondered to which category his mother belonged. The author engaged a local lawyer to help him in his search. The next day the lawyer found out that the author’s birth name was Donald Alfred Cardell. His sealed records were in the Memphis court house. The next morning the author and his lawyer went to the courthouse and made a request to see the records. The records were given to him.

His adoption decree was signed on the 17^th of august 1940. His mother’s name was Ann Simmons Cardell. The records stated that the father had abandoned the child. The author asked for a copy. The clerk realized that the author was holding his adoption decree .she took the adoption decree from him and said that he had to get the permission of the judge for copy. The author’s lawyer found out that his mother had been a school teacher from Mississippi.

The author flew to the city of Jackson, Mississippi and found his mother’s name in the academic records of the department of education. She had completed her master’s degree in education in the year 1952. the author made a phone call to the college’s alumni office. They informed him that they had received a letter form Miss.Cardell ten years ago from a place called Natchez. He found the name of Alfred Cardell Jr. in the phone book. He made a phone call to Alfred and found that Ann Cardell was his aunt. He told the author that that Ann Cardell was living Savannah.

The author flew to Savannah and called up Ann Cardell. He told her that he was her son and that he would like to meet her. She invited him to her home .Ann Cardell, his mother, was an elderly lady above sixty years of age. She served him coffee. She then began to tell the author about his birth. She had been born in a farming family in Mississippi. She had fallen in love with a handsome man, who was a good dancer. He was twenty-eight years old then. When she was pregnant, she had requested him to marry her. But he had gone away. An unmarried pregnant lady was not respected in Mississippi. So, she had gone to Memphis to have the baby. In this manner, the author was born.

The author felt, he was listening to his life history. He sympathized with his mother. His father had died three years ago of cancer. His mother then told him of how she kept in touch with him. She had a unique way of keeping track of him through her students. She would assume her students to be her son. When she comforted a child, she felt as if she were comforting the author. She tried to give to him by giving it to all her students. When she knew that the author would be in the third grade she applied for a transfer to that grade. By doing this, she felt that she was close to her son. But then she felt that she was becoming selfish. She wanted to forget him. She wanted to see him as a man. She was proud that he was now sitting in front of her. She asked him to forgive her. The author went and touched his mother. It was for the first time in thirty eight years that he was doing so.