This is a continuation of the first essay titled Filling in the Gaps. It can be found here.
This is my second time trying to meet Martha, my long-lost sister. We were supposed to meet the day prior but there was a miscommunication. I waited in the coffee shop for about 10 minutes and started to worry that I would be stood up again.
Martha never walked through the door. She called and said she couldn’t find the coffee shop. I threw my coffee away but kept the pictures this time. I went outside to look for her and paced up and down the street to help direct her. There were so many cars zooming up and down the street and parking was hideous. I looked at all the cars going by hoping she was driving one of them. I finally spotted a car slowing down and parking in a no parking zone. Under any other circumstances, I would not have done this, but I got in. I didn’t want to feel the same hurt I felt the day before.
Once in the car, she took her sunglasses off and remarked that we don’t look alike. I didn’t know how to respond. Martha said that she wasn’t familiar with the area and I wasn’t either. But I knew we needed to move her car to a spot with free parking. We drove around looking for somewhere to park or another coffee shop, so we could talk and look at photo albums. But we landed at a McDonalds. I tried my hardest to keep us away from that chain restaurant. I thought the two for $5 Big Macs would cheapen the experience, but this is what we ate.
We cozied up in a booth in a far corner. She opened a photo album and it was full of faces that were not quite familiar. It felt like I was invited to a family reunion and I only knew the person who brought me there. Then, she pointed out our dad. There he was, Sammie Lee Reed, the man I had heard so much about but never seen. My family was expanding before my very eyes, but I focused only on seeing my father.
I snapped a few pictures to show my mother and brother. Even though Martha reassured me we were related, I still didn’t believe it. I wasn’t convinced that the pictures were of my dad. I needed my mother to make this all make sense in my head. I thought that I would see a reflection of myself by finally seeing my father. But I didn’t see any similarities between us.
While flipping through the pages, I learned much more about Martha and the rest of my family than I did about my father. She was an amateur photographer she shot weddings, company events and her friends outside of a funeral home. My sister even had pictures from the 1930s of our grandfather. At one point, we stop on a photo of my paternal grandmother, and I see myself in her. I saw full cheeks similar to mine as she smiled for the picture.
I always thought I looked more like my mother anyway. She was the only person I compare my features to growing up. My father and I not having a recognizable resemblance made it harder for me to feel connected to him. I wished it was a situation of “like father like son” and I took after him. I was always told that we share the same eyes but it’s hard to discern from the photos.
This chapter of my life has been open for 20 years and now it is finally closed. Knowing what my father looks like does not matter because I am finally able to fill in the visual gaps from my memories. As a child, I was always curious about him. I asked my mother and she told me all the stories she felt comfortable sharing. That was enough for me then and it is enough for me now. We build these coming of age moments to be so monumental, but reality can never match. The fantasies are always better.
While I’m happy that I was able to go on this journey, part of me felt like I was betraying my mother. Every moment that was meaningful to me, she was always there. I still respect my mother, but I’m allowed to want to know more about my father. I am glad to have met Martha. She helped fill out my family tree and discover my father’s family through the process. My father has always been this specter looming over me. That section of every form was always blank. This moment, however uneventful it might be, fulfilled a childhood curiosity of mine.