finding her, part 4

i went to my room, mainly to sulk in private.  i was so pissed off.  i had really blown it by making the mistake of putting that stupid phone down.  i vowed i would never forgive myself.

i fluctuated between hating myself and feeling downright sorry for me.  i couldn't believe i had her right there and she was gone again in about 10 seconds flat.  i couldn't recall having been so disappointed in my entire life.  not once.

as i sat there on my bedroom floor in tears, the phone rang.  i leapt up and answer within the first ring.  "HELLO!!!!!!!!!"  it was xyz again!  to be honest, i don't remember much of what he said to me, except for a couple of details.  "her name is sally.  she's from herkimer, is married and now lives in new jersey.  i spoke to her and she would like to know if she can call you? she has a 6 month old baby that is sleeping right now."  of  course i said yes, and at around 10pm, my phone rang.

when i answered, the voice belonged to a man.  totally threw me off.  "hi jeni, my name is david.  i'm married to a woman named sally.  we think she might be your birthmother.  do you think that's possible?"

"yes, i absolutely do."

"would you like to speak to her?"  all i could think was, "wow, what a stupid question."  he put her on the phone and away we went.

we talked for 4 hours straight, until 2am.  we covered everything from big moose, to skating, to her life in herkimer.  we decided that she would come to new york in two weeks to meet.

to be honest, that should have been my first clue that this was going to go downhill from there.  i thought it odd that she would or even could wait two whole weeks!!!  what the hell!!!!!

but wait, i did.  i had no other choice.  that saturday finally came.  i still remember what i was wearing.  i had to work that morning on the air from 9-12.  it was without question, the longest 3 hours of my entire life.  i got home at around 12:30.  i remember being in the bathroom fixing my huge, oversized spiral curls, spritzing them like crazy because they were one of the things i was known for.

i looked at myself from every angle possible to make sure i didn't look fat.  or that my nose wasn't having an excessively 'big' day.  i fixed my eyeliner, mascara and lip liner about 200 times each.

all of my roommates were out, either working or simply making themselves scarce.  i was an absolute nervous wreck.  i was shaking like crazy, pacing back and forth to the bathroom and the full length mirror, then to the kitchen and back to the bathroom.

finally, i heard it- "slam!"  a car door.