183: The Missing Parents Bureau
Stories about the legacy of absent parents. We hear four cases from the files of the Missing Parents Bureau.
Prologue.
Ira talks with Cate, a white woman with a black adopted seven-year-old son, Glen. Sometimes Glen threatens that he's going to return to his real family — royalty, in Africa. The only thing is, Glen's not adopted from Africa. He's adopted from Chicago. But this is the way it goes: Even if there are real parents out there somewhere, sometimes it's more comforting for a kid to believe in a fantasy. (4 minutes)
Case One. Better Left to the Imagination.
Most sperm banks provide all sorts of information about their donors: education level, medical background.... They even have videotaped interviews and recorded answers to essay questions. But not all clients take advantage of this information. In fact, lots of women choose to avoid it. Reporter Alix Spiegel talked with single women who were planning to get pregnant with the help of a sperm bank, and found that they all wrestled with the question of how much they wanted to know about the father of their kid ... and how much they wanted their kids to know. Alix's story was produced in part with a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. (20 minutes)
Song: " Life Without a Father," Travolta W., Kevin G. and Keith L. (Recorded in Chicago's Audi Home Juvenile Detention Facility, this song was part of a show put on by Chicago's Music Theater Workshop.)
Case Two. Tell it to the Void.
We hear a series of letters that originally appeared on the brief-lived, little-known, but well-loved webzine Open Letters. They're written by a woman who signs her name as \"X\" and are addressed to the father of her adolescent son. X has no idea where to send the letters ... but she keeps writing. Since the letters' original publication on the Internet, X has decided to reveal her identity. Her name is Miriam Toews, and her book is called Swing Low, A Life. Her letters were read for us by Alexa Junge. (17 minutes)
Case Three. I'm an Orphan; Don't Tell My Mom.
When Starlee Kine was a kid, she wanted to be a child star so bad she signed up for an acting class with a famous acting teacher named Kevin McDermott. One of the class' exercises was to develop a character with a troubled past, and a real psychologist would come in for a session of character group therapy. Starlee chose to take on the character of an orphan. In fact, Starlee remembers that everyone else in her class did too. Twenty years later, she visits her old acting teacher in Los Angeles and discovers that for some reason, kids today don't want to be orphans. (9 Minutes).
Case Four. Runaway Mom.
In Seattle, Dan Savage and his boyfriend adopted a son, DJ. It was an open adoption, so the birth mother could keep in touch with her kid. But things haven't gone according to plan. Dan Savage has a book about adopting DJ, which this story is not part of, called The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Go Get Pregnant. (6 Minutes)
Song: " Don't Cry, Daddy," Elvis Presley
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