"A baby? I'm almost middle-aged, thirty-five, you know, and besides, I can't have any more babies. Remember the last one, born ten years ago, was hydrocephalic and brain damaged. I can't have any more babies."
"He really isn't a baby anymore. He's a year old and he needs a home. He's been in an orphanage since birth and if nobody takes him he'll have to go to a different facility. He's getting too old for this one."
So...it's a boy. We've been wanting another boy and we have talked about adopting. But I have this wonderful job teaching—just what I've always wanted—in a preschool/kindergarten.
“How did you find out about this baby?”
“The Catholic sister who comes to the chapel once a month told me about him. He’s in a Catholic home, down by Tokyo. I said I’d talk to you about it. Will you go and see him anyway?”
“Of course I’ll go and look, but I’ll need an interpreter. You know me and my Japanese. Next Tuesday? That soon, huh? Okay, you make the arrangements and I’ll go and visit.”
A Japanese baby. Diapers, a stroller—what will the kids say?
My husband, Dale, is a chaplain in the Air Force. We had just arrived at Yokota, Japan, in October with our three children: Rhonda, 13, Daniel, 11, and Diane, 10. We were living in a paddy house, built by the Japanese for Americans. It was small, but adequate.
The next week I went to the Nazaret Home in Nakano, just outside Tokyo. The Sister looked at me and pointed to my eyes. Was there something wrong with my eyes? Oh, she had expected a Japanese wife, not a Caucasian woman.
The interpreter asked to see the little boy that no one had been to see since birth and was now available for adoption. The Sister pointed to my eyes again and shook her head. She was not happy about giving a Japanese baby to a white American—a Japanese American would have been acceptable.
First, she brought tea and an album of the orphanage. This was very nice, but how about the baby? He was being dressed properly, I was told.
Many cups of tea later, she brought Toshio out. He was wide-eyed and frightened, but what a doll, so round and solemn. I reached for him, but he drew away and cried. Could this be my baby?
Next, Dale and I both went to visit. Again there was much tea. (No wonder these people are yellowish—it is all that yellow-green tea.) Then we were given lunch—green noodles. (How am I going to eat these? Close your eyes and swallow.)
This time Toshio came to me and he let me feed him some soup, but he wouldn’t have anything to do with Dale. He hadn’t seen men. The orphanage was run only by the Sisters. We got a picture and took it home to the other children.
I carefully guided Diane onto the train, since she was in a Milwaukee brace for scoliosis of the spine, and could not look down—only straight ahead. As I was getting on, I somehow stepped on the back of Dan’s shoe and it came off and fell between the train and the platform to the track below. It was impossible to retrieve it, so I told Dan to limp a little so people would just think he had hurt his foot. I admit, we were a strange looking group as we arrived at the orphanage.
What shall we call him? Richard Toshio was decided upon, but he was always known as Ricky. The children all fell in love with Ricky and wanted us to proceed with whatever had to be done to get him in our home.
We contacted International Social Services in Tokyo and they assigned us a case worker. We were interviewed, and made several trips to Tokyo before Ricky was placed with us.
On the day we were to pick up Ricky, we decided to drive. The Japanese people on the train might not understand why an American couple had a Japanese baby, especially if he was crying.
We were to be at the Home by ten o’clock. The traffic was bad and we were getting nervous. At a stop light, a motorcyclist leaned against our front fender. When we started up, he fell over in the street and acted like we had hit him. There were plenty of witnesses who saw that this wasn’t so, however. We were allowed to be on our way. I had visions of sitting in a police station for hours, trying to be understood in a different language, but it all worked out fine.
Ricky was afraid to leave with us. He didn’t understand our language, had never been outside the Home, and had never ridden in a car. I held him close and he finally went to sleep.
Chapter 2 to follow
