The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow, Miss Havisham

In the most recent issue of Adoptive Families magazine, readers discuss the play Annie (as in "little orphan" and the sun will come out tomorrow.) They talk about whether it's a damaging one for kids who were adopted, or is just good plain fun. 


Almost every reader who submitted comments either whole-heartedly embraced the musical or found it benign and recommended just talking with children about the differences between that work of fiction and the reality of most adoptions and orphanages.  


Until I read these remarks, I had felt guilty about my daughters' love of Annie when they were younger, how they played "orphanage" in their room after seeing the movie, and that they sometimes enlisted me as Miss Hannigan and gleefully laughed as I barked at them to scrub the floor and make it shine like the top of the Chrysler building. So, reading the magazine last night, absolved me of my guilt. (About that, anyway.) 


But it's hard, isn't it?  To know when to be cautious and when to laugh off the ways kids hear about adoption? 


For the past several weeks, my 12 year-old son has been preparing for (and then performing) the role of (Young) Pip in Great Expectations. When I saw the preview, the night before the show opened, it was the first time I'd seen him in the part. Ian is an independent person and one whom I parent with as light a touch as possible. When he feels controlled or manipulated, he tends to withdraw or rebel. And, in general, he makes very good choices. ("Make good choices!")  So, as he's learned his lines, gone to costume fittings and rehearsals, I have given him space. No stage mom, I!  


When I finally saw the preview, I was a bit concerned.  Not with the production or my son's performance (loved both), but with some of the content in the second half of the play. I worried that when my daughter Mia went to see it a few days later, she might be upset by Estella's frequent, icy reference to Miss Havisham as her  "mother by adoption" and by Miss Havisham's description of how she came to adopt the girl. That she raises Estella to be cruel and heartless to all men in order to punish the one man who broke her heart reveals that her adoption isn't about creating family, but about exacting revenge. (Yipes.)


I told some friends, adoptive parents all, about my concerns.  They seemed a bit puzzled, but were supportive.  It's not like me to worry about such things. So that she could see her brother perform, I told Mia she could go to the first half of the play. I'd take her home at intermission, I said, or maybe we could even go to the new frozen yogurt shop while the rest of the family were at the theater.  Mia demanded to know why she couldn't see the whole show, so I explained that I didn't want her to feel upset about the way the play handles adoption.  


"I won't," she said. "Why would I?"


I acquiesced. When I told my friends that I'd changed my mind, they seemed relieved. "It didn't seem quite right.  It wasn't like you..." one said.  It's true I'm rarely in the position of being the overly-cautious or protective mom. 


After she saw the show, Mia looked me in the eyes. "Um.  What in the world does that have to do with my story?" she asked.


Last night, however, I got a different peek into her response to the play. I was putting food away after dinner and she was sitting at the kitchen counter drawing swirly designs on a piece of paper. She asked me what are the reasons people adopt children.  I talked to her about infertility, about concern for the world's almost 150 million orphans, and that some people just love big families and want to adopt a child, like we did. God makes families in all kinds of ways, I said. She nodded; she was totally on board with the conversation.

Then, in the same, matter-of-fact tone she’d used before, she said: “And some people adopt because they are weird and lonely and just want someone to spend time with.”

"What?  What do you mean?" It was such an odd thing for her to say.

“Like that Miss Haversham.” 

I laughed, uncomfortably, and sat down beside her. I told her what children without families faced in Dickens’ time, reminded her that was fiction, and told her about the way governments in our time try to protect children from being adopted by someone as mentally and emotionally ill as was the character of "Miss Haversham." Home studies. Fingerprints. Reports from doctors and employers and friends. 

“Okay,” she said, looking down at her paper and continuing to draw.

We all hold secret thoughts, make observations and come to conclusions we never articulate. And in day-dreamy, watchful kids like my daughter -- an eight year-old who still believes in fairies and Santa and the tooth fairy (despite TF’s ongoing tardiness) -- these private thoughts seem particularly mysterious. 

The readers who wrote about Annie in Adoptive Families are right - I guess the best we can do is be honest, keep talking, and tell the truth.