Papal Bull declared war on Indians in 1452

"The power to commit horrible crimes against children, and others, and then absolve itself and the rapists and killers it shields within its ranks, has made the Vatican a criminal, rogue body under every international standard of law and morality."

Read about the Papal Bull and what it means to federal laws here today in the US in the article "Ending Catholicism And Related U.S. Imperialism" by Thomas Ivan Dahlheimer at http://www.towahkon.org/endofimperialism.html

Papal Bull declares the legitimacy of Christian domination over (Indian) pagans, sanctifying enslavement and expropriation of property:

Romanus Pontifex, January 8, 1455 - …We bestow suitable favors and special graces on those Catholic kings and princes, …athletes and intrepid champions of the Christian faith… to invade, search out, capture, vanquish, and subdue all Saracens and pagans whatsoever, and other enemies of Christ wheresoever placed, and… to reduce their persons to perpetual slavery, and to apply and appropriate… possessions, and goods, and to convert them to… their use and profit.* (European Treaties bearing on the history of the United States and its Dependencies to 1648, Editor Francis Gardiner Davenport, pages 20-26)

HISTORY: Papal Bulls are the fabric of United States and International law. Papal authority is the basis for United States power over Indigenous peoples, not generally understood. The Doctrine of Discovery is still being used as an active legal principle by the United States Supreme Court in the twentieth-first century, revealed in the case City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York decided in March 2005. The case involved a dispute over taxation of ancestral lands of the Oneida Indian Nation. During oral arguments, it became clear that the case would hinge on whether, in the opinion of the Court, the Oneida Indian Nation “has sovereignty status” with regard to the ancestral lands the Oneida Nation had reacquired. To decide the sovereign status of the Oneida Indian Nation, the Supreme Court relied upon the Doctrine of Discovery. Revealed in footnote number one of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsbergʼs decision for the Court majority: “Under the Doctrine of Discovery,” wrote Justice Ginsberg, “... fee title to the lands occupied by Indians when the colonists arrived became vested in the sovereign — first the discovering European nation and later the original states and the United States... The Supreme Courtʼs reference to the Doctrine of Discovery places the context for the Courtʼs decision in Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York within the Framework of Dominance, dating back to the era of the Vatican Papal Bulls.”

Empire attitudes and dominance are not dead. ----Trace

First Nations Children Still Taken from Parents (CANADA 2011)

powwows.com photo contest

John Beaucage has given the heartbreak he sees around him a name: the Millennium Scoop.

The First Nations leader was recently hired by the Ontario government to look into aboriginal child welfare and what he found -- not just in Ontario, but across the country -- was despair.

After decades of wrestling with the impact of the residential school system -- and then with the "Sixties Scoop" that placed so many aboriginal children in non-aboriginal homes -- First Nations are now facing another tragedy of lost children in the new millennium.

There are more First Nations children in care right now than at the height of the residential school system. That system was a national disgrace that prompted Prime Minister Stephen Harper to apologize for its catastrophic impact on natives.

Instead of being at home with their parents, brothers and sisters, tens of thousands of First Nations children are in foster homes, staying with distant relatives or living in institutions.

"It's a culmination of decades worth of social ills," Beaucage says.

A disheartening mix of poverty, addiction, history and politics has conspired to separate First Nations children from their parents.

Researchers aren't certain how many native kids are no longer living with their parents. A major study in 2005 pegged the number at 27,500. Since then, provincial and federal data as well as empirical reports suggest the numbers have risen.

That's easily double the size of the cohort forced away from their homes and into residential schools during the late 1940s and 50s -- a brutal period of Canada's history that still haunts First Nations families.

There's no question native children dominate the child welfare system.

Former auditor general Sheila Fraser estimated First Nations children were eight times more likely to be in care than other Canadian kids. She pointed out that in British Columbia, of all the children in care, about half are aboriginal -- even though aboriginals are only about eight per cent of the population.

Beaucage's report says aboriginal people make up about two per cent of the population, but between 10 to 20 per cent of the children in care.

"Given the data I've had a chance to see, if anything, it's an underestimation," said Nico Trocme, director of McGill University's Centre for Research on Children and Families.

"It's getting harder to be a parent in these communities."

Jeremy Meawasige is on the cusp of becoming the next child in that pile of statistics.

The 16-year-old Mi'kmaq from the Pictou Landing First Nation in Nova Scotia has myriad challenges: autism, cerebral palsy, hydrocephalus and a tendency to hurt himself.

But his latest affliction comes courtesy of inter-jurisdictional squabbling.

Ever since his mother had a double stroke last year and was no longer able to give her son the support he needed, she has had to rely on government funded social services.

But with each level of government pointing to the other for support, and his mother turning to band generosity in the meantime, Jeremy is now poised to be sent to an institution far from the only home he has ever known.

"They did an assessment on us, and say Jeremy is at the level where he should be institutionalized. I told them, over my dead body," said mother Maurina Beadle.

"I'm the only person he will eat for. If you put him in an institution, that's it."

But with no one willing to provide long-term funding that would cover the costs of supporting Beadle and Jeremy on reserve, authorities want to send him to an institution outside the province.

His supporters say it's a classic case of what has become known as Jordan's Principle.

"Jordan" was Jordan River Anderson, a Cree boy from Manitoba who died in hospital at the age of five as he waited for federal and provincial governments to agree how to pay for his care.

Ottawa and provincial governments have vowed not to let such a thing happen again. They say a child in need of services will receive the services immediately, and the governments will work out the payment scheme later.

But Jeremy's mother argues that if her son were off-reserve, he would be entitled to far more funding and services than he is receiving now -- funding and services that would enable her to keep Jeremy at home where he belongs.

"I've decided I'm going to fight for that," she says.

She has launched a formal court challenge, one that echoes a broader dispute taking place at the Federal Court of Canada.

In that case, the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, along with the Assembly of First Nations and the Canadian Human Rights Commission, are arguing the discrepancy in funding for child welfare services on reserves versus off reserves constitutes discrimination.

Ottawa contends it's not fair to compare the two.

Cindy Blackstock, executive director of the caring society, says she sees case after case of First Nations children in trouble being sent routinely into care because that's where the funding is instead of trying to help families deal with their problems.

As the lawyers duke it out, laments Beadle, "Jeremy regresses."

It would be myopic, however, to blame only jurisdictional wrangling and funding discrepancies for the high rates of First Nations children in care.

Expert after expert recognizes that family dysfunction is more broadly rooted in poverty, poor health and the oppressive legacy of the residential school system that robbed the parents of first-hand knowledge of how to raise a family.

"The simplest reason why, the most important reason why, is that these children are living in communities where families are facing enormous hardships," says McGill's Trocme. "The supports to bring up kids just aren't there."

A child at risk often comes from a home that is over-crowded, with up to four people to a sparse room. The home may not have clean drinking water. It may have mould or boarded-up windows as the house falls into disrepair.

The parents are often not there, or not paying attention.

Instead, they're in their own cycle of trouble, often related to addictions. Or they have not developed the social skills or parenting skills they need to deal with a precarious situation.

In the fridge, there might be some pop or processed food, but little fresh produce.

At school, there would be reading and writing. But not much in the way of library books or gym equipment or things to do after school.

In remote communities, the volunteer network that the urban poor rely on, such as the Salvation Army, shelters or food banks, is virtually non-existent.

In some cases, the child at risk is the victim of violence or abuse. More often than not, when the child welfare system steps in, it's because of neglect.

Neglect, however, "is not trivial," Trocme warns. Studies have shown that neglected children have the hardest time moving beyond their troubles, as their cognitive development becomes impaired.

"They have the absolute worst outcomes," Trocme says.

Still, the Millennium Scoop is not the Sixties Scoop, when children were removed from their homes and adopted by families far from the reserve. There was little discussion then about what would happen to a child once he or she was taken into care.

There is now a recognition that assimilation is not an option, says Beaucage, and there is some attempt to plan for family reunification.

Troubled children are increasingly being removed from their homes, but about half the time, they are placed in other First Nations homes, says Trocme. About 90 per cent of them eventually wind up back home at some point, perhaps as an adult, he says. So the family ties are not being broken as in the past.

"Families don't disappear when you remove a child," he says.

The number of First Nations children in the child welfare system is rising. But slowly funding is also on the rise and so is discussion and innovation about how to help them, he said.

In mainstream society, the number of children in care dropped suddenly in the 1970s. That's when child welfare agencies switched their focus. Instead of removing children from their home as a first resort, they devoted resources to prevention and help for troubled families.

The same approach wasn't applied toward First Nations, Trocme says, but that is changing.

The federal government has added a new layer of child-welfare funding directed toward prevention. It is also funding a growing number of child welfare agencies run by First Nations themselves.

Many First Nations complain that their other child services are so broke that the prevention dollars are sucked away by other more immediate needs.

But Ottawa points to some success in Alberta, where it invested $98 million over five years for its new approach.

The number of children in the care of First Nations agencies in that province has now stabilized, or even edged down slightly, federal documents show.

Not every province has such a program quite yet, although Ottawa hopes to achieve that by next year.

The federal numbers don't take into account the children who are in the hands of provincial agencies. And there are pervasive reports of widespread disillusionment and despair at the local level, says Beaucage.

But there are signs at senior levels of government of creative thinking and a willingness to allow First Nations a stronger hand in child welfare, he says.

"There's a fair bit of flexibility and open-mindedness at the top level," he said.

"We're going to have to measure our success in decades and generations."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2011/08/02/pol-first-nations-kids.html

From the cause: First Nations & Aboriginal Rights

Read more: http://www.causes.com/causes/2181-first-nations-aboriginal-rights?m=6584a9cb

America has its own story which you will read in the new anthology "Two Worlds'...the book is available on every e-reader and at amazon.com.. Trace

Coming Home to Self: Interview with Nancy Verrier

Read this interview with the brilliant author of "Primal Wound" Nancy Verrier. She writes about “The Three A’s” for adoptees which are awareness, authenticity, and accountability in her second book "Coming Home to Self."

Here is the link to the interview in Adoption Mosaic.

Verrier's work helped me so much as I was writing my adoptee memoir "One Small Sacrifice." Writers read much more than they write! It seems I had to release myself out of a fog and find the light. All my issues as an adoptee had to be viewed and witnessed all over again, childhood to present, victim to survivor.

Verrier said in this recent interview," One of the things people need to recognize is that there is no biological mirroring for the adopted child. They don’t see physical and personality traits reflected in the biological relatives around them. (These are inherent genetic traits; they’re not things you just pick up from living around people.) People who are born into biological families and stay in them take biological mirroring for granted. But this isn’t present in an adoptive family. So the adoptee is always trying to figure out how to be in that family and the family is trying to figure out how to be around that child."

True words for the thousands of us Lost Birds/Split Feathers/Native American adoptees who were transracially-adopted and assimilated via adoption..... Trace

Journey Home (archive)

One Man's Journey Home

Torn Apart 32 Years Ago By Canadian Policy Toward Aboriginals, A Mother And Son Met For The First Time.

September 21, 2003|

BY MARGO HARAKAS STAFF WRITER (Florida Sun-Sentinel)

He called himself Lost Cub, and for years he tried futilely to find his way home.
Then last year, feeling that at last he was closing in, Wayne Snellgrove hired a private investigator to follow up on the final four names on his list. He needed a shield, a buffer from the searing pain of renewed rejection. When the Canadian investigator finally telephoned her news, Snellgrove took the phone to the bedroom, closed the door, and, lying down on the bed, braced himself.
"I found your mother," she said. Then it all tumbled out.
Nora Smoke, a Saulteaux Indian living on a reserve in Saskatchewan, told the investigator, she loved Wayne, always had, that it was the happiest day in her life that he had found her. She had never forgotten the child she'd never seen.

"Please tell my son," Smoke pleaded with the investigator, "I've always thought of him."

And the 6-foot-3-inch, 225-pound athlete sobbed, sobbed like a baby, sobbed with 32 years of repressed emotion, sobbed like a kidnapped child returned to his bereft mother.
The search had ended; however, the story of a newborn's disappearance three decades ago was yet to be told.
Snellgrove, like many Canadians, calls it kidnapping. Others call it cultural annihilation or cultural genocide. Officially, it's been dubbed the Sixties Scoop.
Throughout the 1960s, 70s and into the mid-80s, thousands of Native children were separated from their mothers and adopted out to middle-class, non-Native families in the United States, Europe and elsewhere.
"Some communities lost an entire generation," says Darrell Racine, professor of native studies at Brandon University, in Manitoba, Canada.
At best, say the critics, the action of the Children's Aid Societies, authorized at the time to administer Canada's child welfare services, was misguided. At worst, it was racism.
"It goes back to the usual manifest destiny complex white people have over red people and the idea they are more civilized than aboriginal people. They thought they were doing the aboriginals a favor," says Emma LaRocque, professor of native studies at the University of Manitoba.
The problem was those removing the children were usually white and, because of bias or ignorance of Aboriginal culture, they were, say critics, unqualified to determine what was in the best interest of the native child.

http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/2003-09-21/news/0309210300_1_native-studies-aboriginal-children-native-children

Repeating his words (an adoptee reacts to purchasing babies and the cost)

I want all of you to read the words of a bright young wise adoptee: http://adoptiontruth-casjoh.blogspot.com/2011/07/repeating-his-words.html

There is nothing more humbling than the truth... Trace

Lost Daughters: Scandal-paralysis

Lost Daughters: Scandal-paralysis: "First photos after I was adopted in Wisconsin By Trace A. DeMeyer I coined this phrase today relating to adoptees whose mothers refuse to..."

Standing Bear's Footsteps, Ponca Chief, new documentary (preview)

Film Clip: http://blip.tv/napt/napt-standing-bear-s-footsteps-trailer-4950155

The 4th biennial VisionMaker Film Festival will be held September 30 through October 6, 2011, with screenings at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Mary Riepma Ross Media Arts Center and Sheldon Museum of Art.
The VisionMaker Film Festival showcases Native film and video projects that often do not get the spotlight they deserve in a crowded entertainment market. This Festival provides a forum for these productions to gain media and viewer attention. The Festival will aggregate and screen the best of not only Public Television productions, but feature-length and short films as well.
The Festival will feature a range of generations from the story of Standing Bear, a Ponca chief who went to court in 1877 to prove he was a person in the eyes of the law and in the process redefined what it means to be an American to the story of four young Native Alaskan athletes as they compete in the traditional sports of their ancestors.
The Social Media-friendly weekend, October 1-2, 2011, is a new addition to this year’s Festival. Half of the theater will be open to text messaging and status updating via Facebook and Twitter. This initiative is designed to increase public awareness, public engagements, strengthen social movement and ultimately promote social change. Filmmakers will be available for Q&A via Skype, an online, live video chat.
The Sheldon Museum of Art will feature "GRAB," a new NAPT documentary and an Official Selection in the 2011 Sundance Film Festival; plus, attendees will be able to interact with filmmakers Billy Luther (Navajo Hopi Laguna Pueblo), Princella Parker, Omaha (Associate Producer, Standing Bear’s Footsteps), Christina King, Creek/Seminole/Sac & Fox (Co-Producer, Up Heartbreak Hill), Bennie Klain, Navajo (Director, Columbus Day Legacy), and Heather Rae, Cherokee (Family: The First Circle)
Read more: http://netnebraska.org/extras/standingbear/

Adult Adoptees: Documentation and Deportation

In all but SEVEN states, adoption files are sealed tight. Adoptees don't have rights to see their own documents. Adoptees like me are given a fake birth certificate that says adoptive parents are your real parents.

Where were you born, adoptees? This is the new burning question!

I am still wrapping my brain around this since so many First Nations children from Canada were brought to America through the Indian Adoption Programs and ARENA. These children did not choose to come here! Thousands were brought here and adopted here!

Now this -- Adult Adoptees may be deported if their adoptive parents forgot to file paperwork and get them citizenship? This is real, folks. It's already happened!

I used to think it was hard being raised by strangers, forced to pretend I was someone else, given a fake birth certificate to show as my identification. Now adoptees must prove they are American-born or face deportation. 

Could this get any crazier? You spend your childhood in American and then get shipped out?

Unsealing my sealed adoption required nothing less than a miracle in Wisconsin, a closed record state. Fortunately, after many years and many attempts, I found my first family... And yes, Helen and Earl were American-born citizens. Even though Helen and Earl are deceased, I am still denied my OBC- my Original Birth Certificate - from Minnesota (another closed record state)... Other adoptees have this same dilemma and disconnect from the truth and their identity.

What if you were born in Canada or South America and adopted in America? These children did not choose to be adopted or choose to come to America. How are we supposed to know where we were really born? What if your adopters didn't tell you the truth or file the papers? 

This topic will surely gather momentum here in the USA very soon, with immigration so busy deporting adult adoptees who were not born here.  

How many adoptees will be affected? It's unclear.

How did this happen? Unknowing adoptive parents who didn't file papers.

Will immigration help First Nations adoptees find their tribal families? I honestly don't know. But I plan to find out and investigate!

If you were deported, please leave a comment on this blog so I can contact you.

To read the Guide for Adopted Adults,  Click here.

Read Von's excellent blog: Guide for Adopted Adults... Click here....

Yakama teen in 22 foster homes - ICWA not working

Teen who committed suicide had been in 22 foster homes

By Rikki King, Herald writer © 2011 The Daily Herald Co., Everett, WA

LYNNWOOD, WA -- A boy who jumped to his death from a Lynnwood overpass in January had been on a waiting list for a bed at a state-run psychiatric hospital. He had been in 22 different foster homes since 1998.

The boy, 14, ran away from his Lynnwood-area group home Jan. 21. Just 20 minutes later, he jumped from the Alderwood Mall Parkway overpass onto I-5 below.

His public death, which played out in front of shocked witnesses and stalled traffic on I-5 for hours, haunted many. The state's Children's Administration on July 20 released an executive fatality review of the boy's death. The administration is a division of the state Department of Social and Health Services.

The boy was a dependent of a Yakama tribal child welfare agency and had been a ward of the state since he was a toddler. The Herald is not naming him because of his age and the circumstances surrounding his death.

State law requires the Children's Administration to conduct a fatality review every time a child dies unexpectedly while in its care or while receiving its services, spokeswoman Sherry Hill said.

The fatality reviews don't seek to explain all the circumstances surrounding a child's death.

"We look at ways to improve education, policy, training and then if there are any legislative changes that may be needed," Hill said.

During the boy's life, the Children's Administration had worked with the welfare agency and tribal courts to provide services to him.

Tribal leaders and tribal health care workers were involved in the fatality review. So were representatives from multiple districts within the Children's Administration where the boy had lived, Hill said.

Since June 2009, the boy had been in group homes supervised by staff. Just weeks before his death he was placed at Cypress House in the Lynnwood area awaiting room at the psychiatric hospital.

In the year leading up to his being placed in tribal care as a toddler, the boy was visited at least six times by Child Protective Services, records show. Each visit investigated allegations that the boy's mother was abusing or neglecting her children.

Social workers for years tried to involve the boy's parents in his care.

His mother committed suicide in 2001. A few years later, his father was sent to prison.

The boy and his siblings' longest stay in one place was several years in a Yakama Nation foster home. The stability of the home was good for them while they dealt with their mother's death, the review says. However, the foster father died in 2004, and the grieving foster mother asked for the children to be removed.

After that, the boy had a history of struggling to adjust to new homes. He had significant behavioral and mental health issues, the details of which are blacked out in the report.

The boy in 2009 faced legal trouble in Benton and Yakima counties, court records show. Both cases involved assaults. He was still under active court supervision at the time of his death.

Late last summer, caseworkers started trying to get him into a psychiatric hospital.

The fatality review found that case workers did not consistently convey information about the boy's history to all involved in his care, especially regarding his behavior issues and safety planning. People at the group home in Lynnwood may not have known about the behaviors that led the state to seek a hospital placement. He was supposed to be under constant "visual and earshot" supervision at the home.

The review team concluded more supervision may have been needed. It also suggested more scrutiny for placing young people with such complex cases outside their home communities.

The review recommends that Children's Administration workers in similar cases make sure every caregiver has a comprehensive summary of the case. That discussion should occur before the child is placed at the home. The administration also may want to develop additional training for foster parents who care for children with complex mental health and behavioral issues, the team suggested.

In the week after his death, the boy's body was returned to his family for burial. An obituary that ran in an Eastern Washington newspaper said he was an enrolled member of the Yakama Nation. He spent at least part of his life on the Yakama Reservation and was a member of the Shaker and Longhouse religions.

Memorial services took place over several days in the Yakima area shortly after his body was sent back home.

[I am saddened by this story so much. This tragedy again scores the fact that the Indian Child Welfare Act has not worked in many ways and needs attention.   Prayers for this teen and his tribe...Trace]

Aboriginal Sixties Scoop Class Action Lawsuit

This class action lawsuit has been filed against the Government of Canada. The lawsuit alleges that between 1962 and 1996, Canada negligently delegated Indian child welfare services to the Province of British Columbia. Ignoring its obligations to Aboriginal children, Canada took no steps to prevent them from losing their Aboriginal identity and the opportunity to exercise their Aboriginal and treaty rights when they were placed in foster homes and adopted by non-Aboriginals.
The plaintiff, a status Indian, was taken from her parents and placed in foster care when she was a young girl. She is bringing this lawsuit on her own behalf and on behalf of status Indians who were living in British Columbia and placed in foster care or adopted between 1962 and 1996.
If you are a status Indian who was placed in foster care or adopted between 1962 and 1996, please complete the Do You Qualify? form or Contact Us for more information.
Click here for their website and contact info

Indian Child Welfare Act (history) short documentary

Lies the Social Worker Told

Guest Blog By Mary-Lee

When I was adopted in 1946, the unrealistic expectations my adoptive parents were given by the adoption social worker were terribly unfair to them, but also pretty darned unfair to me, too.
Of course there are all the usual ones. Most egregious is the one we adoptees all know... the one that said, “If you do a really good job as a parent, she will never want to know anything about her birthparents.”
Then, hedging their bets I suppose, is the one that said, “If she ever does want any information about her birthparents, all you need to do is come to us and ask.” Not all she needs to do, notice, but all you need to do. My adoptive parents, in partnership with the social worker, were set up from the start as the sieve through which all my questions and the answers would be strained and filtered. I was not a part of that plan. But I digress.
The one really unrealistic expectation “my” social worker set up before my adoption was finalized was, “Her I.Q. is one point below genius, so she will be able to take advantage of every opportunity you will be able to offer her.”
I really wonder how the social worker knew this. I was a bit over a year old at the time and barely able to speak. If I had been older, I might have laughed out loud. But again, I digress.
Still, my adoptive parents were required to have me tested, at their own expense of course, sometime before the adoption was finalized. I needed to prove myself able to see and hear perfectly or I would not have been offered for adoption. I also needed to demonstrate my intelligence.
And the intelligence test I was given? My adoptive mother told me about it years later. The doctor had a large picture of some items that he held up for me. He said, “Show me the shoe.” It seems I had just received a new pair of shoes for the special occasion so, quite naturally, I stuck my newly-shod foot straight up and out. “Yes, that’s a very nice shoe,” he said, “but show me the shoe in the picture. “ The second time I barely missed hitting him in the face with the shoe... the one that was definitely not in the picture.
So... onward. No sense kicking a dead horse, or a lively doctor either.
The next task was to put the doll in the chair. The problem was that there was a piece of glass between the child with the doll (me) and the designated chair. The less gifted child would try to put the doll through the glass and into the chair. The “genius” would simply walk around the glass and install the doll safely in the chair. My response? I pulled the glass over and shattered it. But I did put the doll in the chair exactly as I had been instructed.
And so on it went. I can only wonder how the doctor managed to score his test... after he swept up the glass from his floor. Whatever dilemmas he must surely have dealt with, the score eventually did come back to the social worker and I was one I.Q. point below genius. Yeah! You bet!
My parents’ problem, especially my mother’s problem, was that I never managed to live up to my hype.
Yes, at first I got A or A+ in the school subjects, but my teachers wrote that I could do so much better if I would only apply myself, and they all staunchly refused to give me better than A- in effort.
My mother dissolved into tears when I eventually brought home a B+ in arithmetic. I clearly remember her sitting on the lid of the toilet seat sobbing, “Blessed Mother, where did I go wrong?”
Then I got my first D, in religion of all things. My own suspicion was that the grade was given in a fit of pique because I had, only recently, not stopped blowing my nose in class while Sister was giving the meditation. But that’s just my suspicion. My mother had her own suspicions. None of them boded well for me.
I was truly a mediocre student all the way through school. My mother had told me that she would send me to college to become something “respectable,” like a teacher or a nurse... but not an artist or a translator, which were my preferences. I took as many elective foreign language credits and art credits as I could manage, and those good grades actually helped save me from flunking out completely, but still I stuck with teaching. I really tried to please. Doggedly.
Then came a day that I remember especially well... the day before my adoptive mother died. I was barely twenty-one, and still needed her approval desperately, so I pointed out to her that I was finally a teacher, and that I was living on my own and able to support myself, and wasn’t she at least proud of me for that? Maybe that was the wrong time to ask. I don’t know. But her answer?
“No. I'm not proud of you. You could have done so much better.”
My mother died thinking that she had failed as a mother. But I had to live knowing that I had disappointed her in some basic way and truly not understanding how I could have done otherwise. All because of an unrealistic expectation... a lie actually, among many lies that need not have been told. I have long since forgiven my adoptive mother for believing them... and myself, for not living up to everyone's expectations. But I will never, ever forgive the social worker. Never.

Check this out! My Kindle author interview (7-7-11)

If you want to read a bit about why I wrote One Small Sacrifice:
Click here!

Shooting Stars (reminder) Filming in October!

Hello! I am Rhett Lynch. I am grateful and excited to introduce you to the short film, "Shooting Stars." Shooting Stars is the story of a young Native man who reconnects with his heritage in the most unlikely place, a junkyard. I wrote this piece reflecting on my life's experiences. I can't wait to bring this film to life for you!
The trailer "Edgar's Journey," is from a short film I wrote a few years ago. It was the second time I had the pleasure of working with my Emmy award winning mentor, Thom Eberhardt. Thom directed Naked Fear (I played the role of Jack), Captain Ron, and Gross Anatomy among many other films. I am thankful Thom has agreed to share his expertise and mentor-ship with us on the making of Shooting Stars. We are speaking with a two time Grammy award winner, who will write the score and star in Shooting Stars. Not only is he a gifted musician, he is also a talented actor recently appearing in a made-for-television movie. We can't print his name just yet because we don't have a deal, we can't make a deal without you jumping into the project by donating today!

The Shooting Stars DVD is more than a short film; it is a whole package.
•The short film "Shooting Stars"
•The documentary "The Making of Shooting Stars"
•The original soundtrack performed by (Can't say his name just yet!)
•The music video of (??????) and his band!
You must get involved for all four of these events to be included on the disk!.

Shooting Stars will be filmed in New Mexico in October.

Also check out Youtube! http://www.youtube.com/user/RhettLynchStudio

I'm Associate Producer on this project! Support this film and click on the link..Thank you!!....Trace (more posts coming the end of July)