King's Corner: Redemption
Have you ever seen a situation that seemed beyond healing, beyond any redemption, that suddenly turned around? This is a saga with a surprise ending.
Lillie grew up in a small town in rural Wisconsin and, in high school during the depression, got pregnant to a rich boy who didn’t want to know. Young Marion grew up in Minneapolis and was an early teen when her mother married George, the villain of our story. He soon ‘broke her in’ and in those days there was little she could do except try to escape.
When my dad, Mark King, was discharged after victory in Berlin, he moved to St Paul MN to be near his mom and step-dad, Julia and Clarence. He hung out with his friends Meryl and Joey at a bar on St Peter’s Street and the neighboring restaurant on the corner of 9th Street, Mother Merrills. Marion came in to MM one night with a friend, met Mark, then returned on her own several times. They started dating.
Merl and Mark were then away for four months combing wheat near Dodge City, Kansas. On their return Julia told Mark that, “You must have done something to make her think you are going to marry her” which was her roundabout way of saying he got her pregnant. Meryl said “We’ve been away four months and she’s only two month’s pregnant!” but Mark’s mother made him feel guilty. They married. Soon after George fed her large doses of ergot and quinine which induced a miscarriage.
Fortunately George and Lil moved to California. Mark and Marion conceived Debbie. Marion went to visit her mom, then George wrote that she would not be returning. When Mark came to their house in Chico CA, George’s face was covered with scratches where Marion had fought him off. But he wouldn’t allow her to leave, or see Mark, except when Debbie was born. Then George and Marion left for Southern California. George organized the divorce.
Mark made monthly child support payments for three years until all the checks were returned by a government lawyer, uncashed. The cover letter said they’d been declined by the mother out of belief that if she cashed them the father might have rights to see his child.
Does this sound to you like a disaster? No one knew if Lillie knew what was going on with her daughter and granddaughter. But a few years later, at George’s funeral, she was the last to speak. She stood up at the podium, simply said “May he rot in Hell”, and sat down again. Marion never told her daughter Debbie about George’s role; she simply said that Mark was never there for her as Debbie grew up.
In those days divorce took many years. Mark met someone else in the meantime and another baby was on the way. But his divorce would not be final in time for them to marry before I was born. So my mom put me up for adoption and I grew up elsewhere.
How unjust does all this feel? Mark didn’t see his children grow up. Debbie was led to believe the worst about him, and I didn’t know anything about him for over twenty years.
And you’ve been patient to read this far. Would you say this felt irredeemable? That George chose to destroy several lives and got away with it? That God’s wheels of justice were barely turning, if at all? Who could blame Mark for feeling that nothing about this was fair? But he chose to move on with life, and embrace it wholeheartedly.
Then the tide turned.
I found my birth mother, we had a wonderful lunch with my birth father, and I learned I had an older half-sister. I met Debbie at her home one evening, with her husband Mike and their three young kids. She and I immediately connected, and there was no mistaking we were siblings. Mike sat silent most the night, so I asked if he was all right. He said, “Maybe. This is like watching a male version of my wife, and I’m not yet sure how I feel about that.”
We exchanged vastly different stories about our father. Over time we listened to each other, but could barely believe we were talking about the same person. I told her I’d found the lawyer’s letter with all the uncashed checks, but her mother Marion denied it all.
Then Marion was diagnosed with cancer. Three weeks before she died she said to Debbie, “You know all those things your brother has been telling you about your father? They’re all true, and everything I told you was a lie. Please forgive me.” Then she was gone.
We met at Mark’s home here in Stagecoach. Debbie & Michael drove down from Oregon, and I flew up from Australia. We were all together, but it was hard for Debbie. I laid out the lawyer’s letter and checks from almost fifty years ago to show he’d always fought to be in her life. At first she could barely touch them. Then healing happened. Before they drove away we had genuine family time together.
Later, when Debbie had the same cancer as her mom, she and Mark sat holding hands and talking up until just before she passed. Complete reconciliation.
Why this story? No situation is beyond hope. God’s wheels of justice may grind slowly, but they grind very fine. Sometimes results are here, sometimes in heaven, but you are never overlooked or unloved. There may be a George in your life, but there’s also God, and he’s always there for you. To bring you healing, and hope, and justice, and reconciliation. Ask him, and trust.
