WIND-ROSE

A wind rose is an old design found on compasses, maps, monuments, and sometimes - due to it’s beauty and symbolism - tattoos. Its purpose is to show its readers which direction the major winds blow: North, South, East, West and all the intermediate points in-between. Today, a wind rose is mainly known as a compass rose, but some earlier names given were "compass star", or stella maris, which means ”star of the sea”. Like you, I’ve seen this symbol my whole life, but it was only during the time I was waiting to be placed with a child through adoption that I discovered the history and the meaning of this elegant symbol.

Waiting to be placed with a child through adoption is somewhat like floating in the middle of the sea with a sail all hoisted and ready, but unable to be steered. You go where the wind blows you and trust that somehow you’ll end up where you’re meant to be. But, the winds of the adoption process can also send you astray or floating around in circles (and it often does), testing your hope, forcing you to question whether you are actually lost rather than in waiting. The wind rose is there as a reminder to be patient and trust that soon a new wind will come and another direction will be taken. As I lay floating at sea, solemnly waiting for the wind to guide me to my future child, I knew in my heart that one day I would have a little girl and I would name her Wind-Rose.

We met on Valentine’s Day, my baby girl and I, when she was just two days old. Her father and I arrived at the crack of morning, to a town we’d never heard of before, and a hospital decorated with Valentine roses, love-hearts, and chocolates for sale. We had driven 20 hours straight through the night after receiving a call that a baby girl had been born outside Chicago and the adoptive family-in-waiting had suddenly changed their minds. Just like that, without warning, the wind had shifted and we were swept to shore. We stood in the sterile hallway of a birthing center, holding a splendid baby girl with the most beautiful rose bud lips and no given name. Hours later we sat in the hospital parking lot staring bleary eyed and astounded into the face of our newly found daughter, Wind-Rose. Light snowflakes fell outside.

Wind-Rose, or “Rosie” as she is most frequently called, was the grand marshal of an otherwise sad parade. She was a beaming, beautiful, blessing who headed straight toward me, but behind her there followed a trail of heartbreak. When I set my sights on adoption, I knew that my great joy would inevitably come from someone else’s great loss. I knew that all the wishes I made to finally find a child of my own were also, in some way, wishes for someone’s failure. This made the joy of wrapping her into my arms tinged with bittersweet. Sweet because I was enraptured by her arrival in the way a child is at their very first sighting of Santa Claus atop the finale float of a grandiose parade. Bitter because my daughter was brought into my life from another mother’s arms, a mother who was, in those very moments, surely weeping.

Part of me always feels the presence of this woman, my daughter’s first mother, and the grief she must carry. At times, I feel it is my duty to somehow make up for her sense of loss, but this is an impossible task. Yet, the knowledge of her has also been, for me, a profound guiding light that extends my limits of patience and pleasure while mothering this wonderful child. It is a breathless whisper that follows me saying, “do not take this for granted”. So I don’t.

I laugh often with my child, I love her with bottomless love, I work to better myself so that my daughter’s life will vicariously be bettered, I accept her, adore her, embrace the chaos as temporary, devote my time to her, and I give my all - at least, I aim to. This is not to say any of these acts are unique or go unrecognized by biological mothers. The adoptive mother differs only in that while nurturing her child, she also honors a promise made to the woman who came before her. In this way, how I care for my daughter is also how I care for the woman who trusted me to be her baby’s mother. She, who let me name her child, not knowing that the chosen name, Wind-Rose, was a reflection of her as well - the one who sent the wind to me that day while I waited out at sea. She, who unknowingly saved me.