Arthur Gaines married my mother Betty and adopted me when I was three. I called him Daddy. When I was five, my parents took me to visit Betsy and her family, she was an adopted child. They chose this context to tell me I was also an adopted child, that Artie chose me to be his daughter, as Betsy’s parents had chosen her. We were loved, wanted, and safe. To hedge my bets, I served Artie a dessert dish, red Jello cubes with whipped cream. “I want you to be glad you chose me.” As a child approaching latency, I would gaze at my Daddy longingly, thinking if he died, I would die too. He passed away when I was 13. I swallowed my grief with booze and didn’t stop until January 26, 1997.
Artie had a son from a previous marriage, Michael, born in 1943. The divorce had been brutal, his ex-wife had trained their young child to kick and spit at Artie. Daddy had already lost his father and his two brothers to heart failure and he had a heart condition, so he backed off and eventually, he let go. Sometimes that’s what trauma survivors do, hiding from more pain, hoping to stay in balance. Michael was raised never knowing that Artie was his biological father. He found out the truth when he enlisted in the Army and was told his legal name was Michael Gaines.
Shocked, around the time the Beatles broke, Michael went to Artie’s workplace hoping to meet his bio dad, but he chickened out. He looked inside the showroom of Gaines Motors and walked away. When he returned from the service, Artie had already passed away. Michael was raised by a devoted father he idolized, but Artie had never severed his parental rights, making Michael the closest thing I’ll ever have to a brother, albeit estranged, and unknown.
I met Michael and his wife only once, around 1969. The very sight of him brought me to tears, he looked just like Mr. Gaines, the kind, handsome, yet distant and detached father who gave me a home, his name and kept me safe. I had always hoped to reconnect with Michael but couldn’t find him.
In 2010, Michael’s son contacted me to find out about the Gaines family medical history, he had young children and knew nothing about his grandfather. The men in the Gaines family all died young of heart failure, Betty & Artie never had kids for fear of this family curse. After his son gave me his contact info, I called Michael, and we had a lively, fun, deep, and bittersweet six-hour phone conversation. I discovered Michael was an attorney, had five kids, and like me, he loved firearms, like me, he felt estranged and deeply wounded from multiple childhood trauma. I had found my brother.
We made plans for a family reunion upstate. The week of the reunion, my de facto mother-in-law and spiritual teacher went into hospice care. I explained that I had to reschedule. Emotional scars and miscommunications ensued; Michael felt rejected, hurt, and I, with zero tolerance for any family bullshit, walked away. In 2020, Michael died of heart failure.
Last year, as Venus went Retrograde, and Jupiter and Neptune transited to me natal Pisces/8thHouse, I was contacted by one of Michael’s daughters. She had read my books in College and wondered if Mr. Gaines was her grandfather. We connected by phone, and Facebook, making plans to reactivate the family reunion. What prompted her to search for me was a dream she had of her late father Michael urging her to find Arthur Gaines. She’s a behavioral analyst with psychic, mediumship gifts and an interest in healing. All four nieces and one nephew live in Westchester. Arthur Gaines was a Pisces, so was Michael and all his children. Due to Covid 19, we still haven’t met in person, but I’m now connected to all of them through social media. I get to see their young children grow up in photos, Artie’s grandchildren and great-grandchildren, a legacy of happy, beautiful kids.
In time, God makes all things whole and new.
Donna Gaines, 11/2022
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