My Bucket List

The big 5-0 makes us all perform the mental checklist of life. I am the first to admit that I packed more than most into those first 50 years. I am also the first to recognise that with my memory not what it was at twenty, my very own bucket list is the perfect way to ensure that I get to tick off all of those lists in life that are still sitting somewhere in my to-do box. My hour long session therefore with Glen yesterday was a bit scary, hugely enjoyable and has left my thigh muscles screaming for mercy. It was fun in spite of the fact that he has huge yellow teeth, sweats like a pig and needed a hose down when it was over!!! What’s more I can’t wait to do it all again next week!

Before you get carried away, you need to know that Glen has four legs, a long tail and lives in a stable. Getting back on a horse in furtherance of my quest to join my daughter on a riding holiday at some stage in the second part of my life was probably one of the more physical “to-do”s on my bucket list. But as I sit today and ponder the things that are still waiting for me to master, it is clear there is one thing on my list which has the capacity to change my life more than any other. It is also much scarier than hoisting myself onto a horse after a break of more than 25 years!

I probably need to give you a little by way of background information. My mother was just 16 years old when I was conceived. As a child really, still at school, a Catholic Covent, I was actually born a month shy of her 17th Birthday. The shame that she must have felt when she was thrown out by my grandmother, after her dreadful mistake was discovered, has shaped her life ever since. It is incredible now, in these times when giving birth to a child at 16 is often little more than a means to an end, and carries more in the way of status and benefits than shame and regret. And if I am truly honest, it has shaped my life too. I have come to believe that I am a walking, talking reminder every time she sees me of that terrible thing she did all those years ago. My presence alongside my half sister who neither likes me, nor looks like me is further evidence of the divide. It is not something that my Mother and I have ever been able to talk about. Her reaction to my milestone birthday when it arrived, and I had returned to Southport, my home town for a few days was so very sad. Could I please avoid mentioning my age if we came across anyone she knew. How could she be happy about celebrating my 50^th birthday when it signalled such an obvious message to the people in her world who would be aware that she had not yet celebrated her Golden Wedding Anniversary. New friends would no doubt be shocked whilst old friends would be reminded.

She was lucky enough to meet my “dad” who took us both on when I was very small. If I had been left to choose someone to play that role in my life I would no doubt have chosen him for myself. Despite the fact that I have never been close to my mum, as a child, I always felt ironically that whilst I was not her favourite child, I was probably my dad’s. He took his role seriously, determined to shape my life for the better. Whilst he had not had any education to speak of, he instilled in me me the belief that I could go all the way. In the words of Woody from Toy Story,:’Reach for the stars:.” And I did. He taught me my most important lesson in life which was to never forget my grass roots. He gave me a work ethic which has served me well over the years and allowed me to achieve things for myself and my family which I could never have hoped for in another life.

I don’t remember how old I was exactly when I found out that he was not my dad, maybe 15 or 16. Despite being slim and blonde, and he being stocky with black hair and a thick black moustache, it somehow came as a terrible shock. My sister was and remains the image of him. Those family photos of the two of us in matching dresses must have served to reinforce the difference between who we were and how we had arrived into the world. My paternal Grandmother, a hard and difficult woman always treated me differently. It was ever so subtle yet I felt it without understanding it. My maternal Grandmother ironically could not have loved me more once she got over the shock and brought my mother back into the fold. She was, until her death, a warmth in my life and a constant presence even with the distance of the North/South divide between us. As a child, I had found hidden photos of my Parents Wedding Day and thought it strange to see me present as a young bridesmaid. However I believed only that I was the “bastard child ” born out of wedlock that a couple of cruel kids at catholic school in a small town had called me, no doubt thanks to their even more cruel parents. It never occurred to me that there was a bigger secret to tell.

When I was in my early 20’s I obtained a copy of my original birth certificate which showed my Birth father’s name and the date hat I was formally adopted by my dad when I was just 5 years old. Yet I did not pursue it further at that time in my life. I had too many other things to achieve. And back then my Dad looked on and celebrated alongside me. He was my Dad in all but biology. He was so clearly proud of me on the day that I graduated from University where I studied Law, and even more so at my Call Ceremony when I became a Barrister. Perhaps never more so than when he walked me down the aisle of a tiny and beautiful church in Hampshire at my Wedding Blessing when I was 29 years old. I married a man who became the best Son-in-Law possible, and for the most part my life has been golden. Having clearly had curious thoughts about my roots, not just that one time in my early twenties, but again at various stages following the births of my children, I still never really felt the urge to do anything about finding my Birth father. Even though there were times when for the sake of my children’s wellbeing, I would have liked to have answered those questions which relate to family medical history for example, it still seemed somehow an ungrateful thing to do. I recognised the pain that it would cause my dad if he were to find out about it. And as it continued to be a topic that was never spoken of within the family, there really was no real hope of being able to do very much about it. The one person who would have freely spoken to me about it and told me the truth, my mother’s elder brother, David, died some years ago before we were ever able to talk about it.

Then a few years ago I visited my sister in America. She told me that my mother had told her that she had bumped into my Birth father in Southport. She said that. he had told her that he had been living in the Blackpool area for many years. It was ironic that she felt able to discuss it with my sister yet unable so to do with me. So as 50 loomed, it became something often on my mind. At 20, 30 or even 40 there is no urgency in your life to deal with something like that. At 50 you are so much more aware of your own mortality, and have begun to lose those around you. The sense of urgency is enough to make you realise that if it is something that you are ever going to do then it has to be soon.

So that is how it came to be that my bucket list was compiled. So far I have done a few of the things on my list but not yet achieved the one that may change my life the most. With the recent arrival of my first grandchild ironically also born out of wedlock it has gathered meaning. I want to be able to tell her something of her history and am aware that a large piece of it will remain missing if I do not now face my demons. Enquiries over the past year or so have led me down a number of paths but I have not yet found the man whom I know only as he appears in black and white on my birth record “Edward J Berry of King Street Southport (29^th June 1961)” Along the way I have come into contact with a few warm and interesting people with their own stories to tell, also called Berry but not the Berry I am looking for. I live with the knowledge that he may not want to be found, and that I may even have made contact with him already and been rejected. That is something that I have to accept. I am not looking to change his life. I am not looking to find out why he never stayed around to enjoy my life as it has turned out. I hope that he went on to live a life that brought others into the world who have turned out as grateful for their daily bread as am I. I do wonder if there are others around who may look a little like I do. Isn’t that to be expected?

If he is out there I would want him to know one thing. I had a great dad when it mattered. I had a dad who was there for the milestones in my life, who did not seem to care that I was not there at the very beginning. I understand wholeheartedly that things were very different back then. I understand that in much the way that my life has gone along on it’s tracks, that his will have done too. That it will be difficult and awkward now to face up to any kind of enquiry from me all these years later, when he too may have been keeping the secret in much the way my mother has tried to do. I only hope that he would be able to put all of that aside long enough to be able to understand that I maybe have the right to look him in the eyes even just once so that I can tell him these things for myself.

So my weekly session with Glen is small fry. My aching muscles will heal and the shame of striding out in jodhpurs and hard hat is also small fry compared to what that young girl of 16 must have felt and continued to feel at what she had done to her parents at a time when there were not many sins greater back then than the one she had committed in a staunch Catholic Household. I will continue with my list which involves amongst other things swimming with the dolphins who may even be related to the ones that often swim alongside me as I walk on the beach near my home in Naples, Florida. But I will also try to put in that last piece of the jigsaw that first started with the arrival of Stella Berry, born in a hospital in Ormskirk, Lancashire so many years ago. That is the biggest thing on my Bucket List for sure.

Written by: Stella Reynolds