“Karen. If I knew the answer, or even a likely answer, I would tell you straight out. But this is new territory. I can only promise you I’ll do my best for you if you want me to represent you.”
“How can I afford you? This sounds like it’ll be expensive.”
“We’ll talk about that too.”
I pace the hotel room for some time, grinding my memory for how I had neglected to make sure that Karen would maintain contact between Dawn and Patty and her family. Surely that haircutting fiasco should have been avoidable. How could I have managed this differently after that hearing? I remember how lucky I felt, how Karen and I had ‘skated’ through it and escaped a more pressing examination of Karen’s circumstances. Now I castigate myself for having taken such a limited view. Instead of just calendaring the deadline for Patty’s appeal and waiting for it to pass, I should have spent some time with Karen, counseling her on the adjustment.
Now everything in this case has the potential for becoming infinitely worse.
“Stephen, it’s Analee Meriwether. How are you?”
“Hi, Sharon and I are just back from visiting our youngest daughter. She’s about to start with Teach for America. So we’re feeling good.”
“Congratulations! You’re way ahead of us. Our youngest just started kindergarten.”
“Enjoy every minute of that; it goes way too fast. But I’m sure you didn’t call me for advice on being a parent.”
“Well, maybe I did, in an indirect way. I’m calling you on Ward and Haskins. I represented Karen in the guardianship termination, and I’ll probably be representing her in your parentage action. I’m on vacation this week, and there’s no time for me to prepare with her for the RFO you set in three weeks. May we have a month’s continuance? I’d like to think we could work out some access arrangements in the interim.”
“Well, they have to go to mediation anyway; it would probably have to go over for that reason alone. So I’ll say yes without even consulting my client. But if you think you can work out access arrangements, you are a wonder worker. From what I’ve heard, Karen won’t even talk to her sister.”
“The sad thing is; they used to be close, all their lives. When Karen got sick, Patty was there for her. And they coordinated well throughout Karen’s recovery. Only when Karen wanted Dawn back, Patty balked. And then there was that stupid incident when Karen came to pick up Dawn.”
“Do you think Patty knew how to push Karen’s buttons?”
“Thank you, Stephen. I won’t repeat that.” I paused. “This little girl shouldn’t lose contact with her aunt and uncle and cousins. Karen and Patty need to mend fences more than they need this cutting-edge lawsuit. If we could somehow restore normal relations in the family, if Patty knew she had enforceable visitation, do you think we could make this lawsuit go away?”
Stephen sighed audibly, as if he were thinking it over. “Look, if we could restore normal relations in this family, we’d all be miracle workers. The lawsuit would fall of its own weight. When you get back to the office, we should work on getting them to see the best mediator around.”
“Matt or Joanne?”
“Yeah. Those are the first names that came to me also. But I have to tell you, I think there’s too much water over the dam in this family. It’s gone too far for us to put things back together again.”
“You mean you’re looking for a test case in the Supreme Court?”
“No, Analee; I’ve been around too long to look at it that way. Everyone will lose if we have to take it that far.”
“Well, you give me some hope.”
“Analee, one more thing. I’m glad you’re on the other side.”
“Just tell me one thing. You’re not going back to the office this week.” Adam has returned from the new MOMA, ebullient about the exhibits.
“I’m not going back to the office before Tuesday. Stephen gave us an extension.”
So we rent bikes and ride along the Embarcadero, across Crissy Field and through the Presidio, working up our appetites for another special meal, this time at Poggio in Sausalito, where we eat at an outside table, facing the ferry dock and marina.
“Whatever happened to our dream of living here?” I wonder aloud.
“Reality intervened. I was lucky to get a position teaching con law at McGeorge. I’m more than willing to start a new search, but it will take time, and you can imagine how seldom positions open up in the Bay Area. I have enough seniority now that I could take a year’s guest teaching assignment somewhere here. That’s the best way to get an invitation to join the faculty here, but is it worth it to disrupt our lives to do that? I’d either have a killer commute or we’d all have to relocate for a year or two. What about your practice?”
“You know I’d relocate my practice in a heartbeat, but I admit it wouldn’t work for just a year or two.”
“And think about real estate prices. We’d have a hard time buying a home with two little bedrooms in San Francisco; there’s no way we could replicate our four-bedroom home and big yard if we moved here.”
“Yeah, we’d be defeating our purpose if we could only afford a home in Vallejo and had to commute to San Francisco every day.”
“Besides, what about your judicial ambitions?”
“Yeah. And it’s cold here in the summertime. So should we just say we’re lucky where we are and give up?”
“I know how much you like giving up.”
“Let’s look at homes in Marin on Sunday.”
I awake Sunday morning to Adam’s fingers caressing my back, his wordless sexual invitation that usually hypnotizes me. But I swing out of bed instead, eager to fetch a Sunday Chronicle with its real estate section. Adam sighs and rolls more reluctantly out of his side of the bed, scratching his neck. I am already partially dressed.
“Can you get a New York Times too?”
“Of course.” Then I’m out the door before he can tell me this will be an exercise in frustration. I can hear him sighing as I leave.
I sit in the lobby with a cup of black coffee and the real estate section before even going back to the room. It is obvious that anything we could even remotely hope to afford would be a big step backward from where we now live. So I go back to the room proposing that we ignore reality altogether and just look at fantasy homes in Marin. We visit a hilltop home in Tiburon with views in three directions, oblivious to its eight million dollar price tag. Adam jokes about not being able to concentrate on cooking from the kitchen because of its breathtaking views of San Francisco. Exploring every bedroom and closet takes me that much further away from what is already starting to preoccupy me.
14
ANALEE
“DECLARATION OF PATRICIA HASKINS WARD IN SUPPORT OF PETITION FOR PARENTAGE AND REQUEST FOR ORDER FOR TEMPORARY CUSTODY
I, Patricia Haskins Ward, declare:
I bring this action to secure the legal parentage, custody and welfare of my daughter, Dawn Haskins, age four. Dawn was conceived from my ovum and sperm from an anonymous donor. The resulting zygote was implanted in the womb of my sister Karen Haskins, who gestated and gave birth to Dawn. As a consequence, I am Dawn’s genetic mother and Karen is her gestational mother.
As we had planned, Dawn initially lived with Karen, though she visited frequently with my family. When Dawn was twenty months old, Karen descended into a deep depression that required her hospitalization and led to a prolonged period of psychiatric disability. With Karen’s consent, I became Dawn’s legal guardian on March 30, 201_, and Dawn came to live with my husband Doug and me, and our two children, Sandra (age 9) and Ian (age 6) at our home in Roseville. Dawn lived with us continuously for nineteen months, thriving in the supportive atmosphere of my family, until Karen obtained a court order on July 18, 201__, terminating the guardianship.
Ever since Karen picked up Dawn from our home on July 19, 201_, Karen has prevented
Dawn from having any contact with the rest of her family. On that occasion, Karen provoked an argument over my having cut and conditioned Dawn’s hair (she has very curly hair and it used to hurt her to have me comb it). Karen yelled at me in front of all three children, seized Dawn and drove off with the tires screeching on her car. To the best of my knowledge, she did not even take the time to secure Dawn in her car seat. I do not know if Dawn is either safe or secure in Karen’s custody, and it is not in Dawn’s best interests to be torn from her other parents and her siblings.
Karen has a history of depression going back to adolescence. She experimented with drugs in high school and suffered long “blue periods.” Until her collapse in 201_, she never sought professional treatment. Although she was sometimes employed as an art teacher in Nevada City and wrote and illustrated children’s books prior to her collapse, Karen’s personal life has been erratic and relatively unstable. I do not know what, if any, employment she now has. Karen has had a series of short relationships with inappropriate men throughout her adulthood and has never married. She now lives in Rough and Ready in an old house where, according to Dawn, she goes to the bathroom in an outhouse. I believe Karen lives alone with Dawn, although I have no way of knowing what sorts of people visit her.
By contrast, when Dawn lived with our family, she had two loving and attentive parents and a sister and brother of similar age who were her constant playmates. She attended preschool here in Roseville three mornings a week. She lived with us in our four-bedroom, three-bathroom home where she has her own bedroom (we had a “Dawn Sky” with a rising sun painted on one wall for her). We have a one-acre lot with a play structure in our enclosed back yard. I am a full-time mom who can give Dawn the loving attention she deserves and needs. My husband Doug is an attorney in Sacramento, who is home every night for dinner with our children and me.
For the sake of Dawn, I ask that this court declare that I am her mother (along with Karen), grant physical custody of Dawn to me and permit Karen regular weekend visitation such as she had during the guardianship period.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the State of California that the foregoing is true and correct. Executed at Roseville, California on September 28, 201_.”
By noon on Wednesday, I had read and reread this declaration and the parentage petition, jotted a disjointed list of questions and issues, reread two family law treatises on parentage, and started reading some of the parentage cases. I am becoming more and more agitated and less focused as the hours flee. Karen is coming in at two, and I haven’t even begun to figure out what I will say to her.
Parentage is another legal realm altogether from child custody. I know the realm of custody well, but have had few parentage actions. The ones I had involved unmarried biological fathers, and the question of parentage hung on the outcome of genetics and blood tests. Custody actions depend on the best interests of the child, and begin with the parents participating in mediation to explore whether they can resolve their disputes themselves, with the help of a trained mental health professional. Parentage is altogether different; the issues of mediation and custody aren’t even on the table until one is determined to be a legal parent. The reported cases arise from widely disparate backdrops and contain no bright-line rules. Our codes and cases identify natural, gestational, presumed and legal parents. Presumed parents rank higher than natural parents, but this ranking relates mainly to males and the history of men conceiving children but then either abandoning the mother or taking an active parenting role. We have statutory presumptions, but exceptions to most of them. A child born to a married couple is presumed to be the child of both spouses, regardless of biology, but there are exceptions to that when, for example, the mother leaves the marriage to be with the biological father and the biological father maintains a parenting relationship with the child.
We have a statute governing parentage of a child born from a sperm donation but none for an ovum donation. Social policy arising from marriage collides with biological facts, and the intention factor in assisted reproduction is not always honored.
My mind is muddling. A walk and lunch are my remedies or excuses, but I need to clear my head before talking with Karen.
As soon as I have walked a couple blocks, glancing up at the sheltering trees, I start to think of the people involved instead of the confusing state of the law. Whatever else is true, Patty and Karen remain sisters. Patty had been of immense help to Karen in many ways, and to Dawn as well. They had been close. Their children were close. To fight to maintain a complete alienation must hurt them all.
I have learned over the course of the morning that, while mediation is mandatory for disputing parents, it is not required between a parent and someone who is only alleging to be a parent. I had assured Stephen that mediation would happen, but I have to tell Karen that, at this stage, she can say no and prevent it. Given her state of mind on Friday, she might not agree at all to mediation. Should I try to persuade her? She would not be legally harmed by even an unsuccessful mediation because it is entirely confidential, but she has a right to say no.
15
KAREN
I’ve waited from Friday until Wednesday afternoon to meet with Analee and have her tell me how I can dig myself out of this legal pit I have tumbled into. Jenny helped distract me over the weekend; we drove with our kids to Lake Tahoe, took a short hike, grilled chicken and – all of us holding hands -- dashed into and out of the water. Whenever I brought up the subject with her – out the children’s earshot – she reassured me that my attorney would help me figure it out.
On Monday I took Dawn with me to Rock Creek Farm, where I help out twice a week in exchange for my Friday box of fresh vegetables. The owners Sarah and Paul, a couple in their fifties transplanted from Minnesota, not only consented earlier to my bringing Dawn but seem to enjoy it when I do. They hand us our straw farmer’s hats on arrival and assign me to trimming green beans at a table and tagging them for the subscription boxes. Earlier in the summer, when I asked Sarah how they managed to provide a miniature hat, Sarah laughed and told me they have had visiting children before. From the way she put the hat onto Dawn’s head and asked her how tight to pull the neck cord, I realized this is a treat for her also. My guess is that it’s been a while since she has done this with her own children and she either has grandchildren who live far away or she’s waiting for grandchildren.
Sarah asks Dawn if she wants to work with her today. Dawn takes her hand and they walk to a patch of sungold tomatoes, arching over their metal braces, with beckoning strings of orange, marble-sized fruit. Dawn is just the right height to pick them. They start working close to my table, and I can hear them talking to each other.
“They match your hair,” Sarah tells Dawn, who announces that these are her favorite tomatoes. I watch as Sarah hands Dawn several plastic pint boxes and explains that, each time Dawn fills a box, she can eat two sungolds. I look around me with a sense of pleasure and wholeness. Everything is green and healthy and thriving in the sunlight. Around me are ripening heirloom tomato patches, vines of lemon cucumbers, and fence rows filled with green beans. A huge pile of untrimmed green beans lies next to me on the table, their stems entangled, and Dawn is not more than a dozen feet away, starting to fill her first basket. My task of trimming the green beans and bagging them is repetitive but satisfying in a way I cannot explain. My fingers are busy but my mind is free and open.
“Ian loves these too. I should bring some home to him,” I hear Dawn tell Sarah, who understandably asks who Ian is.
“He’s, like, my brother.”
Why didn’t she say cousin? She knows he is her cousin. Sarah has the good sense to leave the subject alone and compliments Dawn on how many baskets she is filling.
Dawn lasts the full four hours of my stint, though she spends part of the time wandering among the rows of zinnias, admiring all their color. Sarah sends us home with a small handful of
them, magenta and orange and yellow. Dawn carries her little basket of earned sungolds. Just as we start walking to our car, Sarah waves goodbye and invites me, in the friendliest Midwestern way, to bring Ian the next time. All the day’s pleasure evaporates in this instant.
When we get home, Dawn puts her basket of sungolds into the refrigerator and asks me for a particular vase that I haven’t used in a long time. It is a circle of flutes, not more than six inches tall. How Dawn remembers this, I cannot fathom.
Halfway through a cheerful dinner, she puts down her hamburger, studies my face and asks whether her donor has red curly hair. I have told her before that she has a donor instead of a regular father, but this is a difficult concept and she keeps asking. Of course Patty is a donor too, but I hope never to have to explain that to her. I tell her honestly that I’ve never met him but that I read that he is a musician with red, curly hair.
“Do you wish you could meet him?” she asks wistfully, as if this family picture is missing a member.
“No, honey, I’m just thrilled to have you.” As if this will stop this conversation. But then I ask the next question.
“Has anyone ever asked you that before?”
Dawn looks wistful. “Once, when Aunt Patty took me to the grocery store, a lady asked me the same question.”
“What did Aunt Patty say?”
“She said ‘no, he has straight brown hair.’”
I want to hurl something at the wall but hold my tongue. Patty’s husband Doug has straight brown hair. I try to keep my face expressionless.
“Why did she say that if it isn’t true?”
“Maybe she forgot.” I try hard to keep my voice civil.
She asks if she can sleep in my bed, which she does occasionally, and I say yes. Later, as I am reading her “The Giant in the Bean Stalk,” she interrupts to ask what a donor is.
Raising Dawn Page 11