Cinco de Mayo

Here are two links to Cinco de Mayo, one irreverent, and one very respectful and historical.

For me, Cinco de Mayo has a different meaning. Every year on this date I get a phone call from a young woman. When I was her child protection caseworker, Cinco de Mayo was the day the court terminated her parental rights, thereby making her free for adoption at age seventeen by her foster mother. She is now in her mid-twenties. She also calls me on April 22 of each year, as that is the date when the court authorized her to be removed from her "parents." Her mother was a thief, and her stepfather hated her. She was sexually abused when she was younger.

I was the person who investigated the conditions in her home, and was her caseworker from age nine to eighteen, meeting with her at least weekly for all those years. Before she could be placed in a foster home, she was placed in a mental health facility, then a residential treatment facility. I was her main adult support person through all of those experiences. Then, I found a wonderful single woman, who is a doctor. She became her foster parent, and later, her adoptive parent.

My wife was the school psychologist who first made the call to me to ask if I would investigate the conditions in the home (we were not married to each other at that time). The date the investigation began was September 9, 1993, and, yes, we get a phone call every year on September 9, too.