My roots: A diary is all I have

I've got this little diary perched upon my computer desk as I write this. A Five Year Diary, dating back to 1957, bound in satin with a blue and aqua floral motif and with a little lock on it. It's cute. My mother wrote the words "A bundle of joy" on the first page. It's also all I have to go on when trying to uncover the biggest mystery ever... where I come from. The still-legible, beautifully-written words of my adopted mother, Mina Eisenthal, jump out at me from a bygone era. The day of my birth, April 26. My various booster shots. The assortment of doctors she used to treat my many ear infections. The time I cut my hand and had to be rushed to the hospital. All my weight and height measurements.

And reading through this precious little tome about 10 years ago is when I realized something didn't add up. A Jewish baby's bris, his circumcision, is Halachically (according to Talmudic law) supposed to take place upon the eighth day following his birth... so why was mine on May 24, 1957, 28 days later? Doing some digging, and using the diary's entry on May 24 (which in the diary, contained the guest list), I learned from our since-deceased family rabbi, A. Bernard Leffell that a "beit din," or Rabbinical Court, had been established at my bris for the purpose of ritual conversion. So, I was not born Jewish. The mystery deepened.

My late mother and father, Mike (Mendel) Eisenthal, had always told me I was born at the Jewish General Hospital here in Montreal. But when I happened upon his cheque registry for 1957, I found a listing for a cheque made out to the Royal Victoria Anasthesiologists, dated April 25, 1957 in the amount of $25. So, somebody needed anasthesia the day before my birth... my birth mother, perhaps?

Then again, the late date of the circumcision is troubling, because it could also mean that they managed to fudge the date of my birth in the official records, a procedure done all the time in the black and gray market baby adoptions of that period... and I could have been born eight days before May 24, or May 17. Wanna hear a funny coincidence? Growing up, my parents celebrated my birthday on two dates, making me sound like a lunatic in elementary school when you had to stand up and tell the class about yourself at the start of each new year. I had TWO birthdays, lucky me... April 26 and May 18!!!! My parents' explanation for this seemed logical at the time: I always seemed to have a cold around my birthday in April, so they held my party on May 18, 18 being a lucky number in Judaism, representing life.

I have researched the circumstances behind my adoption as best I can throughout my adult years and I always hit a brick wall. Since birth files are still sealed in Quebec, there is no way to get into them and I have exhausted virtually every other means of finding out what my roots are. Many of you won't get why this is important, but for many adoptees, this uncertainty is agony. Just imagine, for instance, every time you have been asked by a doctor whether you have a family history of something...and then ponder each and every time you have known absolutely nothing about your background.

I hold onto this little diary as if my life depends on it. I guess it does.