Susan Lily Jackson’s work includes the following: Semi-Finalist for the National Playwrights Conference—Eugene O’Neill Center- monologue (LEAVING, SIMONE) chosen for THE MONOLOGUE PROJECT-Curator, Dominique Morisseau;  Staged- read/produced New York, Bay Area, Eugene O’Neill Foundation, William Inge Festival, Sydney, London. DEATH BE NOT LOUD! --Best of Capital Fringe—Washington Post positive review.  Published: Smith and Kraus, (2017-2025) Finalist: Creede Repertory Theatre; Henley Rose Competition for Female Playwrights; Fusion Theatre Company; Centre Stage; 3Girls Theatre Co. Alum-PlayGround; Mid-America Theatre Conference; Last Frontier Theatre Conference; Powerstories: Voices of Women Festival.  Commissioned: Years Ahead-Oakland;  Napa Theatre Companies. Part of the SF Young Playwrights Festival with Lauren Yee and Christopher Chen. 

Aboriginal

Based on real stories of adoption; four individuals share their heartbreak and joy at an Adoption Symposium in New York City—they are from the Midwest, South, California, and Australia.

Characters

*Mark Wilbur: male, 30’s, (also known as Killara Matari), Aborigine/mixed race; member of Australian Parliament, one of the children forced into the Assimilation project by the Australian government; mixed race—“passed” as Caucasian

*Rachel Elizabeth Johnson: female, 20-30’s, adopted by a Mid-western family, living at home

*Minnie Camaan: female, 40’s-50’s, pastor—new age

Willis Mavern: male, Caucasian, 30-40’s, family man, South Carolina good old boy

*Based on true stories.

Actors can speak the lines to each other, the audience, to the “interviewer”.

Setting

A panel of individuals attend an International Adoption Symposium at NYU. New York, New York.

Time

2005

MARK
My mother died in childbirth. That’s what they told all of us.

RACHAEL
Mine was just a teenager.

MINNIE
We never knew and I didn’t ask. Even when Grandmother said that I wasn’t her “real” granddaughter. Daddy would have disowned her had he’d known she said that.

WILLIS
No, it ain’t my mother----it’s my big brother Russell. He’s always been one of a kind, doncha know. Let’s see, by now, Russell has….five—no, six, no, five? children.

MARK
They took me from the hospital the day I was born.

RACHAEL
She was just fifteen years old.  

MINNIE
They couldn’t access any records back then. Not even the parents who adopted the babies. Or, so we thought.

RACHAEL
She loved me though, I know that. That’s why she gave me—away---She’d never say, “if you do anything bad, we’ll send you back to the orphanage.” Not like the Johnsons.

MARK
More than half a million of us were moved to new “homes.” 

WILLIS
Not rowdy, like the rest of us. Won’t eat meat at the barbecues and married that hippie woman, Cindy, now callin’ herself Marina. Democrat. But you can’t stay mad at Russell for any length of time. He’d come over and mow your lawn, and water your plants whiles you was away. Without even bein’ asked.

MINNIE
“It doesn’t matter to me or Jackie that you aren’t our ‘birth mother.’ I don’t need to know the past. As far as we’re concerned, you are our real mother”. That’s in the letter I gave her two months before she ---left us. Cancer.

WILLIS
Has two of his own—the others are from Mexico, Korea, uh, China, and oh yes, a fourteen-year-old from Minnesota! And that child…well, he’s got some problems. He had it pretty good there for a while, but then he turns bad. Russell never gives up on that boy, though, even after he gets hisself arrested. You see, the others was all coming in whiles they was babies-- So they don’t know the difference. Maybe it’s better if you don’t know what’s missin’. Youngin’s not knowin’ anythin’ else but Russell and Marina..

MARK
I was taken from my mother’s arms. Tens of thousands of us were removed from our families---if you had one drop of white blood, you’re part of the project; so your life could be “improved” ---you live with white families, and learn their ways. Fishing with boats and poles, instead of spears. 

RACHAEL
Her parents won’t let her keep me, because they’re Catholic. That’s what my new mother told me….Anyway, I live at the orphanage till I’m eight years old. I don’t think I’ll ever leave--no one takes older kids. But, in September, the month I was born, the Johnsons come, and after three meetings--- I’ve been on my best behavior--they take me! They pick me! Me! Rachael! They give me a beautiful baby doll. I hold her on my lap in the back seat and don’t put her down even when we go into a restaurant. I’m going home. I’m finally going home!

MINNIE
Dad falls apart when she dies---couldn’t do anything around the house---just stopped. We have to hire people to come in and feed him. He spends hours going through the photo albums, mailing pictures of Mom to everyone, even to strangers listed in the phonebook. We try to talk to him about it, but he won’t listen.

MARK
My parents-- they’re good people. I was lucky. But I know something isn’t right. First thing I do when I come home from school is strip down to my underwear. I don’t like to wear clothes. It doesn’t feel right.

MINNIE
Mom even wears her wig to bed, because she wants to be—you know, for him, even though she’s---she wants to be pretty, for him. My mother wasn’t vain, don’t misunderstand me. She was a typical housewife. She prepares dinner every night, and makes the pies and biscuits from scratch. But Dad’s first. If we’re talking to her, and he comes home, she’ll put her hand up for us to stop talking, wink, and then go and greet him like he’s been gone for weeks.

WILLIS
Russell wouldn’t hurt a flea. Now Daddy served in ‘Nam---once he and Russell  had that fight about “serving your country”? Well, Russell, he knows the best thing to do is to just shut up. They don’t discuss nothin’. But after 9/11--everything changes between them. Like it done for all of us in our country--we was all nicer. For about six months, anyways. Then some peoples went back to bein’ mean again.

RACHAEL
We drive up this long driveway to a big white house. The door opens into this huge living room and a hallway filled with the biggest pictures I’ve ever seen! And then, my room. A pink bed and brand new clothes in the closet, and windows with white curtains. Neat and clean and so pretty! Just for me. Rachael. Rachael Elizabeth Johnson.

WILLIS
After 9/11,  Russell and Daddy spend hours talkin’ ‘bout things. In fact, I think that’s when he and Daddy decide that Russell’ll bring babies over here from other places, and Daddy’ll help out. ‘Cause that’s when all this foolishness begins. 

RACHAEL
I have a home! Rachael Elizabeth Johnson.

MARK
There are some more children in the neighborhood who look like me. But they keep us isolated.

MINNIE
Jackie took it hard too, when mom died. Got a divorce. After Dad dies, Jackie tells me he’s gay--Jackie didn’t want them to know. He didn’t think they’d accept it. And he’s afraid of losing his stepson, whom he loves like…like….his own.

WILLIS
We didn’t know exactly how Daddy’d helped Russell till Daddy passed, and we discover that there’s nothin’ left. No inheritance. All the land was sold and all the money goes to bringin’ kids over here. Every time we gets us a new baby, my daughter says somethin’ that sticks in my craw-- “Daddy, I wants to go see Uncle Russ, ‘cause I got to tell our stories all over again to the little ones!” 

MARK
I ask …them--my parents? to explain

RACHAEL
I was good. I was very good. Made straight “A’s”, did my chores, everything, so I won’t be sent back to the orphanage. They tell me if I’m bad, I have to go back. That baby doll--they put it on the top shelf in the closet. They only let me play with it if I behave myself.

MARK
It stopped about 1970--I was one of the last to be taken. They said, “we knew it was wrong, but we loved you at first sight. You took the place of the baby we lost.” I got it in my head that their baby was sent to live with another family, too. I finally found some hospital records, but there was nothing about my birth. They’d been destroyed.

MINNIE
You know, I wasn’t surprised, somehow. Jackie’s always---not like anyone. And of course, neither of us resembles each other, or them. When we talk about them now, it’s as if we had a different set of parents. Like that family trip to Florida, which was so much fun for me, was so painful for him. 

WILLIS
Got three of my own. Good kids. Two boys. And four huntin’ dogs.

RACHAEL
The first time we go to church, I think, “I’m a princess!” All dressed-up; black patent-leather shoes, hat, gloves, my hair perfect. But I’m the only little girl dressed like that, so the other children make fun of me. I think they knew. The choir director’s daughter likes me, though.  She brings chocolate candy and dolls, and we play and play and play. She gives me one of her dolls, and she tells me I can keep her. I name her Rachael.

WILLIS
Russell says he’s thinking of bringing two more little babies over here. This time, we’re gonna have to have us a family get-together. We want to make Russell promise that this’d be the last one. He’ll say “yes”, but dang, once that crazy man finds out about “another necessary rescue mission”, well, y’all can guess what that means!

MINNIE
We’re going through some old family photos, and we find some files that have our birth history. Jackie--he’s a lawyer---makes a list of the pros and cons; should we read them? I just have my heart. I tell him, “Be patient. We’ll get some kind of sign to show us what to do.” He’s skeptical--Jackie thinks my career path as a pastor’s a little crazy, but he always listens to what I have to say. So, we look at the pictures again, and there’s one of grandmother. “Did grandmother ever tell you that you weren’t her real grandson?” “Yes!”, he says. “What did you do?”  “I told her,  ‘If  I’m not your real grandson, then you aren’t my real grandmother.’  And then she burst into tears and hugged me.” That’s our sign. We burn the papers.

MARK
When I turn eighteen, they take me for a drive through the Outback. They want me to see the land of my ancestors because they think I’ll feel better. When we get back ….home, I tell them I’ll go to the college they selected for me. For awhile, I immerse myself in their culture. I run for office in the Australian Parliament. I was there when they offered the apology. They publicly apologized to us for taking us from our families. 

RACHAEL
Things go pretty well for a few years. When I was sixteen, I told Dad that he looked ridiculous in his old fashioned suit. On his way out the door, he remarked, “We should have sent you back.”  I said, “I’m sorry”, but--I’m sent off to boarding school—maybe I won’t be allowed to come back home. I didn’t know what I’d done that was so bad they’d send me away.

WILLIS
Total of six. “Good even number”, he says. And my daughter gets her wish, ‘cause as all the children grows up, she can keep tellin’ the family stories. But by now, he’s used up all the money.

MINNIE
Jackie sees his stepson every other weekend. His ex-wife handles the adjustment pretty well. She must have known something all along, though we never—she’s not a person who talks about certain things-- Jackie says that’s living “in denial”. I understand his perspective. I think mom and dad would have accepted Jackie. Yes, I believe they would have. Because we love each other and we were wanted. Every day of our lives, we were wanted! 

RACHAEL
Mother had a stroke while I was at the University. I came home….I won’t go back. I’ll take care of them until –and then I’ll be fine. At least I’ll be home. My home. Our home. Me and Rachael. (she picks up baby doll) This is Rachael. We’ll never leave.

MARK
We are Australians; the government acknowledges that we are the originals. My name now is Killara Matari-- “A permanent man”. They apologized, too. They didn’t mean to cause harm. They thought it was the right thing. When is snatching a child from their mother “the right thing” because you lost your baby? It’s hard not to hate them, but sometimes I do. But mostly I love them. I call them by their first names, and they call me Matari. 

WILLIS
Dang it, I know he’ll find “another necessary rescue mission”! (pause) We’re gonna have to have us a raffle. Raise money somehow. My little girl starts comin’ up with names.

RACHAEL
I got courageous one day, and asked mother and father why they chose me. “You weren’t desperate, like all the other children.” We were all desperate. 

MARK
Many of us look for siblings. There are a few that might be related, but with no supporting documents, we---we decide anyway. So far, I have three brothers and …four sisters. I have three children. I’ve told my children the story, so they will never allow that to happen again. That’s the best that can happen.

MINNIE
No, it’s true. I never wanted to search. What difference would it make? But sometimes, sometimes, I wish we hadn’t burned the papers. Not that I would have read them, but-- I keep telling myself that just being wanted is good enough.

WILLIS
These kids know they’re not Russell’s biological children--Ain’t that obvious? So’s when strangers at the Kmart stare and ask stupid questions, my daughter gave all the kids Post-its, to hand out, which say, “thanks for staring, thanks for caring. We’re a family just like you.” And my daughter’s only eight years old. Reckon she knows more than most of us.

MINNIE
Every day of our lives, we were wanted!

RACHAEL
We were desperate to be chosen.

WILLIS
Maybe it’s better if you don’t know what’s missin’. Youngin’s not knowin’ anythin’ else but Russell and Marina.

MARK
I’ve told my children the story, so they will never allow that to happen again. That’s the best that can come from this.

END PLAY