When I decided to write in this blog, the primary purpose was to let people in on a little dose of our everyday lives and the chaos that is known as "The Felax's", but as I thought about it more and more, the story of how we came to be the Felax Five is just, well, comical. I'll leave out the mundane details of the journey, but touching on the highlights, craziness, and the humor is what I intend to do.
So after Holly and I have our first date, we eventually start talking more and I start to get to know her more and more. I think I caught her off guard a week or so later when I made a comment about wanting to meet her daughter, Cheyenne (you know...the one that had recently gotten a ridiculous pickle birthday card from some stranger). I think she figured that having a child would scare most guys away, which I'm sure it would, but I accepted from day one that if I chose to pursue this relationship that I would be dating both of them, technically speaking. I still vividly remember the first time I saw Cheyenne. Keep in mind I was a 21 year old college student and the only experience I EVER had with kids was with my nephew Travis, so when this little one year old girl came walking into my parents living room, I really had no idea what to expect. I know my first thought was, "yup, it's a mini Holly". She was wearing the cutest little black and white jacket that was in the pattern of a cow, and I'm pretty sure she only had two teeth. But one thing I can tell you for sure was that she was a beautiful little thing and I was happy to meet her.
The next big hurdle was meeting her dad and the rest of the family. I knew from day one that Louie wasn't crazy about the fact that Holly was seeing me, which made that first meeting even more uncomfortable. The first time I met the family was when I was on my way back to college. My plan was to stop out, say hello, and get the hell out of there as fast as I could. Shortly before I left my parents house, Holly called and asked me if I had any dime rolls. Dime rolls? Why the heck are you asking me if I have any dime rolls? She said that her dad had some dimes that he wanted to roll but he was out of dime rolls. Now...I don't know if this was some sort of "Louie Test" or not, but thankfully my mom had some dime rolls so I could get my first brownie point! When I showed up, I was nervous as hell...more nervous than I'd ever been before to meet anyones parents. I don't remember much from that first meeting because her family doesn't say a whole lot, but I do remember one interaction I had with her dad.
Louie: "Didn't you play baseball?"
Me: "Uh...yeah."
Louie: "That's what I thought. I remember seeing your name in the paper a few times."
Me: "Er...uh...yeah, that was me."
And that was it. I wasn't sure what he was getting at, but in hindsight I think he was just trying to be nice and start a conversation. It was awkward, but I think he was happy that I was from the area and that he already knew my family since he worked with my mom for a few years.
As time went by, our relationship got more and more serious. We had a one minor issue a few months in when Holly pretty much told me that she didn't want to ever see or talk to me again. When I asked her why, she just said, "You talk too much." Not a joke. She literally dumped me because I talked too much. Compared to her however, pretty much everyone talks too much. A couple days later, we reconciled and things were back to...well...normal I guess.
I still had another year of college left, so we carried on a long distance relationship from Posen to Saginaw. It actually worked out nicely since Holly was technically supposed to drive Cheyenne to Standish every other weekend for her biological fathers visitation. So instead, Holly offered to just drive an extra half hour down state and cut down on Biofat's trip. (I don't want to use his name, and Biofat is a nice short name for biological father...I have a lot of other names I'd like to use, but this is a family show.) If it gives you ANY idea of the type of people we were dealing with, when Holly offered to drive an extra half hour to Saginaw to cut down on his trip from Lansing, the first time he said, "No, I want to do what the custody papers say, and they say to meet in Standish." So, Holly just dropped her off in Standish and basically followed them for the next half hour and came to Saginaw.
The experience with Biofat was possibly one of the most difficult things we've ever gone through...and those of you that know us know that this is a BOLD statement. Biofat continuously broke visitations, made excuses, and pretty much acted like the total dick that he was. One visitation VERY early on, he brought a 2-year old Cheyenne back with her ears pierced. Holly promptly took them out and told him that no decisions like that can be made without her approval...and she didn't approve. I had grown very fond and close to Cheyenne, but his continued "on and off" relationship was having a HUGE affect on her. His child support payments were spotty at best, and he never seemed able to make more than a few visitations in a row. Then the shit hit the fan one time when upon returning home after a visitation, Holly saw Cheyenne repeatedly hit herself in the head while in the back seat. Holly asked Cheyenne why she was doing it, and all she said was, "Papa hit me. Head. Papa hit me. Head." Needless to say, we contacted a lawyer and demanded that an investigation be done and we stopped allowing visitation altogether until we were satisfied that she was going into a safe situation.
Not surprisingly, we stopped hearing from Biofat shortly after a court hearing where he represented himself and the judge ordered his dad to sign some "release of information" papers so that they could do a background check on Cheyenne's papa. One of the most ridiculous things about that court hearing was hearing Biofat tell the judge that he thought it was Holly's dad that was abusing Cheyenne. He also said that he witnessed abuse, and when the judge asked what he saw, he said, "I can remember watching Louie give Cheyenne a bath in their washtub." Yeah...apparantly giving a bath in a wash tub is abuse. This is especially comical for anyone that knows Louie. Cheyenne was his first grandchild and they were as close as bark to a tree. He literally did everything with her and would never do anything to harm her. As we speak, they are upstairs at my house watching TV together...13 years later:)
So we stopped hearing from Biofat and we thought that maybe we were done with him, until a horrible day a couple years later when he called and basically accused Holly of denying him his parental rights. Keep in mind, the judge merely ordered his dad to sign a paper to get visitation back, and it just never got done. So it was back to court. One thing that we THOUGHT we had on our side was the fact that he had made absolutely NO attempt to contact Cheyenne in well over two years. We thought the worst that could happen would be to get 4 or 5 supervised visits, followed by a few unsupervised visits...and then and only then would she have to go and stay overnight. What happened in the courtroom in Rogers City that day still has me baffled beyond belief, and it was one of the most difficult days for all of us. The presiding judge (I will not use his name out of respect for his family, but he is a complete joke and a sorry excuse for a human being.) ordered ONE supervised visit, followed by just picking up where we left off with every other weekend overnight visitations. We were stunned. When Biofat came to pick up Cheyenne for the first visit, I was a wreck. I'm pretty sure that was the first time I ever took medicine to calm me down...and it actually worked.
By this time we were living in Port Huron, and we started driving to over near Flint every other weekend to drop Cheyenne off for visitation. Things seemed to be going well for quite a while, but then something ridiculous happened. We were dropping her off just like every other time in the parking lot of a McDonalds off of I-69. I was giving Cheyenne a good bye hug and started to hand her over to Biofat when something fell out of what I thought was his front pocket. I didn't even bother to look at first, but he seemed to get very uncomfortable so I peeked down and saw 2 or 3 bullets on the ground that had fallen out of his 9 Millimeter handgun that he had stuffed down the front of his pants. At this point, I think I said something like, "What the hell is that for?" He said that he had a CCW and he always carried it for protection. I really didn't know what to say and Holly was just standing still as though she saw a ghost. We literally didn't know what to do because we were so shocked, so we got back into the car to drive away. It was almost like we both realized at the same moment that something was seriously screwed up about this situation, and what happened next was almost like something out of an action movie.
They had driven around in the drive thru while Holly and I were sitting stunned and talking about what to do. Luckily, they must have had a big order because they were told to pull over into a parking space next to the restaurant to wait for their order. Holly and I knew what we needed to do, and we took action. I put the car into drive, not knowing if they had left yet or not. I came around the restaurant and we saw them parked, so I floored it and abruptly stopped directly behind his car so that they couldn't pull away. He got out and asked what we wanted, and I just said (in my biggest badass voice), "Get Cheyenne's bags, she's coming with us." When he asked why, I simply told him that if where he was taking Cheyenne was so dangerous that he needed to be packing heat, she wasn't going to be going with him. Surprisingly, they didn't put up much of a fight and we got Cheyenne in the car and drove back to Port Huron. Little did I know at the time that that would be the last time Cheyenne ever saw him.
Weeks passed. Months passed. Years passed. We still lived in fear of getting that fateful phone call from them, demanding visitation and telling us they were taking us to court. We were prepared, but it didn't ease the tension. I had asked Biofat before to sign off his parental rights and let me adopt, but he would have none of it. We had no idea what would happen next, but all we knew is that we were not about to take her back over there until we were convinced she was safe. Then one day while I was in the teachers lounge at school, I got a phone call from Holly and she uttered the two words that I never wanted to hear her say.
"Biofat called." (OK, she actually used his real name...but you get the picture).
I didn't know what to say...but I think it was something like, "Oh God...now what." Then Holly said the last thing that I expected her to say..."He wants to know if you'll adopt Cheyenne." The rest of the conversation was a bit of a blur at that point, but I do distinctly remember hanging up the phone and starting to sob uncontrollably. I don't know why I reacted that way. I think it was part relief and part overwhelming joy. It didn't take long and it was done. We went to the courthouse in Port Huron and stood in front of Judge Brown, and listened to him happily say that the adoption was complete. Cheyenne's new official name was Cheyenne Lyn Felax. (We changed her middle name to match Holly's for two reasons. One, the other one was given to her by Biofat. And two, Kennedy had been born by this time and we gave her Holly's middle name...so why not all three.)
And now here we are, 13 years later. Cheyenne is a beautiful 8th grader at my school, and she has one of the coolest teachers in the world in her first hour class. Yeah, that would be me. We have been through a lot of ups and downs, highs and lows, but I couldn't be more proud of the young lady she has become. Yeah, she's a little boy crazy. Yeah, she's not crazy about school NEARLY as much as she is about boys. But she's a kind-hearted, vibrant, artistic, and caring young lady that has been through more than any 13 year old should ever go through (more on that later:). She plays basketball and volleyball and she sings in the choir in her school. Yeah, that little two-toothed one year-old has turned out all right...and I'm so proud to be able to call her my daughter.
Until next time....
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