I recognised my own handwriting on the adoption file

Dear Delyara, I placed a baby for adoption when I was seventeen. I was told the records would remain closed, and for thirty-four years I knew almost nothing about the life that followed. Recent law changes allowed me to request part of the file. It arrived today. I expected official forms, signatures, typed summaries. What I did not expect was a letter I had written to my daughter the night before leaving the hospital. I had forgotten writing it. The handwriting is mine but younger, rounder, full of hearts over the letter i. I told her I loved her, that I was sorry, that I hoped she would have a bedroom with yellow walls because yellow had been my favorite color. I do not remember why I chose yellow. I read the letter and felt jealous of the seventeen-year-old girl who still believed she could explain herself in three pages. At fifty-one, I have no better explanation. I do not know whether my daughter ever received the letter. The file does not say. I know she is alive. I know her first name changed. That is almost all. Tonight, I keep tracing my younger signature at the bottom. She wrote, “Love always, Mum.” I have spent thirty-four years wondering whether I am entitled to that final word.