Author Description

This story begins with a poor family living in an Army town. Arlene, only fifteen and pregnant with her first child, is married to William, a soldier and twenty-five. As the story develops, having four children to raise, they have many family struggles. There is the lack of education, not able to keep a job, moving from place to place, and the children subjected to alcohol, fighting, lack of food, no stable home life for the children. One child is ill and removed from the home by a relative. The marriage begins to crumble, both parents leaving the children home alone as they are out partying and drinking. As the fighting and drinking escalates, the parents eventually abandon the children for days, until a neighbor calls the authorities, and the children are picked up. Arlene and William return to reconcile with their girls, unfortunately lacking the "where with all" to accomplish the task. The story will explain the plight of these two sisters through abandonment, Welfare, foster care, and finally adoption. Beverly and Diana begin their journey not only to reconnect with each other after fifty years but to go back to the veracity of "where did they come from?"