Current Events Watch

“Hi, my name is Gary,” he said. “I was wondering if you could help us.” His wife, by his side, bent down to wipe their son’s runny nose.

“Hi, Gary, of course! What can I do for you?” asked CJ.

“My wife Cynthia, and son Bobby, here, we’re a very happy family,” he said with pride. “Cyn and I try to be the best parents we can be. He’s adopted, but we have always made sure that he knows that he is loved and that he was meant to be our son, and we’ve given him a good home.”

“That’s wonderful! Too bad there aren’t more folks like you. There are far too many children who need a loving family and a have no place to call home,” CJ said with a smile.

“Well, here’s the deal,” Gary began with some hesitation. “After adopting Bobby, we decided to help other kids who were lost in the system, too, so we became foster parents. Made it through the certification process with flying colors, and it’s truly been a blessing to give those kids a home, even temporarily. We love them all, and miss them when they leave.”

“You two seem to be exemplary folks. God bless you!” CJ seemed to be impressed, leaning over to give little Bobby a pat on the head.

“Yeah,” Gary continued, “but I have this cousin who recently had a baby, Max, and she wasn’t able to take care of him, so, of course, we offered to take him into our home. Especially since he was family, of course. She even signed the forms that gave us legal parental rights. Man, we love that little guy. Our little Maxi-man.”

“That’s very touching. Family is everything, you obviously did the right thing. Outstanding! So how can I help you?” CJ asked.

“Okay, to make a long story short, we want to officially adopt him. Like we did Bobby here, and we thought you could help us out.”

“Well, Gary, uh, to be honest, I can’t help you with that! You’re fat! Huge, even. Definitely too fat to be a dad,” CJ stammered, obviously taken aback by the request.

“But, I’m already a dad! A good one! Bobby, get that finger out of your nose!”

“Don’t worry, Gary. Of course they’re not going to take Bobby away from you and your lovely wife. He’s your son, for God’s sake,” CJ said, shaking his head. “They can’t take your kid away just because you’re fat, that would be ridiculous! You can keep that one, you just can’t have another one.”

“But we’ve been good parents to Bobby, they let us adopt him! And we were given legal parental rights for baby Max for the last three months, that wasn’t a problem. Not to mention the many foster children they’ve placed with us over the years!” Gary exclaimed in frustration. “Why can’t we adopt Max, too? He’s family, we’ve been raising him, and we simply want to officially call him our son!”

“Umm, yeah, but, but, uh … well, I don’t know. Whatever. You’re fat. ‘Nuff said. No baby for you. I’m afraid we’ll need to remove Max from the home and place him with a skinny family. Sorry about that. Schedule a gastric bypass and maybe we can reconsider. But, moving on, on the bright side, since you are state-certified foster parents, and appear to be great parents to little Bobby here, we do happen to have this foster kid who needs a temporary home, if you’re interested,” offered CJ. Court Judge.

Okay, so I wouldn’t make a great script writer. I tried. All imaginary dialogue, of course, although the gist of the story itself is unfortunately factual. The cast of characters really does exist. Gary, Cynthia and Bobby Stocklaufer, from Independence, MO. The Court Judge apparently remains nameless, so I had to improvise, and just went with CJ. Artistic license, however questionable the “artistic” part of that description might be. Even though this story has garnered national media attention, here’s the real story, straight from my local news channel, KMBC9, because the fat guy and family live right here in the KC area, practically my neighbors! Where baby Max is now, who knows?

adoption, obesity, foster care