A Lost Child Finds Himself in Adulthood

About a year after Adam was born, Diana Watts sought closure on the issue of Reese. She had previously searched Web sites that claimed to reunite family members, but had never put out a notice. She decided to post information, promising herself this would be her last attempt to find her missing son.

It was time to move on.

"I had a conversation with God," she said. "I said, 'I can't go through this anymore.' "

A Web Find

One night, after finishing a paper for his English 1102 class in study hall, Reese Hoffa, then a senior at the University of Georgia, started what had become a routine for him: searching the Internet for Lamont. Familiar with many Web sites that allowed families to post information that could lead to reunions with missing relatives, he scanned six sites, then found a new one -- Adopt-assist.com. He recalled doing the perfunctory searching, plugging in his date and state of birth. After a few seconds, a paragraph popped onto the screen that startled him:

Match 1 Birthdate: 10/08/77 Country/State: KY

I am a mother looking for a son given up for adoption at age 4 in 1981 in Louisville, Kentucky. He was adopted by a large family of 5 or 6 and the family owned a farm at that time which was burned down possibly in Bardstown, Kentucky. Please e-mail me if you have any information about my son. His name at birth was Maurice Antawn Chism, and he has an older brother.

Reese Hoffa read the posting again and again. Everything matched. Every single detail. He felt numb, stunned, suffocated. He had become comfortable with the blanks in his past. He knew how to search; he was an expert at wondering. He couldn't fathom finding.

"At first I could not believe what I was reading," he said. "I got up from my seat and walked away, talking to myself that I may have found my mom."

Then, he went back to the computer and started typing.

No Joke

For three days, Diana Watts -- who had no expectation of a response to her posting -- did not check her e-mail.

One night, as his wife tended to Adam, Mark Watts logged on to their account. When he perused the messages, he found the third of three that had been sent from a University of Georgia student. The latest read, in part:

Subject: hopeful mom

Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2000 19:10:56 GMT

From: "reese hoffa-man"

to hopeful mom I am not sure if had gotten my last e-mail, if you did it may have been a little confusing because I was not clear. I am very sorry I have had a day to collect my thoughts and hope to do a better job.

I found your e-mail address on an adoption web sit while searching for my relatives . . . well what I found in the search was you, and for that reason I feel that you are or could be my mom. On the site had some add information about the child mother had lost. That information fit me perfectly . . .

I do not want to scare you or alarm you I would just like to say hello and get to know you. I do understand [if] you do not want to talk, but I would like to know that you are doing well and if you have found my older brother Lamont...

A little about my self my name was changed to Michael Reese Hoffa most of the time I go by Reese. I am a senior at the University of Georgia. I am a member of the UGA track team I am shot putter. I finished sixth at the Olympic trials in 2000 and hope to make the Olympic team in 2004. I have another year of school and I will have a degree in Health and Physical education then off to grad school.

I really hope that you will contact me because I do care and have a genuine concern for you. so please find it in your heart to contact me.

thanks Reese

Mark Watts immediately felt a sense of doom rather than elation.

"I was so afraid it was some sort of joke," he said. "That was my first impulse."

He approached his wife nervously, told her she needed to look at the computer, then escorted her to the screen. He didn't attempt to explain. He knew the message, if not genuine, would break her heart.

When she read the e-mail, silently, intently, she noticed one thing right away. The message mentioned Lamont. Her posting had not. How could the author have known about Lamont?

"I wasn't at all calm," she said. "I was all shaken up. I couldn't believe it."

The Meeting

Reese Hoffa sat in a coffee shop in Athens, Ga., when his cell phone rang. He did not recognize the number. When he answered, he felt a surge of adrenaline, a wave of shock. A woman was on the line, he didn't catch her name, saying the strangest things. It had been 19 years since his mother left him on the steps of the Roman Catholic orphanage. Finally, after all this time, she was back.

"I'm so sorry about the fire," Hoffa blurted out, the first words he could muster.

Diana Watts, shaking as she spoke to her son from her home in Indianapolis, wanted to cry.

"All these years," Watts said, "he thought the fire was the reason."

That night, they talked for two hours. It would be the first of many long conversations.

A month later, Diana and Mark Watts purchased a plane ticket for Reese to fly to Indianapolis for the weekend. Though the Watts immediately recognized Reese -- whom they had looked up on the Georgia athletics Web site -- he nearly walked by his birth mother. But after introductions were made, they embraced. It wasn't uncomfortable.

"What really surprised me is he called me 'Mom' right off the bat," Watts said. "He seems to genuinely care -- as he said he did."

Reese peppered his birth mother with questions about Lamont but the answers weren't as satisfying as he had imagined. Lamont was convicted for possession of a controlled substance five years ago, public records confirmed. The brothers met just once in Louisville. Lamont worked at a fast-food restaurant, Reese recalled. Their meeting, he said, was awkward.

Diana Watts declined to discuss Lamont's situation, other than to say: "It's very difficult to become what Reese became. Both had the potential in the first place, but as far as I'm concerned, Reese got what he needed, and Lamont didn't."

At Reese's commencement on Dec. 21, 2002, Diana sat with Reese's family, including his sister Jeanette and brother Chris. When the parents of the graduates were told to stand for recognition, Cathy McManus smiled at Diana Watts.

"You stand up, too," McManus said. "You gave me this son."

Happy Ending

The Watts now live at the end of a cul-de-sac in a suburb of Jacksonville, Fla., with Adam, now 4 1/2 , and daughter Elizabeth, nearly 2. They display the e-mail they received from Reese in a wooden frame.

Hoffa discovered a simple way to distinguish his mothers; he refers to Cathy McManus as his A-Mom (adoptive mother) and Diana Watts as his B-Mom (birth mother). He sees them as often as he can. Both will attend the traditional family dinner on the eve of his Nov. 26 marriage to Renata Jean Foerst, a recent Georgia graduate.

"I never questioned why she did it," Reese said. "She was trying to get a better situation. She did the best thing for me. . . . It takes a strong character for a person to say, 'I can't do it.' "

For Diana Watts, Reese still sends her emotions spilling. She looks at him, or her scrapbook of his achievements, and knows: Getting a new home, and new parents, was the best thing that ever happened to him. He thrived because she left him. Even years later, riding the crest of a better life, reunited with her long-lost son, that truth still settles uneasily.

"I don't know exactly why it was that things happened the way they did," she said. "I'm older, and I think there's a reason for everything. Reese's success, I don't think it would have been achieved with the mother he had. . . . I just could not have given him all he got."

It is this reasoning that brings her to a halting acceptance of her deeds. And there is some consolation in this: The emotions that even now torment her brought about their reunion. Practical problems drove them apart. Passion brought them back together.

"I want him to know," she said, "how much I loved him and missed him all those years."