bluecanary is a very good friend of mine who I've been blessed to know IRL for 20+ years and this illustration was a gift I'd drawn to commemorate a significant life development. In 2020 a series of events in New York state allowed children who had been given up for adoption the opportunity to look at their original records in order to facilitate the discovery of family connections that had previously been hidden. Erik (aka Jasper Blue) had been making efforts to work through the legal challenges for many, many years but when this breakthrough came it was only a relatively short time later when the pieces fell into a place and a phone call was made where Erik introduced himself on the phone and the emotional response came back: "I'm your mother."

This was an amazing story to hear and I had been listening to the progress with some trepidation about how it would all turn out... hopefully good, but who could know all the backstory that would lead to a parent giving their child up for adoption nor what could happen over the lifetime that would follow. Amazingly everything came about in the most positive way you could hope for and I began hearing the stories that came about from the conversations and eventually meeting in person and I was moved to commemorate the reunification in my own way through this illustration.

For those who don't immediately recognize the context, this is a picture that puts Erik's character Jasper into the context of the original P.D. Eastman book "Are You My Mother?". The book tells the story of a little bird who falls out of the nest and begins searching for their missing mother, encountering more and more dead ends and frightening situations, eventually resulting in a happy ending. For me this book was one of the very earliest examples in my life of how art and cartooning would hit me in a profound way. I checked this book out from the school library in 1980 when I was six years old and the look of the drawings and the storytelling contained within made an indelible impact on me. P.D. Eastman along with another children's book author / illustrator Bill Peet were animation industry artists in the 1940's through the 60's and their stylistic background was a HUGE influence on me when I read their children's books. In fact I know that I checked out "Are You My Mother?" from the school library in 1980 because in 2007 when my daughter was born my mother pulled out a bunch of children's books that she'd kept for decades and there it was... with the library card still inside it after 27 years. We'll just keep that little secret to ourselves, yah? I wonder how much the late fees would add up to?

Anyhow, drawing this was a really special thing, both to express a shared sense of wonder over the turn of events in Erik's life and to touch a bit of history that had been inside of me since I was a little kid.