Arbor Investigations

I tried to let this sit for as long as I could, as I am worn out from trying to fight various sources for nonexistent customer service. I lasted five weeks before I went postal, and now it's been two more.

I hired Linda from Arbor Investigations (otherwise known as Vancouver Private Investigator) at the end of January to begin the search for my father (see previous post here). She talked a good game in the beginning, trying to make a connection with me by saying she was from Toronto originally, and she sounded perfectly reasonable. My credit card was charged $500 the moment I agreed to retain them, which was the only sign that they had received my e-mailed contract. My unease at the lack of contact grew as each day and then week passed with no messages from them. I obsessively checked my email inbox, wondering if at any moment the mystery of my father's whereabouts would finally be solved.

I sent an email tentatively asking what I should expect in terms of communication and follow-up, as they had only explained what they would do, not when I would receive progress reports. There was no response, which was my first clue how this would go. I waited five days and followed up with a phone call, and was told by the woman they only get in touch when there is news, but she would ask Linda to give me a call. I received a generic email later that day from a company address but with no signature, so I had no idea who it was from. It said it could take up to 30 days for there to be any news. And so I waited.

After 30 days had passed with no further communication, I sent another email expressing my disappointment and asking where things were at. Is this really rocket science? All it takes is a two-minute call or email to say what steps have been taken and what is coming next. It's common sense to try to make your clients feel as though you are actually working for them. This time my email was responded to by a woman named Julie who said they were still working on it, and she would ask Linda to get in touch. No surprise - no call from Linda.

Another week went by and I phoned again, finally reaching Linda in person. She said they had confirmed my father had not died in the province of BC, nor did he own property there (which I'd already checked through a realtor friend, and told them so), nor did he have a telephone in his name. They were now waiting to hear back from another contact about the existence of a cable t.v. account. This all struck me as incredibly lame for 5 weeks of work. I asked what would follow the cable inquiry, and she said they would likely want to move on to another province, and she would be in touch as soon as there was news.

After replaying this conversation repeatedly that night, my gut told me not to trust these people at all. It made no sense that it had taken 5 weeks to confirm just a few pieces of the most basic information, nor that the next step would be to check each other province one by one. I sent another email asking for a financial accounting of what had been spent of my $500 retainer thus far, and saying that I would want to terminate the agreement and obtain a refund of the remainder of the fee. I guess I should not have been surprised that again I received no response or acknowledgement of my email.

Two more weeks passed, and I finally called but was sent straight to voice mail. I left a very emotional message asking for the owner of the agency to contact me, and followed up with an email.

I received a brief email from Julie saying that "quite a bit of work" had been done on my file, and she would review the case with Linda.

What I received in the end was a Word document in an email titled "Closed Notice", saying that much time had been invested in searching on their end, they had been unsuccessful finding any trace of my father, and the file was now closed. No accounting of how my $500 was allocated. 

It's shocking to me how many unprofessional people there are in the world who seem able to work completely independently, with no recourse for clientele to escalate issues. It's galling, considering my years spent in customer service and management where the customers were always responded to and appeased. 

I don't have the energy or the money to start this process all over again. Maybe he is better left unfound.

One of Life's Great Mysteries

My mother and father  (copyrighted)

It's become quite commonplace with all the genealogy websites for people to search for their roots. I, however, am searching for something more like the whole tree.

My parents broke up when I was barely two months old. I never knew my father, which sounds like a blessing given all of his apparent shortcomings. Coming from a "broken home" was unusual in a prairie city in the 1970s, and although I don't recall being teased about it, I do remember feeling different than my friends. My mother eventually remarried, I acquired my first father figure, and I quickly learned the lesson about being careful what you wish for.

My "real" father was something we just didn't talk about. I wasn't comfortable asking, and my mother clearly wasn't comfortable telling. In hindsight I have to give her full credit for everything she managed NOT to say, because despite the difficulty of growing up with so many unanswered questions, it would have been harder to hear the truth about what an ugly, drunken, loser he truly was. It's impossible for me to imagine my smart, kind, giving, funny, hard-working, loving, successful mother choosing to settle down with this underachiever, but she was ridiculously young and agrees now with the statement that "you marry to the level of your self-esteem".

She finally provided some answers when I worked up the courage to ask a few direct questions in my 30s. When I learned something about what her life had been like with him, and how little he had ever done to help care for her or for me (including going on a bender the day my mother unexpectedly went into labour, leaving her to drive herself to the hospital and recover alone for days - gold star, Dad), I made the decision to not look for him. I asked Mom questions because my curiosity was on the verge of getting the better of me, and I'd found myself periodically Googling his name. Her story made me feel that nothing could be gained by finding him; that if I did, I'd be more inclined to harm him than to hug him.

Fast forward ten years, and I find myself in a very different place. I don't need this man to be my dad. I'm not looking for someone to give that moniker to, nor to share holidays with, nor to impart sage fatherly advice. As I have embarked on a journey to create my own family, what I find myself needing is simply some answers to basic questions that harbour no judgement. I just want to know half of my family's medical history, where I came from, and what became of my relatives (including a half-brother overseas that this only child would love to know). I fear I've left this too long now. If I'm fortunate enough to have my own children, I don't want to pass on the feeling of being incomplete. The gaps in my family history are big enough to fall into.

I've finally set the ball in motion, and called a private investigator. I started with a well-known firm in Toronto called Pinkerton's, but it took Glen Bacon so long to acknowledge two voice mails and an email that I chose to find someone else. Since I think my father may be in BC I called Arbor Investigations in Vancouver, and gave them a $500 retainer.

It's been two weeks since I handed over this very emotionally-charged case to a rough-sounding young woman with a smoker's voice. She could call me at any minute and tell me my father died years ago, and the trail ends there. Or she could call me with an address and phone number, and a new trail begins there. If she calls and says they require additional money I'm not sure what I will do. I think I have to know what became of him, and I'll probably keep going until someone finds me the answer.

Which will it be?