By RAELYNN RICARTE
News staff writer
May 6, 2008

Vidara “Vid” Marvin was removed from his family home at the age of 11 and spent the next eight years in foster care.

Marvin, 21, can’t recall the exact number of homes that he lived in during his teenage years, although he believes it was 25 or more. He remembers one possibility of adoption — until two older teens got into trouble with drugs and he was also removed from the home.

Eventually, Marvin learned to disconnect from the people that he stayed with — it was easier to say goodbye that way.

“Foster care is a mixed bag. Sometimes you get a kid who’s been with the same family for years and they are in an environment where they learn a lot of things — and sometimes you don’t,” he said.

“The longer you are with somebody the more traumatic it is to leave so I guess that I became immune to it.”

Although he was identified by caseworkers as an “at-risk” youth, Marvin was never drawn to drugs or alcohol as an escape. He also never felt compelled to vent his frustrations with criminal activity.

“My greatest vice has been spending too much time playing video games — and not enough keeping the place clean,” he said.

Marvin aged out of the foster care system after leaving high school when he was 19. He quickly realized that there were a lot of life skills that he hadn’t learned, including the discipline to go to bed at a decent hour.

“I didn’t know how to manage money and I didn’t have a work ethic,” he said. “I did, however, learn pretty fast what an overdraft charge was.”

Because of his own struggles, Marvin is strongly supportive of WINGS, a local nonprofit group that is attempting to help young men learn life skills after leaving foster care. Although some residents on and around Rockford Road are upset about the prospect of having the four males, ages 18-23, live in the neighborhood, Marvin thinks time will calm their fears. (See related story.)

“Foster kids aren’t bad; we are just like any other kid except we’ve had a few more rough breaks in life,” he said.

For a while after leaving high school, Marvin “couch-surfed” with friends and lived off Raman noodles, the one dish that he knew how to cook. But then he met Hood River resident Allyson Pate, director of WINGS, through a mutual friend. She gave him a job where he learned some basic bookkeeping skills. He also began making the mental adjustment into adulthood and accepting its responsibilities.

Today, Marvin is proud to be employed as a courtesy clerk at Rosauer’s. He lives in an apartment with a roommate and pays his own bills. He has learned to fill his life with friends who are empowering him and not dragging him into negative patterns.

“I made a decision to love my job and I do,” said Marvin. “I like the pay and being able to say to a friend, ‘Let’s go get something to eat — it’s on me.’”

Two of Marvin’s three younger brothers, also placed in foster care, have been adopted by a family in Astoria. His other grown sibling, Rory, lives in transitional housing in The Dalles and is also learning how to live independently. Marvin is pleased that everyone, after a rocky start, is doing well.

When not behind a video game controller, he composes music and is self-taught on both the guitar and the piano. His biggest life goal isn’t to get a GED, it is to learn how to play the harp and be able to do it professionally.

“I still see some of my foster parents now and then and when they tell me that I’m doing good, I say, ‘Yeah, you are a part of it,’” Marvin said.