Blank Paper:

Bemusing is a good word for it. Overwhelming is another.

I've never done the Ancestry DNA, 23 and Me, etc test kits. I've done the Ancestry website free trial before, but not the DNA testing thing. I have reasons for this! Other than the "Ah, they own my DNA, WTF?!?" aspect of it all. (I should have read the fine print before ordering...)

But, also, because I have a pretty good handle on where I come from. Dad was 100% Swedish. OK, that is a lie. Finnish by way of Sweden. Mom is a mix of mostly German with Scottish and Irish. I have some genealogy research from both sides of the family. No reason to spend the money to see what I already know.

Only, notice I said I ordered one?

My first cousin did a 23 and Me. (Pretty sure that portion of the family did it because one of the siblings found out that her father was not her father and did the test to find out. Got matched with some cousins or such.) And she had a message in the last day or so from someone else matched as a first cousin on the Finnish side and she thinks I have a brother.

*blinks*

*blinks*

Wait... Wah?

OK, I took it better than that, I did. The gentleman was born in San Diego in 1975. He never knew his father and his mom died when he was 2 or 3.

Mom and Dad married in San Diego in January of '75. My sister was born in December. Mom and Dad dated maybe a couple of months before getting married.

I know what my dad's attitude towards cheating was. I know what his attitude towards child abandonment was. I know how hard it was for him to find out from my older half-sister that his wife had a boyfriend. I saw how much it hurt him when that same half-sister rejected him.

I do not know the circumstances around conception. The math works so that he was conceived shortly before Dad and Mom got together. But we all know that pregnancy math is never exact. And everyone who would have known is dead now.

My cousin, whom I call "Aunt" because she and Dad were more like siblings than uncle and niece, said that he was foot loose and fancy free (that is what we are calling it around the munch) between the divorce from his first wife and marrying Mom. My new, bonus brother, said the same could be said for his mom. (He has two older brothers, each from a different father, and his mom died of a drug overdose. So...)

Of course, I still need to approach my other half-siblings about this. I have not talked to them in about 30 years. So, that will be fun. They may be fine with it, or use it as a way to degrade our father's memory. My half-sister, Janice, didn't even tell Dad that she got married. I saw her when I was 7 and when I was 14. I'm sure I saw her more than that, but those are the ones I remember. She refused to visit and refused to take Dad's phone calls.

Jacque has seen John, our half-brother, in the last couple of years. He was delivering asphalt to her work as part of a paving project and she went out to meet his new wife. I saw him shortly after Dad's funeral, when he had left his wife and kids and brought his girlfriend to live in a trailer in our back yard for a bit. Yeah, class act, my sibs.

Anyway, tomorrow would have been Dad's 83rd birthday. "Happy birthday, Dad! It's a boy!" has been my joke of the day.

Also, he has a J name! That's 5 kids in total from my dad with J names!!! Justin, this time around.

So, that's why I ordered the 23 and Me. Unless Dad had a full sibling running around that he did not know of, I have a bonus brother.