It doesn’t get more interesting than this…

Well, well. It has been quite an interesting month or so in my life.

Photo: The last image I have of me and my brothers together (with our grandmother).

Background

Those of you who know my story know that my parents divorced when I was little (when I was around 6-7 years old) and, after the divorce, I never saw my mother again. She was not permitted to see us. The court decided that she was “unfit” to be a mother and, therefore, was denied visitation. My brother’s and I were remanded to the care of my father.

My mother had been married previously and had a daughter named Helen, my half-sister. She was much older and, naturally, after the divorce I also never saw her again either, or anyone from my mother’s side of the family, for that matter.

Together, my parents had three children — myself and two older brothers. My eldest brother went off to college when he was just 16 (I was 10) and never really came back home. I had contact with him occasionally until I was about 24, and since then, we have had virtually no contact except on a few occasions when I reached out to him. His responses, if at all, were very brief, maybe three or four words.

More recent history

In 2002 (I was 47 at the time), I was looking around the internet to see if anyone in my family was still around, particularly my aunts with whom I had lost contact when my father died in the 1980s. One of my sources of information was the Social Security Master Death Index. (At that time, this site was accessible to the public. Sadly, no more.) And, lo and behold, not only did I find my father and his sisters, I saw my mother’s name on the list and, more surprisingly, one of my brothers. At that point in time, my brother had been dead for approximately seven years.

This discovery shocked me to the core. Not because it surprised me so much, (I always thought he would die young), as that no one had told me about it. My first response was to fire off an email to my other brother, asking if he had known and, if so, why he hadn’t told me about it.

No response. (sigh)

Back to the SS Death Index — I wasn’t surprised at all about seeing my mother on the list. Had she been alive, she would have been in her late 70s or early 80s. And, since we had had no contact for 40 years, I wouldn’t have expected anyone to let me know that she had passed, and I hadn’t given it any thought since, until recently.

Recent revelations

A few weeks ago, I was speaking with a student of mine about how easy it is to get information about people on the internet. I googled her to demonstrate my point. She didn’t come up. I was surprised, since usually anyone with a social media presence will appear. She didn’t. Or perhaps she was too far down the list (she has a very common surname). Not willing to give up on my claim, however, I googled my oldest brother’s name. I knew he would come up, as he is an avid blogger and has written a number of books. That is, after all, how I found him years and years ago and was able to occasionally contact him, the last time just before I moved to Mexico, so, roughly eight years ago.

On this particular day, I decided to leave a comment on one of his blog posts and signed it “your sister, Donna.” Much to my surprise, he emailed me!!!

Manage your expectations

One might think that after all of this time, his email would have been a bit lengthy — so much to catch up on! After all, the last time I saw him was more than 40 years ago!

But no. As in the past, I received an email of few words.

“What’s your mailing address?”

Huh?

You can imagine all of my questions here. No contact for 40 years and now you want to send me something??? What could it be?

Several emails and WhatsApp’s later, it was revealed: it was a check — an inheritance — from our late mother. He never said how much it was exactly, and, honestly, I didn’t care. What he sent me was greatly appreciated and much more than I could have expected.

Ok, ok. So now my brain is screaming. WTF? She’s been dead for more than 20 years? How would my brother have received an inheritance from her when we had no contact with her after the divorce? And, if true, why now is he thinking of this? Why didn’t he tell me eight years ago when we last had contact? Or better still, when he first got the call?

Listen, money is money, and a gift horse is a gift horse. Who am I to question it?

But I couldn’t help myself.

And now the interesting part

After much back-and-forth with him, the story behind the inheritance finally came out — he had been contacted by our half-sister after my mother’s death and, not knowing where I was, they split the inheritance between the two of them. And, apparently, he had had some contact with a cousin on our mother’s side of the family who, albeit wrongly, informed him I was dead. Dead!

One of two people who I hadn’t had contact with since I was a small child decided I was dead! How would they have known? Had they ever tried to find me? If so, why? And, what made them decide I was dead?

Well, I am not dead. Clearly, that rumor has been dispelled, and, I believe my brother knew it wasn’t true as well, since we had been in contact, minimally, but in contact nonetheless. I understand that having been married twice, I would have been more challenging to locate. I had also moved across the country several times. Nevertheless, my brother knew about the first marriage and had even met my ex. (Somewhere I have a photo of this….) So there was some trace of me to be found if he had bothered to look. Honestly, though, I don’t think he (or anyone) looked very hard.

I also know that he knew how to reach me since there were several occasions when his girlfriends would contact me to ask me questions about him. Of course, they could never tell him that. Contacting me was forbidden by him, or so they said.

But that is ancient history now.

Long story short, my brother did send me the inheritance money and it is now deposited into my account. But that isn’t the end of this tale.

The more things change….

Ok, ok. So, to the point.

This interaction with. my brother left me feeling quite out of sorts. I couldn’t get over that he had been in contact with people from my mother’s side of the family! Maybe even contact with my mother! No one told me! Could I have had a relationship with them? Would I have wanted one?

And, most importantly, why was it easier to tell people I was dead than just that we were “estranged”? (That’s what I told people.) In fact, he told me that he didn’t plan to correct this lie that he has even told to his wife of more than 30 years.

Why does this bother me so much? I suppose like most people I have a need for family. Granted, family has been more to me than blood relations over the years. I have forged family relationships with many people. That said, however, there is something about blood relatives that pulls at us–at me–and the idea of what could have been haunted me.

How might my life have been different?

Could I have had a relationship with my mother?

Did she look for me? Did she want to have a relationship with me? After all of those years of not calling, writing, or visiting, she left something for me, for us, my brothers and me. Why?

Alas, I will never know.

I will never understand the decisions that others have made or may make.

And, after a long period of soul searching and agonizing over what might have been, I have (once again) accepted that there is nothing I could have done to change the course of my life. Nor would I want to.