For Thanksgiving, I did something I haven't done in probably 25 years... I went to my aunt's house for Thanksgiving dinner. The past 15 years is because my dad disappeared and I was never close with his family because he didn't really get along with them so we never had a close relationship. The previous 10 years was because again due to my dad's wife after my mom, we didn't go around often in that important 8-18 age for me where you really start establishing who you are with the family.
Unfortuantely this year didn't really have much of an option. I love my mom and all, but she's been a pretty bad cook the last two years... guess it has something to do with her having past. (Haha, sorry one way to cope with her not there is to make light hearted jokes) And also my in-laws decided they were going to go on vacation. Woe is me right? No, I have been meaning to go to my Aunt's for the last few years but with my home and the wife's home, wasn't much time. Few years ago we made it there... well after dinner, but we got to chat with my aunt and my cousins. This year, nope, full fledged dinner... and surprisingly there was only one instance of who's that guy. One of my cousins kids who I guess is 18 and I haven't been around the whole family in 15 years, so she was three last time. Also my 88 year old grandmother didn't immediately recognize me, but she was told that it's Jared, and I guess a switch flipped back to me being younger. She's pretty deep into alzhiemers so who knows what she would have remembered. I guess to an extent I am thankful for facebook for allowing me to be "friends" with some of my cousins that when we stumble past each other, I'm not completely awkward or blind sided.
By the end of dinner I had to take my son outside because he was just getting crazy. My cousin was standing out tending to a fire pit and we just talked it up for while. He was outdoorsy type and I hope my son has an appreciation for that stuff too. Turns out that he used to disc golf and still has his equipment, so we made plans to play on Monday.
While out Monday, we got to a point about talking religions because I must've made a joke about pushing my son Jewish to avoid all the crazy Christmas pandemonium. He mentioned how our grandfathered had actually converted the family away from that to become christian. Then to learn his involvement in WWII as a POW, family held at Auschwitz, being a Polish freedom fighter, rescuing jews and his inner struggle later dealing with the fact that he always thought he was being pursued. Now my only memory of him was being really young and debating with him whether its zipper then button on your pants or button first then zipper. Haha. Recommended the movie Defiance, which was pretty good about a bunch of Jew hiding and taking refuge in the forest for a few years and that after all that time, those 1200 refuges have spawned into 10's of thousands across the world... what if we were one of them.
Therefore I decided to start a family tree and do a little research using ancestry.com. Nothing earth shattering yet, but some of the simple things you stumbled across. I now know that my dad's family arrived here on October 30th 1956 when he was only 4 yeads old and was able to see a scan of the passenger list which included my grandparents, my dad, 2 aunts and an uncle. Also stumbling across a copy of my dad's first marriage license before my mom where is address is listed as the USS Vulcan, which was the lead ship in its class, and was decommissioned quite a few years ago and made into scrap in the last 10 years. Seen pictures from England/Wales Birth registries where some of my aunt's and uncles names are on them. My aunt sent me a picture of one of the walls/lists from the Holocaust museum where my cousin found my grandfathers name as part of a family that was there. It's all very fascinating.
Up until three days ago, I thought I was just the product of a normal immigrant family. Polish grandfather meets british grandmother, legally move to America as the land of opportunity for a better life. Work your ass off to provide for your family and here we are. But no, my family story is so much deeper and complex than I ever thought. I am both filled with pride and curiousity now and wish to know so much.