Nothing funny about feldspar

I’ve been working on a rough draft of my lineage (why yes, it is related to the impending marriage of My Sister’s Child). I’ve signed up for a short subscription to Ancestry.com, and after 3 days of pretty intensive searching I’ve learned so many things that I should have already known — and in the meantime totally exhausted Ancestry.com’s utility for researching my family’s history.

That’s ok, though, I’ve also learned some things that I would never have known without travelling to remote parts of Ohio (as remote as Ohio gets, anyway).

For example, I’ve always been told that one of Dad’s grandfathers was a veterinarian, but I’d always assumed it was the one on his mother’s side. It’s not — it’s his dad’s father. I don’t know what happened to his father — did Frederick and Mildred Nellie get a divorce? Did Frederick die? All I know is that sometime between 1930 and 1934, Fred and Nellie ended their marriage, and Nellie married a different Fred (perhaps she had a thing for the name?).

Then, on Mom’s side — I knew she had 2 brothers, but I always assumed they’d been her mother’s children. Now, I’m thinking they’re half-brothers, and they’re her father’s sons. I wish I’d asked for clarification a long time ago…

It seemed so difficult, though, talking about this old history, about these old hurts. My parents were each estranged from their parents (with the exception of my mom and grandmother — but grandma died pretty young).

So I’m left with inference and a bit of guesswork and maybe just a few stories about people to whom I’m not related, and yet it doesn’t matter. I can weave a reasonably coherent tale about my mother’s and father’s antecedents that makes it appear that I come from a Very Long Line of Ohio Farmers. That’s cool, though. I hope My Sister’s Child with think so, too.