Adopted War Babe - Part 7

     After I got the rejection letters, I let things lie for a bit.  I was pretty discouraged.  My angel, Annita, told me about then, that she thought she had done all she could and that I should maybe get a couple of extra Ancestry tests to keep in case I might find someone who seemed to be the child of one of the suspected men, or at least a close relative of someone I suspected. She again told me that she was almost positive that I needed to look at those two families and all the kids and their kids and their kids.
    So, I started writing things down.  You see, I hadn't really written anything down, maybe a few names here and there, certainly the names of the two families she was so sure about. I had been watching (binge watching) the shows Long Lost Family, Long Lost Loves, and also Finding Your Roots. I had previously watched Who Do You Think You Are? even before I decided to pursue my genealogy. I had seen one of the genealogists take each name and put them on a blue or pink sticky note and attach them to a large wall so as to be able to move them around. I liked that.  Most all of the shows were wonderful, soft squishy happy ending shows...of course, who wants to watch a show where you are rejected by your birth family or never found any relatives?  I KNEW because of my own experience with my Birth Mother, and through reading some of the heartbreaking stories on DNA Detectives that it was possible to either NOT find anyone, or that they would want nothing to do with me when found.  I was ok with that, I am pretty easy going.  But I think I said earlier, what is wrong with just ONE more person on this Earth that cares about you just because you are blood?  I just don't get it.
     So here is what one of the 7 or so pages that I wrote down looks like.  I didn't have a large wall that I could stick hundreds of stickies to! I wrote down EVERY high match I had on EVERY DNA site and what I might know about them, their kids, their parents, etc.

     You can see (can't you?) that I wrote down even the Centmorgans that were matched with me.  I was trying desperately to make some sense of everything I saw.  Again, I got dizzy and cross-eyed trying to find a connection to someone, anyone. I sadly put it aside.  This was IMPOSSIBLE!  I reached out to my angel again, feeling like I was certainly a number one pest.  Please please help me again, I just can't make sense of this.  She looked several times asked more questions and we didn't come up with much else.  She was just so sure about Thomas or Henry Tackett families. I tried a few more times, days apart to just no avail. 

     Meanwhile, Sandra's mother had passed, the one who matched me the highest. She had been mourning and trying to get all the arrangements together and get her mom's affairs in order.  She emailed me with some pictures of who someone (I don't remember who it was, sister? uncle? not sure) that was thought could be my father.  He was Reverend Richard Tackett. I had looked at him and looked at him, but according to the National Personnel Center, he was not in the military at the time.  So could they have gotten it wrong? Did he reenlist and they didn't have it recorded?  Someone on DNA Detectives told me that many of the military records of that time were destroyed in a fire... somewhere. So I tried to find names of Richard's children to try and contact them.  No luck, at least not that I could find.  Here is what she sent me: 

       My angel did find some folks that were children of someone we had looked at, honestly, I got them so mixed up I just went with it.  She had found three of them on Facebook and so I messaged all three of them.  Each day eagerly checking Facebook Messenger to see if they had even picked up my message.  They all three eventually did open the message, but nothing ever came of that.  SIGH.  NOW WHAT??

     I started hearing from some of the folks I had messaged on the several DNA sites.  One was someone from Ancestry, I matched her husband Paul at the 3rd cousin level.  They had tested his Dad and I did NOT match his dad, so, although his mom had passed.  I looked at her husbands tree (thank goodness he had one) and his mother's mom was Claudia Tackett, and her dad was Claude Tackett!  Ok, I think I may be on to something. That would make his mom my 2nd cousin, her mom as my first cousin? and her grandfather as my......? I get so confused!  Again, I say, I think of myself as pretty smart, I have a BS degree in Education, and a Masters degree in Education. I should be able to keep relatives straight, shouldn't I?  Well, I couldn't!!!!!  I have mad skills in some things... genealogy, not so much. :( 

     

     So I kept emailing the folks that I had heard from.  Sandra sent me some more pictures and I kept looking at my notes.  I am looking back at emails and I see that on one of them I said: "I looked at William Russell Tackett and he is the right age but if he didn’t have children then not sure who to test.  I also looked at Goldie Tackett White as maybe one of her sons could be my BF.  Maybe test one of her sons children?  Sometimes this DNA stuff just has my eyeballs swimming!  Haha. 

Do you have any suggestions for me?

Here is what she sent back: Russ Tackett had kids. He was my 1st cousin. He is dead. And Goldie White was my aunt. She had 9 kids and raised them in Columbus Ohio.

 I asked Sandy if I could see her family tree, she said she didn't have one. DANG.  However, she did say she would do a DNA test for Ancestry.  So I sent her one.  We had some snafus with registering it but it is on its way.  Maybe now I could find out something more. If her mom was my Great Aunt I guess she would show up as my.... great cousin?  Humm, well unless her Mom was showing up as a first cousin once removed, then she would be my.... Heck, I just could not begin to make sense of this.   No one would give me any kids that I could test!  I am pulling my hair out by now.  (can any one reading this relate to me about now?) 

    Enter another angel, Patrick.  He didn't KNOW he was an angel, but he was.  He had appeared as a 2nd cousin match on Ancestry on December 20, 2017.  I messaged him with this message:  Hi Patrick,

My name is Pam. I see that we possibly share grandparents! You show as a second cousin to me. I would love to see exactly where we are related if you would like to.
Sincerely,
Pam Stephens

He actually messaged me back on the SAME DAY!!  First word was "fascinating"!  My heart skipped a beat. He says he doesn't have a membership but gave me names of his parents, grandparents, great grandparents, just a list of names. I saw one that I knew quite well, James Thomas Tackett!  I think he was a great great grandpa to me!! I then proceeded to give him a brief paragraph about being adopted. 

     Again, he says "fascinating"!!  (Did I ever tell you I love you, Patrick??!!)  He proceeds to tell me about his pawpaw and men that he thinks were in the military in his family.  Then, he says, "From your picture, my Mom says you remind her of her cousin, Vicki.

Be still my heart!!! and he gives me his mom's name and says she is on Facebook.  So begins what I hope to be the final  chapter of my quest. I will write more later about the things I think I have found out, and the person that WE think was my birth father, William Russell Tackett. 

Adopted War Babe - Part 6

Being new to genealogy, I looked at the literally hundreds if not thousands of cousins that showed up that matched me and wondered, what in the hell do I do with all this?  Generally, I consider myself a smart person and I am still not too old to learn new things, so I set about trying to make sense of all of what I had.  I am not afraid of clicking places and trying new things on a computer so I clicked around and back and forth.,  I posted on Facebook something about my DNA results and how confusing it all was (as seems to be my custom). I really don't think I knew anyone that had done their DNA.  I found that I could message folks right in Ancestry so I started messaging everyone of the cousins that were the highest on the list.  I think I had about 5 second cousins that showed up, maybe about 20 or 25 third cousins, and hundreds of 4th and 5th cousins!  I didn't document the numbers at the time but this is what they look like now, after building some "fake" trees.

I began to message starting at the top with something like this: You show to be a 2nd or 3rd cousin to me by my DNA results. I am a 63 year old German born female. I am looking to try and figure out who my birth father might be. I was born to a German woman in 1954. She told me that my birth father was an American service man, but that is all she told me. Do you know if anyone in your family was stationed in Germany (specifically Goeppingen or Augsburg) in 1953? Thanks in advance!!

Sincerely looking,
Pam Stephens ( birth name RoseMarie Schulz)

The title was: Searching for my Birth Father. I wasn't paying attention to when they last logged in and I also didn't understand that if you didn't have an account that was paid, you were unable to message. I discovered that I could click on the star to indicate something so I starred everyone that I had messaged. It was many, for sure.  I did get a few responses back from some folks (I won't name names here :) ) but it was all negative, meaning they could not help me.  So, again it seemed fruitless. I didnt know how to connect to these people that were supposed to be somewhat distant cousins.  So I waited. I then decided that maybe I could find a closer match on 23and me.  I sent off for that kit and spit when it came and sent it off (Oh, that was on I THINK Amazon for their Black Friday in June sale?  Not sure)  I checked ancestry every day, sometimes several times a day to see if anything had changed.  Occasionally I would hear from someone, but it was never a lead. 

     I started looking around again and entered in the message boards and placed my message there thinking maybe I would hear something.  I won't mention that again because I didn't!  I also noticed that there were dates as to when the people last logged in and realized that some of them that matched me had not logged in since 2016, or early in 2017 so they would not have seen my message anyway.  However, once I got back my results from 23andMe I saw that they had email addresses listed!  I started emailing some of the folks that were top matches, but no one  was very close there either. I got back a couple of replies and offers to help. I did hear from a lady on Ancestry who was managing an account for her husband. Her husband matched me as a third cousin. They had had his father DNA tested and I did NOT match him.  So I must match his mother.  Well, his mother's maiden name was Tackett. So I did have a crumb to begin with.  I THINK that it was one of those folks who asked if I had a Facebook account and if I had heard of DNA Detectives as a closed group on Facebook.  Of course I had not.  

     Immediately, I went to Facebook and asked to be admitted into the DNA Detectives group. I was pretty quickly given membership and began reading some of the most incredibly wonderful and heartbreakingly sad stories of people looking for lost families. It was through that group that I learned so much about  centimorgans and shared DNA segments.  I downloaded charts like this in every configuration to help with assigning relationships: 

I finally posted something of my delima of not knowing what to do next and several people answered me with charts and suggestions for uploading raw data into other locations to find people.  Then, Annita Cox found me.  You see, they have folks in this group that they call "search angels".  These are just ordinary (well extraordinary in my opinion) folks who love the search and have helped many folks find loved ones.  They take their own time to research for someone that they do not know. She was truly an angel.

    She started by asking me to give her access to see my DNA and any tree I had started.  I only had a tree with my birth mother and a few of her family members, but I let her see that one. Then she asked me questions about what I might have found on other sites that I had uploaded data to. GEDMatch is one that gives a "boat load" of information that still confuses me, but I know that it connects folks that DNA test from all the different places and tells all sorts of information about them. I told my angel that I had my closest match on a site called My Heritage.  I had a match at 550 centimorgans, she showed as either a Great Aunt, a First cousin, or a first cousin once removed. I had messaged her there but could not do much as I was not a paid subscriber. 

   After talking with Annita, my angel, she set to work. Meanwhile I heard from the daughter of the woman that I matched with, Sandy. She said her mom had Alzheimers and wasn't doing well so would not be able to help me, but she would try and give me information. 

     I am pretty sure I am going to get the timeline of things here mixed up because things happened fast and furious about then.  With the information I gave her, and the information i had from the few folks that had answered me, and looking at the trees in Ancestry of the folks who had actually BUILT a tree, Annita had some names for me.  WOW!!  

     I knew from the ethnicity chart that my birth father must be from Kentucky or very close to there.  Anita used her skills and told me that she was almost positive that I came from a line of people who were from two Tackett brothers who married two Barber sisters.  Thomas Tackett who married Sarah "Sis" Barber, or Henry Tackett who married Lettie Barber. They each had like 20 kids who would all be double cousins so we certainly had our work cut out for us!!  She told me that she was sure one of these couples was my Great-Great Grandparents. 

     I started building trees for every one of their sons that could be anywhere near my father's age.  My BM was born in 1929 so he would have to be sort of near her age, wouldn't he?  I had about 8 "fake" mirror trees built with each son being my birth father. Then, with a bit more understanding, I started looking at my DNA matches (who had trees) to see where they might line up with my trees. I would work so long sometimes I would go cross-eyed seeing so many Tacketts!!!  Then I would forget which tree or which person I may need to look into. It HAD to be one of their sons. (ok some of you reading this who are smarter than me will quickly see that one of those couples would be Grandparents x 2 not x 1)  I wasn't looking at the sons of their kids at the time, it didn't occur to me. 

     One day, my angel messaged me to let me know that someone had told her that if I was a "War Babe", meaning I was the result of an American GI and a girl from a country where he was stationed while serving, there had been an act passed that I could write to an agency with some information on my part and get the service records of that GI!!  I was so excited!  All I really needed to know was if there was a man stationed in Goppingen Germany, probably in the army, who was there late spring early summer of 1953.  Before I had EVER done DNA testing, I had googled, and yahooed and tried everything I knew to find out a list of service men stationed there at that time.  I did find the name of the barracks, Cooke Barracks.  I also found the division of the army that was stationed there at the time. 

     So I downloaded the form they supplied, filled out about six sheets with what I knew of the men I wanted to look at and sent it off to the National Personnel Records Center 1 Archives Drive in St Louis, Missouri. Flash to about 3 weeks later, I received several emails from the man preforming the searches for me. Each was a short letter about how this man wasn't in the military or this man was in from 1942 to 1946 or the like.  Talk about being disappointed!!!  Ok so, if these six, who were close to my BM in age were not there, it must be another brother.  I filled out i think 8 more forms, not regarding age (unless there was a boy maybe 10 in 1953 ) and sent them off.  Surely......but alas, this time I waited about 6 weeks, almost forgetting I had sent them off.  Here is one of the "REJECTION" letters. At least that is how I felt!!

Adopted War Babe - Part 5

After the wedding, Laura and I stayed a couple more days and toured the Columbia River Gorge and part of Washington state. SO BEAUTIFUL THERE!  We left in good spirits with thoughts of maybe having a relationship with my brothers at least.  Possibly my birth mother if she could get over being upset with me. She was so afraid that her family would be upset with her, but by my view, they were not at all.  I sent her an Easter card and a plant in 2007.  She sent me a letter . Here is the letter. You can tell she is still upset with me. (even addressing me as Pat)

She was still angry and held it against me.  I wondered why she just couldn't accept me. What is ONE MORE PERSON IN YOUR LIFE WHO LOVES YOU JUST BECAUSE YOU ARE BLOOD?  I didn't need a Mom, I had told her that. She said that everyone had stopped talking to her.  I guess she meant Bob, and Pat. Me going to the wedding really upset the family, but now it had already been done. Once something has been done and over with, you just need to move on and try and live your life as you should.  I just would have liked to know her, to see if I was anything like her.  You know, environment vs heredity the old debate.  I didn't know anything much more about her or her family (my family) than I did before I found her.

    Fast forward a couple of months.  I had spoken to Art and his wife Pat a few times over the phone.  It seemed that I had caused one HELL of an issue with the family!  Art and his mom, as well as Pat and her mother-in-law just didnt see eye to eye at all. Pat and Art kept trying to get her to accept me but she was so very mad that they had invited me to the wedding that there became a huge rift between them.  And, because of the closeness of Russ to his mom, there was a huge rift between Russ and his brother as well.  In discussing this with Art, he told me that he had never gone back to visit with his mom anyway, after she told him that his birth father's name etc was none of his business.  He just took off and never felt the need to go back, even to visit.  I continued, and still continue, to receive a Christmas letter from Karen (only from her). Usually with pictures of their girls, they now had three.
     I am not sure when exactly it happened, but the calls stopped coming from Art and all letters were returned to me.  The phone number I had had been disconnected. In the Christmas letter, Karen said that they had lost touch with Art and Pat and no one had heard from him.  This continued on for several years.  The girls grew into beautiful young ladies, and time marched on.
    In about 2013-2014, I learned from Karen's Christmas letter that Liz had Alzheimers and they were going to put her into a facility.  Gradually she began to not even recognize them. This does concern me and every time I forget something I think, DANG will I get this Alzheimer's?  sigh.. I guess we will just have to see, won't we?  As of Christmas 2015, she was in bad shape I was told. But now I can fill out those questionnaires and say that I have Alzheimer's in my family.

    A week or so into January of 2016, I received a letter from Karen with an obituary and a leaflet from the service of my birth mother. She had passed away.  I truly didn't know how to feel. I was sad for the family, as anyone would be for the family of someone who passed, but how did I feel about HER passing?  I just couldn't put a finger on my feelings.  To this day, I am still not sure. But I do believe that in living with God, she now no longer has to live with the terrible guilt I felt that must have led her whole life. The guilt of having three children out of wedlock when it was looked on as so bad by her family.  Maybe even the guilt of giving me up.  Is that just my own soul trying to sooth the abandoned feeling I might have had?  I don't know.  I never really felt abandoned.  I was so lucky to be so loved and cherished in the family that chose me, maybe that is why abandonment wasn't an issue, or at least one that didn't seem to bother me much.

   I started thinking that Art must not know that his mother was gone.  It really bothered me that he didn't know.  So, in true Pam fashion, I stuck my nose into the internet to try and find my brother again.  I googled and searched and looked for days.  Finally, I decided to pay one of these "we can find anyone" web sites where you have to pay for information. BINGO!!  I got a list of his and Pat's addresses for the past, well for his past whole life!  I immediately unsubscribed from the web site and it only cost me about $20.00 to find his address and phone number.  Pretty good I thought. He and Pat had CERTAINLY moved around a lot!  Not sure what that was about.
     I called and Art answered.  He was quite surprised to hear from me, I think it must have been about 15 years since anyone knew where he was, not sure of the amount of years. but that is close. I asked him if he was sitting down and I told him about his mom.  He was very quiet.  Then he thanked me and thanked me. We talked a bit about him moving around, he said that Pat just likes to keep moving!!  haha  Wanderlust I guess.  But not far, as they were in Washington state. Art was a cook in the Navy and a darn good pastry chef. (he had made his own wedding cake and decorated it!)  So he really didn't have much trouble as a vet with good cooking skills.  Pat had had a stroke and Lymphoma and was in a wheelchair and on SSDI, so he had to take care of her some of the time.  We hung up promising to keep in touch. (he is NOT a computer guy) so email isn't much of an option.
     If some of you reading this know me, you know I post often on Facebook. About my life, nothing about politics or religion, just life happens sort of things, pictures of my grandson, and pictures of my cats.  LOL  Well, just so happens that I posted something about my birthmother passing, me not knowing how to feel and that I found my brother and told him!  I was excited to find him.  I had no clue how his brother and sister-in-law had felt all those years he had been gone from everyone's life.
I was quite surprised to get an angry message from Karen, as she was a friend on Facebook.  I had not understood the hurt they had all felt when Art just cut off all communication with everyone.  They were left alone to take care of Liz in her time of need, with no way to even find Art, let alone have him help.  I was devastated, to say the least.  They were angry at me for finding him and angry at me for telling him about his mom.  I apologized and felt horrible that I had taken things in my own hands, but it was done and there was nothing I could do about it.  I was even more upset that I would maybe lose the small connection I had with Karen, and through her, my brother and my nieces. I said everything I could think of to her to apologize.  I hoped that she would reconsider her anger towards me and forgive me because I just had no clue. (sometimes I act out of idiocy)  I think she finally forgave me and we moved on.  Thank GOD!!
     Flash to April of 2017. Art called me one day and asked me a favor.  Pat really had wanted to do a DNA test and had noticed that 23andMe  was having a sale.  Art wanted to know if I could purchase a kit and send it to Pat for her birthday which was in May. He would send me a check to pay me back.  Sure I said, no problem!  I went on line and purchased one and had it sent.... but, that got me thinking, I REALLY would love to do a DNA test for myself and see if I would be able to find my birth father or at least some of his family since he was probably gone.  So I purchased one, spit in the vessel and sent it off!   I also started looking at Ancestry.  I had had a subscription years ago off and on doing a family tree for my adopted family.  Which was fine, but I started realizing that although it was interesting, none of the folks who I had never met were not MY blood.  I renewed my subscription and even signed up for the world wide portion to maybe trace my birth mother's side too.  I never had gotten much information at all from my brothers, and certainly not my birthmother.
So I waited for my DNA results.

     I think I got my results in about August of 2017. Not sure of exactly when.  I was pretty shocked again how my ethnicity panned out.

I knew the European but the Great Britain must have come from my birth father's side!  Then I saw the other, the one from the USA.

WOW!  Now that is really concentrated in one area!!  My birth father must have been from this area and all his relatives must have lived there all their lives!  Thus began my DNA search.

Adopted War Babe continued. ... Part 4

   We spoke on the phone a few more times. I learned that she had a couple of grandkids.  They must live near her because she spoke of seeing them a lot.  I was also told that she had two sons.  She was SO VERY afraid that they would find out about me and they would think that she had lied all these years! (Do ya think?!?!!!)  I could hear the fear and worry in her voice, so I told her that I would not contact them. (I was very honest with her at that time, I really didn’t plan to find them!)
     We exchanged some pictures through the mail. She wrote to me only once or twice.

 One of the last times I talked to her, she said she was heading to Germany for the first time in many, many years to visit her family.  I told her that I would send her a disposable camera for her to take lots of pictures.  I wanted to see the rest of my family.  She told me that wasn’t necessary, she had a camera and would take pictures.  She was supposed to be gone about a month.  She had had to return to work after her husband died, not really for the money, but for something to do.  She knew how to clean and cook, so she took a job cleaning office buildings there in where she lived.  She was able to take a month off.
     I was glad to have found her, we had spoken a little about meeting somehow, me going there didn’t seem to be a good idea to her for some reason.  We discussed meeting somewhere between Texas and Illinois, but she said we would talk more about that when she returned. So I waited...and waited.
    It had been several months since I had heard from her.  I had called her a few times with no answer.  No answering machine either. (It was still about 1993 I believe)  I started to worry that something may have happened!  Time to be a SUPER SLEUTH!!
    I began to think about how to find my two half brothers, because that seemed the best way to find out why I was not hearing from her.  Thinking of our conversations I realized that she spoke of her granddaughters being around quite a lot.  They must live near, or maybe in the same city!  So I called directory assistance there in Illinois where she lived.
“How May I help you?” said the operator.
“Well,” I hesitated, “I need to find my friend from a long while ago, but I just don’t recall his first name.  His last name is *****.  His dad was Russell *****, but he is now passed.”
“Oh, you must mean Russell *****, Jr then,” she said.  BINGO!!
     After writing down the phone number I began to sweat and shake a bit.  What would I say?  I dialed the phone (yes, we still used that type of phone).  After just a couple of rings, a woman’s voice said, “Hello?”
     “Hi!  My name is Pam Berry (previous married name). I am an old friend of Elisabeth ***** and was trying to reach her.  I wonder if you could help me.  I know that she was in Germany visiting relatives but I haven’t been able to reach her lately, do you know if she has returned yet?”
  “Oh hi, Pam, she returned several months ago!  I’m not sure why you haven’t been able to reach her.  I am her daughter-in-law, Karen, I would be glad to give her a message for you.”
    “Ok,” I said. (My heart beating out of my chest) “ Tell her that Pam called.”
     “I sure will,” she said.
     We said goodbye and hung up.  Gosh, I wonder what had happened for her not to call or answer my phone calls.  Maybe I had just missed her.
    Fast forward to about 36 hours later.  Phone rings.  I answer.  “Hello?”
     “I told you to NEVER contact my sons!  How did you get his phone number?!!”
    She was furious!  I had promised her to never contact them.  But in wanting to find out about where she was, I had reached out to some chat areas on the internet dealing with adoption.  They had told me that my half brothers were adults now and they deserved to know that they had a sister.  Find them and let THEM decide if they wanted to get to know you or not, they told me.  So, I went on my search for them.
     "I did NOT tell your daughter - in law who I was, I only said that I was an old friend and that I was worried that you hadn't made it back from Germany yet!"
     She would only say that when she saw her family in Germany,(who had of course known that she had been pregnant and given a child up for adoption) they told her to forget about things, let things lie and don't go back.  Just don't talk to me any more. She told me not to call her again and for sure not to call her boys again. Then she hung up.
     I was in shock.  She had wanted to get to know me, had sent me pictures and even talked about meeting.  Her family had a strong affect on her.  Well, ok, she wasn't rejecting me, THEY were. I think I can live with that.
     I didn't think about it for a while, but I kept going back to what I had been told, that my brothers deserved to know that I existed and that then THEY could make a decision on whether they wanted to know me or not. This made me think of the reason WHY I was trying to connect with my birth family.
     I had a wonderful childhood and upbringing.  I could not have asked for better parents.  I wasn't at all looking for another mother or any of that, but any of you out there reading this that may be adopted as well, you know that at some point in your life you have a longing of sorts to find out exactly what your roots are... where do you come from?  What exactly was the situation that lead to your birth and adoption?  I also was very tired of putting NON APPLICABLE on medical papers that wanted to know family history!!
     So, I gathered my courage...again, and found the phone number for my half-brother, Russell.  I dialed the phone. Karen answered again.
     I began, "Hi, this is Pam Berry again. Do you remember when I called before to ask about Elisabeth?  Well, I believe that I am Russell's half sister."  Disbelieving silence followed. She called to Russ.  He gets on the phone.
     "Hello?  You told my wife that you may be my half sister?"
     "Yes," I said.
     I went through my brief adoption story and made the story short as to how I had found Elisabeth. I told him that I had all of my adoption papers and that I would send him copies if he wanted me to.
    His first question was, "What year and date did my parents get married?" (strange question don't you think?)  I told him.  He said, "WOW!"  and told me his birth date, it was BEFORE they got married!  He had never known the date.  They had never told anyone their anniversary date. I guess because he had been born before they got married, and at that time, 1961, it was still not a normally known thing to not be married and have a child.
    Then he told me another shocker, his older brother, Bob, had been born in 1956, only two years after me, and she had kept him.  He had been adopted by Russ's dad when he was about 5.  Then I found out our birthdays...Russ's birthday is Feb. 26, 1961, my birthday is Feb 27, 1954 and Bob's birthday is March 9th, 1956.  WOW, all within a week of one another!!  None of us born with the advantage of marriage!  Interesting!
   I did send him copies of my adoption papers and the marriage certificate that I had received so to prove what I had told him.  I had also learned that for many many years, he and his wife had lived across the street from his parents!  Now that his dad was gone, he took on the role of always helping his mom.  She had never learned to drive, and had always just been Russell ***** Srs wife, nothing else.  So she needed taking care of!  Plus, they lived across the street so that extended family was just wonderful for them and for their girls.
     After they received my papers, I got a phone call from Karen, my half-sister-in-law.  She told me how shocked and surprised Russ was, and that he was NOT going to talk to his mom about it, he did not want to upset her. She did give me her brother-in-law's phone number however.  He was living in Portland, Oregon.  He had joined the Navy at 18 and never been home again.  He was somewhat estranged from them in a way because he was traveling all over with the Navy, but had settled down after he got out in Portland.
   So, what do you think I did?  Of course, I called him!  He was delighted!!  I don't remember the conversation at all word by word but paraphrasing it this is what we talked about.  First, he went by Art, not Bob (His name is Arthur Robert *****), only his family called him Bob. He did not know he had been adopted by his step-father until he was 18 and was enlisting in the Navy.  They had wanted his birth certificate and then was told he was adopted.  When he asked his mom who his birth father was, she replied that it was "None of your business!"  WHAT!??  Dang woman!!  How could you?
     Art also said that he was getting married in a few months and he sure would like for me to be able to come!  I didn't think that there was a chance in heck for me to go, but I said I would look into it. We exchanged addresses and promised to keep in touch.
    I talked about going to the wedding to my parents and my husband at the time.  They were all against it. They were afraid that there would be trouble or something.  However, my good friend Laura had lived in Portland for years.  Laura was now living in San Antonio.  I called her and we concocted a plan to try and go.  Well, she found a really cheap round trip flight for us for the time, over the fourth of July week, and talked to friends of hers in Portland that were more than glad to let us stay with them AND have the use of their car while we were there!  EEEK!!  We were actually going to Portland, Oregon.  I would get to meet my birth mother's family because they were all going to be there!  (none from Germany, but my BM, and brother and his family).
     I let Art know that I was going to be able to come and he was so thrilled.  However, a couple of nights later the phone rings and a VERY ANGRY German woman says, "How did you get their numbers!!??  Why did you call them??? I told you never ever to speak to them!!???"
   Trying to remain calm, I said, "Well, I got Bob's number from Karen and he invited me to come.  I thought that they deserved to know I existed and they can decide if they want to know me or not, they are adults now."
    She sort of begged me not to come and I said that I was going and that I already had the plane tickets.  She hung up on me.
     July of 1996.  I am on a plane with my friend Laura on the way to Portland, Oregon.  Her friends pick us up at the airport and we go to their home to get settled in for about a 5 day trip.  I called Art and we took off in the car to go and visit him and his fiance, Pat.

                                                        My brother, Arthur Robert and me at his wedding

                                               Art and Pat sharing their wedding cake.

                                         My birth family, without me of course.
                                        Liz, Karen, Russ, Art, Pat, and Russ's two girls, my nieces, Heather and                                                                              Caitlyn.

                                                          Russ and Karen

At the wedding...
     First of all my visit with Art was so fun and we really got along.  I got along with Pat as well. They were busy with wedding plans but took time out to show me around.  Their wedding was to be in the back yard of their home.  We even ended up spending one night with them!
     On the day of the wedding, my birth mother and Russ and his family steered very clear of me.  Karen kept giving me these, "I'm sorry" looks.  Birth mother even talked to her son and insisted that my friend and I NOT sit on the grooms side.  She didn't want to be embarrassed!  Also, she asked Art to quit introducing me as his sister.  He said no, he was going to introduce me as his sister, because I was!!  (Yay Art!)
    I sat on the grooms side but near the back, there weren't too many people there so that back wasn't far. My friend, Laura, took pictures and video.
    After the wedding was over, during the reception (there on the grounds as well) Karen came to me and said that Liz (my BM) wanted to meet me on the other side of the house.  That side was the driveway side and no one was on that side of the house.  I went to the other side and waited a while... nothing.  So I returned to the reception side.  A few minutes later, the same thing happened, I went, I waited, nothing.  Finally, after returning to the reception a second time, Karen came to me again and said that Liz was ready this time. Ok, so I go over to the other side of the house once again.  In a few minutes, around the corner comes Liz.  I smile and she never looks at me but just MARCHES past me down the driveway.  Ok, so, I follow her.  She goes down the driveway, across the street and down a little into the DITCH across the street!!  I followed her.
     Once there, she flips around (my perception??) and with hands on her hips says, "Why are you here!?? I told you NOT to come!!"
   So, with little hesitation I said, "I was invited to come, and you gave up telling me what to do a LONG time ago!"  (good for me... right?  haha)
     She says, "Well, now you have DONE IT!  My boys will now visit you in Texas instead of visiting me in Illinois!"  With that she flipped around and MARCHED back out of the ditch, across the street, down the driveway and disappeared around the corner of the house.
    I think I was sort of stunned.  (not sure why I should have been)  I remember walking slowly across the street and down the driveway to the steps of the house.  I sat down on the steps to think.  I felt like I should cry and honestly I am not sure if I did or not.  Pretty soon my friend Laura came around the corner to find out if I was ok.  Sure, I was, I think.
   I returned to the reception for a while and didn't cross paths with Liz again that day.  I did take some pictures with Russ's girls, but never with Russ around, he just didn't want to upset his mom.

     I will have to stop for today.  There is more to the story!!  Quite a lot more!!