Family Is What You Make Of It

When I was in high school, my four girlfriends and I would all bring bagged lunches so we could race to my friend Christina’s house every single lunch break so we could catch as many minutes as possible of Jerry Springer… I’m not even joking. If you’ve never seen it, let me break it down for you: it’s a hot mess of a talk show full of angry, cheating spouses, paternity tests, on-stage fistfights broken up by bouncers, best friends being torn apart by lies, and the list goes on. It was a way to watch all of these crazy things, then turn it off and go back to your normal day and think to yourself, “Wow, I’m so glad my life is not like that.”

I mean, why air all of your family’s dirty laundry in such a public way? Oh yeah, because people love to watch it—me and my 16-year-old friends included.

In this day and age, the word “family” can mean so many different things, amiright? There’s too many types of families to even begin naming, from the ones that you’re born into, to the ones that you choose to create for yourself, and all of the crazy, blurred lines in between. I might not have a Jerry Springer-like family story, but I think mine is still pretty unique.

To start off, my real father was a total crapper: an angry, mean drunk that frequently got mixed up in bad situations, getting tossed in jail every so often. By the time I was 3, he and my mom were divorced, and he lost his visitation rights pretty quickly. After the divorce, my father started a relationship with another woman, and they had a daughter. This daughter and I never got a chance to meet because I had already moved out of state with my mom and had zero interactions with my father at all. He and this woman were together three years before splitting, and he disappeared from this daughter’s life as well.

See? A total crapper.

Now, fast forward 30 years: I have graduated high school, graduated college, commissioned into the Army, moved to Germany, got married, moved to Texas, moved to Kansas, had a baby, moved to California, and had baby number two…

Whew, gotta love that Army life!

Right about the time we landed in California, the Facebook Buy/Sell/Trade groups were just starting to become a thing. You know, where you post stuff to sell, others can buy it, and you can send messages back and forth, but (and this is an important “but,” so pay attention!), if you and that seller weren’t Facebook friends, your message would go into a folder labeled “others.”

It took me forever to realize that “others” folder even existed, and the very first time mine was opened, I was messing around in my kitchen in Monterey, California. I had asked my husband, Josh, to see if he could find it since, you know, he’s a computer genius, and after a second of reading stuff he says, “Um… Babe? There’s a message in here from someone that says she’s pretty sure she’s your sister…? She like, has your mom’s info, and what I’m assuming is your real father’s info…? She says to message her back if you want to, but if not she’ll understand completely…?”

And yes, every single sentence he said was punctuated by more and more incredulous question marks.

This was the day that my tiny little family changed.

That message from my sister, Brandee, had sat there for 7 months without me seeing it, and she honestly thought I didn’t want to have anything to do with her! Of course, I messaged her back and apologized profusely, explaining that since she had messaged, my life had been a complete roller coaster of crazy after the birth of my second daughter, and I was barely functioning. Figuring out Facebook clearly went on the back burner!

She and her family lived in Arizona and we were in Central Cali, so we planned to meet up somewhere in the middle and have our very first get-to-know-you! I was married with two young kids, she was married and they were trying for a baby, and after we got over the incredible craziness of the situation, we realized how much we actually had in common! Even my husband said we were alike, though none of us could quite put a finger on it. We’re both friendly and outgoing, with loud laughs and big personalities, and we both married secretly hilarious husbands with red hair (I mean, c’mon).

And of course, we both shared the same deadbeat dad.

Since that first meeting in 2012, we have made it our personal mission to stuff in enough memories to make up for those lost 30 years!

While my husband was deployed in 2014, she and her son came to visit me at Fort Lewis, and we went on an epic road trip to all of the Twilight locations, took Thai cooking classes together, and did all of the highlights of downtown Seattle. Then later that year, her hubby flew me and the kids to Arizona to surprise her for her birthday! This is how I found out that my sister has some type of rockstar, secret-squirrel bank job that requires security passwords and photo IDs to even be able to visit her at work.

Yeah, she’s awesome.

And then… something crazy happened. While living at Fort Lewis, I got another message in that “others” folder (seriously, Facebook?). A family in California had taken in our father when he lost his job, and his health was declining. He talked about my sister and me a lot, apparently and wondered where we were and how we were doing. With no one knowing how much longer he would be alive, this family found me online and sent me a message, asking if there was any way I would welcome a visit from him.

After talking it over, she and her family flew to Seattle, my mom flew up from Oregon (still the protective mama bear), and we flew our father up for a visit. My younger years were spent being angry at this man for not being a good father, but then as I got older, that anger turned to indifference. When we pulled up to the passenger area at the airport and I saw that old man sitting in his wheelchair, waiting for his two grown daughters to pick him up, I felt sorry for him. If this was going to be our first and last time seeing him after all these years, then we’d better make it special. It was a whirlwind couple of days, but worth it.

Less than two years later, he was gone.

My family was in Iowa celebrating Josh’s parents’ 50th anniversary when we got the call that my father had passed away, and I made the choice to not attend his funeral because it was held on the exact same day of the party that Josh’s family and I had spent months preparing for. There was a lot of stress, and a lot of phone calls throughout the day, but my mom, uncle, and sweet sister and her family all attended, with my sister standing in for me to receive the flag draped over his coffin at his full burial with military honors.

She keeps that flag with her, and I have the bullets fired from the 21-gun salute.

Since then, our families have continued to visit back and forth. I daresay they love it when the Army moves us to a new spot! We all went to Arizona and did the Grand Canyon together; they all came to New York and saw the best 4th of July celebration ever, with fireworks along the Hudson River while the Army band played; we got sister tattoos at a famous shop in NYC; my son and I went to Arizona to surprise her when I photographed a wedding nearby; and (possibly the best one), last summer we flew to British Columbia and spent a week together exploring the city, zip-lining, whale-watching, and just… being together.

Oh, and almost dying by laughing so hard while I was driving that I had to pull over so I didn’t crash. Or pee. Or both.

And I can’t tell you what we were laughing about because it’s a sister secret.

About a year after our father passed away, we got another surprise (no, not another sibling, don’t freak out!)

He had been involved in a long-standing lawsuit related to a job early in his life, and the legal team, upon his death, transferred any and all monetary awards to us. Every once in awhile a check will show up, we call each other for a long-distance high-five, and then promptly put everything into savings so we can take a couple’s trip to Italy, just us adults. Summer 2021, here we come!

Listen, when he was alive, our father didn’t give us anything—no child support, no pretense of being a father, pretty much wouldn’t even give us the time of day. I’m sure he had his reasons, none of which I care about at all.

Do you want to know why?

Because he gave my sister and me each other.

So, what’s your family story?

Is it like mine, with twists and turns, separate paths leading to new, beautiful things?

Or is it like my husband’s, whose amazing parents are in their 54th year of love and commitment?

Whatever it is, it’s yours.

Your family is what you make it.