Visitors From Outer Space

Lots of visitors this week.

Thursday - Sara arrives. Sara being my half biological sister (deadbeat dad sperm donor side). We met for lunch downtown...I broke her Thai food cherry...it wasn't really awkward or anything. We have been in contact for 15 years so there is a bit of familiarity there - the existence of that made this rather painless.
We made our way back to my house and spent the afternoon talking...she filled me in on all sorts of stuff about her dad and her life growing up. She gave me all the goods on the family and the dynamic (she is fairly positive her grandparents never knew of my existence) and how she fit into it all. We went for a nice long swim, chatting the whole time...then ordered in some dinner....more chatting. It was pretty decent really. While we have very little in common as people we are both conversationalists to some degree so there was never a lack of something to talk about.
At the end of it all - I was glad it happened and even more relieved to realize I missed absolutely nothing in the biological dad dept. One thing I certainly did not need then or now is another poor male role model/father figure in my life and that is exactly what that would have been. Listening to Sara explain his lack of real interest or kindness twds her as a child was very sad. I applaud her for - at 31 - being able to manage accepting that he is only capable to certain things and she has no expectations of him beyond those things (car advice, help with moving, etc) - anything emotional (support, sharing of feelings, etc) is completely not on the table.

Though, he has moments of real thoughtfulness from time to time (though seemingly infrequently) - Example being: When his oldest son James and his wife Jackie had a baby girl and named her Kayla...he quietly mentioned to Sara to not tell them that I had a daughter named Ayla b/c he thought they would feel obligated to pick a different name...for some reason I think that was thoughtful even though Ayla and Kayla are 2 different names and to me are nothing alike.
In a nutshell it sounds as if he spent a lot of his life as an alcoholic, abusive and mean and a gambling addict with very little to show for his life at 65...materialistically or relationship-wise.
Of his 3 children (Sara, James and Kevin) it sounds like he is closest to Kevin, his youngest, who is in his 20s and is fetal alcohol affected and leads a fairly limited life. It sounds like he makes a point to look out for Kevin a lot which was a bit redeeming.
I certainly have no reason to ever take his lack of interest personally...and this visit did not change my opinion of him at all, being that it was fairly low to begin with.
If you click the photo I think you can see that Gordon's family all have a similar look, long face etc...Sara says she sees a little of that in me but it is not pronounced like it is with her and James and Kevin. I still do not see it even a little in myself...but others do. No real pictures of Kevin to use but he looks very similar to Gordon and James, just very thin.

 Madelyn xo

Friday - Kelly, Regan and Madelyn arrive. So nice to see them all, especially Madelyn who is 9 now and loves to swim - we had a blast swimming while Kelly and Regan went to visit Kim at work and go for a drive. They left this morning on their 2 week road trip south to San Fran/Santa Cruz, California. Kelly is 18 weeks pregnant and this may be the last road trip in a while!

Today was a quiet day - not feeling well at all so I slept a lot and will probably be up late. There is another SUPER MOON tomorrow night. Hoping I won't forget about this one and get a look.

EDIT: APRIL 2020 - Guess what...that guy was not my dad after all thanks to Ancestry DNA confirming Sara and I were not related. Turns out my real dad, who I met 2 yrs ago, is pretty dang AWESOME!!! :) And I look a lot more like him, imagine that!