‘I can’t find my half-sister. Can you help me?’ was the message I received at 10:00 p.m.
My encounters as a writer have taken me down many an adventurous path, but nothing as enticing as this.
I had reached out for my phone to swipe it off for the night when I saw this email flash on the screen. The sender, Karen, had spent most of her life trying to find her long-lost family, in particular her half-sister Mary. After many attempts, she Googled Mary’s mother’s name and my blog popped up. On my blog, I talk about my colleague’s death, who happened to be Mary’s mother.
Karen told me about herself. She grew up knowing that she had a half-sister Mary from her father’s previous marriage. But according to her father, he had lost touch with both his ex-wife and his daughter Mary. She believed Mary had died in the 1980s. Her father had since passed away. Despite knowing that both Mary and her mother had died, Karen still yearned to know about them, and asked me: “Can you tell me anything about Mary and her mother?”
Now I was wide awake. I turned on my computer and sat down to give Karen the good news: her half-sister Mary had not died in the 1980s and the last I checked she was very much alive. She got married in the late 1990s, had made a beautiful bride—her mother had shared photos with me. Sadly, I was not in touch with Mary nor did I know her new last name. (I wish women didn’t change their name after marriage). Mary’s mother had remarried and had a girl and a boy. Her husband was a renowned author. I gave her the link to his website, which I had to look up while emailing her. He is alive.
I couldn’t sleep. Too much adrenaline flowing. I kept nudging my husband: “Isn’t this the most amazing thing!”
7:37 a.m.
I turn on my phone. There it is: an email from Karen.
“I’m in serious shock right now realizing Mary may be alive. Mary’s mother sounds like a wonderful woman and I’m sad not to have dug this deep sooner. . . . I reached out to her husband through the link you sent me, thank you so much for that!”
8:52 a.m.
The screen on my phone blinked:
“I found her!!!”
I almost dropped the phone trying to fumble my way into Karen’s email.
“I found her!!! The most bittersweet part is she lives about an hour from where I lived and grew up in New York. I moved to Colorado two years ago. . . . Your information about Mary’s husband allowed me to find her on Facebook. I messaged her last night and she confirmed this morning. I cannot thank you enough. I have been wondering about her my entire life and always hoped that by some miracle, I’d be able to find her.”
I went running over to my husband: “She found her sister! In less than 12 hours!”
I was OMG-ing all over in my email to Karen.
“Wow! What a happy ending. Or should I say: what a happy beginning! I can imagine your joy. So, what is Mary’s last name? And how did you find her not knowing her last name? Enjoy your newfound half-sister,” I wrote.
From Mary’s stepfather’s website, she had found his author page on Facebook; through that his personal Facebook page; had scrolled through his Friends list and found three familiar names: Mary, her maiden name hyphenated with her last name, and her two step siblings. Bingo! Dots connected, she reached out to Mary.
Facebook did what ancestry.com couldn’t do, with a little help from a blogpost.
We wished each other well and the email chain ended.
Will Karen and Mary meetup? Perhaps after the pandemic subsides? Meanwhile maybe on FaceTime? Will they find their voice echoing in the other? (People tell me that I sound just like my sister). Will they find family resemblance in each other’s looks? Will Mary say to Karen: “Your hand gestures remind me of Dad.” Mary must be in her thirties, Karen younger. Will Mary want to know more about the father she didn’t grow up with? Will they say: “Tell me about your life?” Or will they just pick up from this moment and see where it takes them?
Don’t we all love happy endings!
PS: All names and places in this blog have been changed.
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