Weldon's Family Saga

Date: [unknown] [unknown]
Location: [unknown]

Way Back Machine

DNA has taken our family research far afield, discovering how we got here by learning about the location and life conditions of our paternal genetic 'tribe' at intervals over the last 70K years; my maternal side is too diffuse to track discretely, but likely the women were along for the trip as well.

DNA compiled by expert researchers shows my direct male/female lineages comprised a great part of the original population of Europe 40K years ago, their descendants venturing north after the end of the last ice age to attempt (re)?population of northern Europe.

You see an England Badge because the majority of my nearer ancestors come from there, including my maternal grandparents in the early 20th century. Some of my paternal ancestors also arrived from there as 17th century Adventurers, on the Mayflower, the Fortune, the Anne, and many Great Migration ships.

Fathoming all my other ancestral paths to this shore, there is likely a Hessian soldier 3g-grandfather (Balthasar Kaltwasser), a possible Schenectady Dutch 4g-grandfather (Hendrick Brouwer), possibly a 4g-grandfather from Bayern, surname Bower. And then there is my strictly paternal (Y-chromosome) lineage.

Our current Y-DNA subclade seems unique to Finland for over 2000 years since the Nordic Iron Age. My most likely narrative: ~2000 years ago, my paternal DNA tribe migrated from around the continental North Sea and Baltic Sea coasts to north-coastal Finland. In the 17th Century, one of their descendants likely joined a few hundred others from the Finnskogen, on voyages from Göteborg to the New Sweden Colony on our Delaware River. His descendants merged with my other immigrant lines to partake of the great early American Experience, taming forests, then planting subsistence crops (and Baltic-style log cabins) amid the stumps.

These were not planters beholden to their commercial sponsors. There was a second type of early immigrant, the adventurers, forest tamers, frontiersmen living off the land, following first the Great Wagon Road to the Shenandoah Valley, then, amid an inflow of Scots-Irish later immigrants, spread through Appalachia from Georgia to Ohio. They settled in great tracts given by the English King, then later via the American government, subsisting via bartering with animal furs and forest products, such as pine tar and home- and boat-construction materials, while growing basic food crops and animals for themselves. Before roads, they followed rivers in their small boats wherever the water safely led.

Almost Present Tense

My early years evolved in semi-rural Connecticut (small town bordering on Westchester County NY), followed by middle school in rural Colorado (alfalfa and sugar beets, ~1 hour drive north of Denver), and then becoming a permanent, citified left-coaster (formerly purplish, but now deep blue): high school in SoCal, college in Bay Area, career in SoCal, retirement along Puget Sound.

After a college degree in mathematics, adulthood involved a career (42 years) in computer software, most of the final two decades on contract at JPL, while raising a family in SoCal. My two children and one grandchild by my first marriage were enriched further by three more adult children and six more grandchildren by way of my second marriage. Debby and I and fluff-pup Moby now enjoy the retired life, in a cottage overlooking the Sound.

Here And Now

Small ball (baseball terminology) describes my minimalist approach to life, finding success bottom-up by doing the small things well, and by acquiring only that which can be put to use for well-being of family, body, mind.

True to my self-image, my eighth decade finds me operating a seven year old sub-compact station wagon, a seven year old mobile phone, a nine year old desktop computer, assisted by an eleven year old mini computer hosting my SSD-based music library (over 1K albums) and its tools, via screen sharing with my desktop.

Debby and I share a study in our small, 1953 bungalow (tiniest house either of has ever inhabited, on the largest plot of land we've ever acquired), desks face to face, computer monitors back to back, surrounded by a few shelves of books. Our study is a 17' x 22' room with large windows on adjacent NW-NE walls, providing peek-a-boo views of the Puget Sound and Olympic Mountain range beyond, through the NW temperate rain forest.

As a retiree carving out time to follow my passions, and further promoting well-being of mind, find me now digging on the Internet, satisfying an insatiable curiosity about all the happenings on planet Earth, including researching my family's ancestors. (As predicted three decades ago, the Internet protocols of DARPA, together with the WWW user protocols that Tim Berners-Lee developed at CERN, have immeasurably enriched our lives going forward, the bliss of an information junkie. These technologies seem second only to electricity itself as the greatest modern human inventions. See me now Quixotically tilting at information paywalls, my continuing nemeses!)

When not at my computer pretending to work, find me photographing birds and other natural beauties, tutoring grandchildren, reading (now mostly for discovery about things that interest me), taking online courses (e.g. Write Like Mozart: Music Conservatory, National University of Singapore; Galois Theory: Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia), walking/running with Moby (our bandit pooch - thieves shoes and socks), maintaining house and garden, enjoying life out and about (pre C19), all shared with Debby.

Although our daily activities are largely independent (even though seated close together in the same room for some hours a day), we come together in the evening for dinner preparation, discussion of the day's details, and entertainment date nights before our six year old big screen, shared with our tiny cuddle, Moby. We continue to find together activities, from driftwood sculpture to badminton and pickle ball, and currently line dancing lessons at our senior center.

One of my great joys had been cycling through forest and field on trails re-purposed from old railway rights-of-way. But aging takes a toll, whispering in my ear now to follow other's advice and substitute hiking along nearby forest trails for exercise.

Second to my outsized curiosity is my life's passion as music spectator, the only spectator activity that suits me. Mother often left classical music playing for her tiny 'radio baby' spectator, since graduated to audiophile headphones. Actual musical performance is not entirely foreign to me, having sung and played brass instruments through my school years.

My keyboard synthesizer has perched next to my desk for most of its thirty years of duty, its keyboard occasionally used to further develop skills, digitally connected to sampled piano sounds. Wanting a renewed taste of performance myself, a role as continuing piano student haunts my existence (practice is not my thing).

The most one can infer from my described talents and social supports is that mine could have been a somewhat easier life than many. So it amazes that my learned background did not result in a capacity for teaching to others (teaching may not be my thing). Yet another source of amazement has been my lack of consequential achievements, or any achievement other than comfort with my life's progress over the hurdles of my four score years. But my modest and self-centered early ambitions explain all. Because these were not grand illusions, my pursuant living never escaped my comfort zone.

Those early ambitions, stored in memory, have been accomplished to some degree: to be healthy; to be self-supporting in an enjoyable and challenging occupation; to deeply understand and enjoy my reality; to preserve these understandings in a public forum; to be with wonderful women and enjoy our amazing children. Other minor ambitions included collecting ancestors (via genealogical+DNA explorations), collecting photographic images of birds (over 100 genera represented); collecting recordings of all of Brahms opus with curated playlists (one song still eludes); gaining ability to play the piano. With the exception of becoming trained in piano performance (sigh), it was the process itself that was enjoyed; the attainment of the goal was only emblematic.

For myself, this is quite enough, but mankind will not recognize me as a bright bulb. You might think it's not too late for me to try; on the other hand, one of my Sages proclaims: 'You can be better! (but not much)'. Well said, Sage. It proves difficult in life to rise above one's ambitions. If you want a BIG life, imagine yourself in a BIG life early on, with regular excursions beyond one's comfort zone.