My English mother.

I grew up with a mother who decided she was English in her fifties. Through her mother’s side, she had traced her family roots back to the second sailing of the Mayflower. I suppose if Mom hadn’t been such a die-hard liberal, she might even have joined the DAR (she may have, for all I know). She’d visited Hartshorn House with great pride. There are Hartshorn houses in Providence RI and Vermont, but it was this one:

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1251959

Mom traveled England extensively. She and Dad enjoyed English-style B&Bs so much that they opened their own on Bainbridge Island (please note, this has been a private residence forever, so I can’t show it to you).

You can see the tile mural of the Canterbury pilgrims Dad installed over the fireplace in this photo – she bought it in Canterbury. You can also see some of the pink and white china of which she was so proud – my parents ate their meals off the Johnson Brothers pink castles every day. She also planted and tended (well, probably Dad did) a small English garden. Mom gave talks on the more impressive historic UK gardens she’d visited at the Bloedel Reserve on Bainbridge.

Mom was English, through and through.

But…her sister was not.

The strange thing is, my aunt Elaine was Norwegian. She shared a passion for genealogy with my Great Aunt Christa. She’d done the research on their father’s side, and she may have even visited Norway. She paid attention to Scandinavian history and playfully incorporated it into her art.

She adored Poulsbo, a little town on the Kitsap Peninsula. She had two tile murals installed here; one of a dancing Norweigian couple, and one of five swans. Here is a short wayback newspaper article about the swan mural and my aunt, whose last name is misspelled here. Sadly, I can’t find a photo of the mural.

https://www.kitsapdailynews.com/news/a-homecoming-of-sorts-for-artist/

Here is another article about Aunt Elaine, but I think the drawing she referred to of her maternal grandmother makes no sense, as Grandma Foster was born in Kansas. On the paternal side, her grandmother was born in Yankton, South Dakota. So maybe she meant a great-grandmother–but if it was maternal, that’s the Mayflower side of the family.

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-10-09-hm-43869-story.html

Anyway. Back to Me.

I have a complicated history when it comes to parentage. I was the second daughter born of a man and woman whom I understood to be German and English, respectively. His mother was born in Minnesota and raised in such a closed German society that she still spoke with a German accent. I found her daunting. I never met my paternal grandfather, who died with this father was young.

My parents divorced when I was six, and I only saw this original father a few times after that. When I was nine, my mother remarried, and at age 11, I was adopted by my stepdad, who became Dad. This is the father who raised me. He was half (I think) German and half Swedish. His mother was actually born in Sweden, and came over here when she was two. She had no accent, but her parents, my great grandparents, certainly did. Otto and Edith. They were charming people.

I envied my younger brother’s clear Swedish heritage. He also carries a trace of Genghis Khan DNA, which suits him, as does his clear path to a Viking heritage. I envied this. I love the Swedish aesthetic. I love the stave church where my parents had their wedding. Swedes were tall and strong and indomitable. I wanted to be Swedish so much.

DNA

So imagine my surprise as I have watched DNA unfold the story of my heritage. I am 40% German, but I am also 45% Scandinavian: 29% Norwegian, 12% Danish, 4% Swedish. When the test splits my DNA by parent, the 9% English I carry comes mostly from the paternal side, not the maternal (there were apparently French and English contributors to all that German heritage on my birth father’s side). There are a few other trace elements in my DNA – Scotland and Eastern Europe but really, I’m more Scandinavian than anything else.

I bought a test for my sister, who took one look at her results and said, “You got all the good stuff.” This bespeaks a general attitude of deprivation over any DNA reality. When we put our results side by side, we match exactly in heritage, if not percentages. Plus, she has French and Icelandic, of which I have neither. She got the cool stuff. But an older sister’s feeling of displacement by a younger sister…well, that is another post.

My DNA results are not life-changing.

I already go to Nordia House. We held my older brother’s memorial service there (he had a different father, but he still had to have a bunch of Norwegian in there from our “English” mother’s father). Nordia House is a Scandinavian cultural center. They have a yearly sale that yields treasures, and Christmas concerts with cookies. I enjoy occasional, expensive, delicious breakfasts at Broder Soder (I recommend the lost eggs or the lefse stack).

I’ve visited the Troll several times. I mean, how could you not?!

This does not make me Swedish. I do not have a home done in beautiful minimal Swedish decor. There is no Christmas aesthetic more beautiful than the Swedish, and my Christmases are all over the place. But when you add it all together, the Norwegian, the Swedish, the Danish, I am a bunch of Scandinavian. I’ll take it! When I push against the gorgeous carved wooden doors of this cultural center, I feel a boost of pride, knowing that, like my aunt, I belong here.

Godt nytt år to you all!