The Amazingly True, Sometimes Bizarre Story of How I Came to Be- Episode 2: The Quest for Bio-Dad

As we were cruising down the highway of life a second beautiful daughter arrived and everything was hunky-dorey. When each girl got old enough, we sat them down and explained to them why they had two grandmas on my side of the family. Both of them responded with this shocking news of my birth in the same manner- “Oh- ok. Can I go watch tv?” Kids- whaddaya gonna do?? Things were going well- until tragedy struck, once again. You see, Sherry had been in poor health for several years, which forced her to retire. She moved in with her daughter Lynn, and her son Xander. Then one day, about two-and-a-half years ago, Sherry collapsed as she was entering a Dollar General Store. Sadly, she was dead within minutes. Although she had been in poor health, it was still quite a shock to all of us. I delivered one of the speeches at her memorial, and it felt odd that I was standing in front of all of these people, and sharing with them the nature of our relationship- what had been, for so many years- a deep, dark secret hidden away by our family. One of my goals that day was to honor and pay tribute to Sherry, but at the same time acknowledge that Geraldine was, and will always be, my mom. I thought I conveyed those ideas rather effectively, if I do say so myself. My other thought was this- if I ever wanted to know more about my bio-dad, that chance was gone. And so once again, I thought that subject was a dead-end road.

Life continued. My girls got older, I got fatter, things were going well…. until last August, when mom left us. She was 91 years old, and had lived a long, fruitful life. Sure, she suffered from a list of ailments that typically accompanies older age- but she was strong right up until the end. She developed pneumonia, went into the hospital, and just couldn’t recover this time. I thought, “Well, I guess that’s it. No more parents for me.” With the exception of my wonderful mother-in-law Marge, who is like a mother to me, I was parentless at the age of 46. I don’t say that to whine, because I know many people aren’t as lucky me. I had parents who loved me, took care of me, influenced me, and inspired me for several years. Many people never get to experience that, and I am extremely thankful for every minute of every day that I got to spend with them. I know the sacrifices that each one of them made so that I could have a better life, and I am eternally grateful for that. I can only hope to aspire to be the same kind of parent to my children, and I work at that every day.

We laid mom to rest, and almost immediately, that old nagging feeling that I had kept tucked away for so many years resurfaced again- what if your bio-dad is alive? What if he’s out there somewhere? One of the main reasons I never attempted to look for him was that I didn’t want to cause any pain or embarrassment to the two women that I loved dearly, my mothers. But they were both gone now, so what was stopping me? Suddenly I was thinking about it quite often- how could I find him? I wrestled with it for a few months, and decided to do a little digging. As previously stated, all Sherry ever told me was his name, and I knew that he was at Tinker AFB. That was it. I asked her daughter Lynn and her sister Sande, and neither one of them had any other information. Seems Sherry didn’t really talk about it much to anyone. So armed with that miniscule bit of info, I emailed my sister Tami, who is a bit of an internet Nancy Drew, and gave her a Mission: Impossible- here’s his name, and he was at Tinker. That’s it. See what you can find. And the very next day she emails me back- she had found him.

I was stunned. Surely it couldn’t be that easy? All Tami had done was Googled the name I gave her, and a video came up. Seems that a few years ago, the VFW in the town where Byron lives was recording video interviews with veterans to talk about their experiences. Byron had been interviewed, and in the first 15 minutes, he talks about the time that he had spent at Tinker AFB in late 1966- early 1967. Bingo. This had to be him, right? It was the name Sherry gave, and his timeline matched up for him to be the #1 candidate for Scott’s bio-dad. So now what? I had no idea what to do. For years, anytime the thought of trying to find him crossed my mind, I quickly dismissed it because such a search would be too difficult, bearing no results. But now I had a name and address. Holy crap! Although it appeared to be a slam dunk, other thoughts entered my jumbled brain- what if this is the wrong guy? What if Sherry gave you the wrong name? What if? What if? But then finally- what if it IS him? I wrestled with this info for several months. My darling wife, who had been my sounding board, suggested I talk to someone else about it. We have a friend, Canaan, who is a marriage and family counselor. She suggested, “Maybe he can give you a fresh perspective?” So Canaan met with me, and I laid it all out for him. (I did preface our conversation by telling him he may want to make a diagram to chronicle all of the twists and turns in my family tree- which he did.) After listening, he asked me some simple questions- what are the pros and cons? What do you hope to gain? But the one that really got my attention was- what’s the worst thing that could happen if you attempt to contact this guy? And the more I thought, the more I realized, the worst thing really wouldn’t be that bad. My biggest concern was for the man’s wife- what would she think if she learned that her husband had possibly fathered a son years ago? But I hoped that she wouldn’t be angry, and would be supportive of the situation. What I really wanted Canaan to do was to tell me what to do. He finally said- “I’d go for it”. Yes! That’s the ticket! Maybe.

I still struggled. I felt like I wanted to contact him, but there was still some trepidation on my part. I’ll deal with this after the holidays, I thought. And I did. January hit. And I finally just told myself, “Do it.” So I sat down to write a letter to the man who may or may not be my father. I labored over what to say- “Dear Dude- Surprise! I might be your son!!” I figured that might not be the best way to go. I wanted to just let him know the circumstances, and that there was a strong possibility that he may be my father. I also wanted to make sure I didn’t sound like a lunatic, and to assure him that I didn’t want anything; I just wanted to know. So after carefully editing and re-editing, I had my letter. I finished it by saying that if he thought this was a possibility and he wanted to pursue it further, he should contact me. I told him if I did not hear anything in response, I would make no further attempts at contacting him. I signed it, and dropped it in the mail. Whew. I at least felt that I had done everything I could, although I KNEW that I would never hear from this guy. Or so I thought….. (how many of these foreshadows can I put into this story??)

Cindy agreed that I would most likely never hear from the Dude (I had begun referring to him as “the Dude” in conversations with my wife), and that would be the end of it. About a week later, on a Saturday afternoon, I sat down to check my email. I opened up my inbox, and sitting there was an email- from the Dude!!! “Cindy”, I yelled, “get in here!!!” We were both stunned. He said he had received my letter, remembered Sherry, believed that it was a possibility, and wondered if I wanted to do a paternity test to determine if he was indeed my father. I re- read his email several times- I really could not believe he responded. I was now in uncharted territory. I quickly consulted my manual What to Do When the Dude who May be Your Father Wants to do a DNA Test (I purchased that on Amazon- true story). The manual said to consult my friend Matt, who is an attorney, about who to use for a DNA test. He told me that name of a national company, and I quickly looked them up. According to them, it was very simple. Each of us would receive a kit in the mail. Just swab your cheeks, stick the giant q-tip in an envelope, and mail it in. Once the company received both kits, they would have the results in three business days. I relayed this info to the Dude, and he agreed. After about a week I got my kit in the mail. I did the swabbing, sealed it up, and mailed it off. I consulted with the Dude, and a day later he did the same. Here’s the part where I learned that Tom Petty was a soothsayer- the waiting IS the hardest part. I tried to do a little math (always dangerous) in  my head- I allowed 4-5 business days for the kits to arrive, then added the 3 business days to test them, which meant that sometime late the second week we should get our results.

Let me tell you- those 2 weeks were difficult. About half way through the second week I called the DNA company to see if they knew when the tests would be finished. “I’m sorry sir- we haven’t received either of those kits yet.” What???!!?? Now panic started to set in. What happened? Where were the kits? Was this a result of a vast government conspiracy to prevent me from finding out the truth about my birth? Was I spawned by aliens? I then began calling every day. “Are they there yet? Are they there yet?” Finally, on Wednesday, two-and-a-half weeks after we had mailed them in, I got the response I wanted- “Yes sir, we have both kits, and we’ll have the results ready Friday morning.” Phew. No aliens. But those next two days, I was a nervous wreck. After years of speculation, it had come down to this simple test, and I would finally know who my birth father was. Cindy was great during this time. On Thursday night, she asked me, “So what do you want the results to be?” All along I had stated that I just wanted to know one way or the other, but honestly, I wanted the answer to be “Yes. Yes, this man is your father.” Friday morning came and I went to the high school where I teach. I have to be honest- I wasn’t really focused on my students that morning. An email would be sent by the DNA company with a link to the results. It seemed like every five minutes I was checking my phone to see if I had an email. Finally, about 9:30, there it was, sitting in my inbox. I logged onto the site on my computer, and clicked on the results. My heart was pounding, my hands were trembling. I quickly scanned the report. There were multiple numbers which meant nothing to me, but there, at the bottom, was the phrase “There is a 99.95 % probability that he is the father.” I immediately started tearing up; I had found him. I mumbled something incoherent to my students, jumped up, and raced across the hall to my wife’s office. She had a student with her, but I’m sure my wild-eyed crazed look indicated that something was up. I went back to my room, and a few minutes later Cindy showed up. “It’s him”, I said. We just looked at each other for a moment, then hugged. I think she was as shocked as I was. I was trying hard not to just burst into tears in the hallway, and I somehow maintained some composure and got through the day.

After a few days, Byron affirmed that he had received the same report as well (now that he was confirmed as my father, I no longer thought of him as the Dude). We decided via email that we should actually talk. So the next evening we arranged a time for him to call. What would I say? Is there a script I can follow? Once again, I felt extremely nervous. We chatted for about 20 minutes, and I explained to him why I did what I did in tracking him down. He told me a little about himself. What impressed me the most was when I told him that I was shocked that he responded. He replied, “It was the right thing to do.” We expressed a mutual desire to meet, but he said before he did anything he needed to tell his family. He had already told his wife (who took it very well), but he had two grown daughters who he had not shared the news with yet. So he told me once he talked to them, we could possibly make further plans. He would let me know when he had done so. And that’s how we ended it.

Great. More waiting. Every day I anxiously scanned my emails, awaiting some news from him. But after a few weeks, I still had no updates. Finally, over a month later (felt like years), he emailed me and said “Tomorrow is Easter. I’m finally going to tell the girls.” I tried to picture what that conversation would look like. “Hey girls, guess what- you have a big brother! And he’s the most awesomest boy in the world!!” “Hooray, dad! We can’t wait to meet our brother- I bet he’s even more awesomer then you say!!”  Or it could go the other way- “Ewww, dad, gross. We don’t need a brother. He’s probably totally icky.” (I didn’t really envision them speaking as pre-teen girls, it was primarily done for a comic effect. But you get the picture.) I couldn’t be patient- the night of Easter I emailed Byron to see if he did indeed tell them, and how did it go? He replied rather quickly. He said it went great, and that both his daughters responded quite positively. They even wanted my email address! I was so happy, for him and for me.

Things seemed to move rather quickly from this point on. Heather, Byron’s oldest daughter, contacted me that week, and Corey, the youngest, not too long after that. Soon we were all Facebook buddies! It was quite a surreal feeling, suddenly looking at these two young women’s lives in pictures, and thinking “These are my sisters”. I’m sure they felt the same way. It was all a lot to process. But everyone seemed to be in agreement- we all wanted to meet. So Cindy and I began hatching a plan to travel across the country. Byron and Heather lived in Massachusetts, not too far outside of Boston, and Corey lived in northern Virginia. Bartley Road Trip 2015!!! We loaded up the family car and set out on our journey the second week of June. 

We had mapped it out to where we would stay with friends and family along the way. As we made our way east on the interstate, almost every thought of mine was, “This is it. I’m actually going to meet my biological father.”  What would we say? Would I look like him? What would our first encounter be like? Would it be like the movie Elf, where I would burst in on him jubilantly, and begin singing “I love you! I love you! I love you!!!” 

Or would it be more of an Empire Strikes Back scenario, where he would encourage me to join him, and together we could rule the galaxy as father and son? I would soon find out.

On the final leg of the journey we left Richmond, Virginia early Friday morning so we would arrive in Boston early evening. This was the day. We arrived at our hotel about 5:30 pm, and when I checked in, the girl helping us said “Oh- Mr. Bartley, you have a package!” It was a gift bag from Byron, containing food and beverages that were locally created. What a guy! We quickly cleaned up, ate dinner, and made our way to his house. We pulled up in front of the house, and Byron and his wife Judy came out to meet us. Here he was, standing before me. The man who I had thought, for over 25 years, that I would never meet. We went inside and sat and chatted for a while. Soon, Heather arrived- it was a bona fide family reunion! The four days we spent there were fantastic. We met Heather’s husband Dave, and their twin 3- year- old children. Corey had planned to fly up with her baby, but unfortunately, the baby got sick. So Corey did not join us. Luckily, she and her husband Tom and their two children lived on the way back to Richmond, so we were able to stop and spend a few hours with them. Over the time in Boston we visited a Science Museum, did a Duck Tour, walked the Freedom Trail, walked around Harvard, ate at a place called “Mr. Bartley’s Burgers”, and soaked up all things Bostonian. I even bought a Red Sox hat. How do ya like them apples??  It is truly a beautiful place.

And the family? I couldn’t have imagined a better scenario. I was overwhelmed by their acceptance. Their attitude was very matter-of-fact: you’re part of our family now, and we’re so excited you are. I found myself in disbelief several times, and I was always on the edge of tears. Cindy describes meeting them as meeting some distant relatives who we had never met before. It was like that, but I would look across at them and think- “This is my father. These are my sisters.” It was truly an indescribable feeling. I immensely enjoyed every minute I was with them, and am so grateful for their hospitality. Before we left, Byron and Judy told me they would like to come to Oklahoma next year for a visit. I would absolutely love that! All of them could come at any time- you’re always welcome! Just don’t come in the summer- it’s wicked hot. And for those of you wondering, no, I don’t really look like Byron. Cindy claims that we have a similar stance and posture. I can’t wait to return and see them again- I have a lot of years to catch up on! Plus, I didn’t think it would be appropriate for the first visit, but the next time we meet I’m going to give Byron an invoice for 18 years of missed allowance. Hey- a brother’s gotta eat, am I right??

So that’s my tale. If you’ve made it this far, thanks for sticking with me! Where do we go from here? Luckily, thanks to the Facebook, we can all keep in touch fairly easily, and see each other in pictures. I will absolutely go to Massachusetts again, and as stated, would welcome them all with open arms here. The ending to this adventure was greater than I imagined. And let me assure you- this is not about being disgruntled with my current family, or striking out to find a bigger and better one. Although they may not realize it, I love my Oklahoma family to death. They all played a part in helping me become the man I am today. I will always be thankful for each and every one of them. So rest assured, Bartleys, you are not being replaced. I do still wonder if I should feel guilty for thinking of Byron as my dad, because I had a father who raised me for 16 years. But the majority of my life I haven’t had a father. So I’m going to take advantage of the time I have with my “new” dad. I’m just adding a new chapter to my life- one in which I meet my new family, and get to know them and grow to love them as well. I’m so excited about the possibilities. This is not about me wanting to replace a family. This is not about forgetting my parents and what they did for me. It’s simple really- it’s about a boy, looking for his dad. And he found him.