Maybe that wasn't the last letter home
From the archives, remembering that Christmas, my grandmother's last, when we met our Swedish relatives for the first time, over video chat.
Originally posted on January 14, 2017
A few weeks before Christmas, I received an email from a man named Ronney.
He's a genealogist-loving Swede who had picked up on my family tree in a genealogy forum set up by people who do this transatlantic ancestry work like a full-time job.
Ronney recognized my ancestor's name as the younger sister of his wife's great-grandmother, who was also from outside Visby.
I had to read the email a few times to understand that he was giving not only me, but every member of my family: A living branch of the historical family tree.
I let the news soak in for a few days and concocted a plan. When we were visiting my family in Missouri for the holidays, I could surprise my family with a video chat with these new relatives.
Ronney and I set it up. 1 p.m. December 28. Facebook. Be there or eat lutefisk.
When the day finally rolled around, I made sure my grandma, mom, dad, uncle Chris and his wife, Betsy, who were also visiting, were in the room. I was showing them some Sweden pictures on my computer, with Facebook open in another window, and right at 1 p.m. our time (8 p.m. theirs), the video alert sounded.
No one in the room knew who was going to be greeting us on the other end of the video.
I switched the screen, and there they were: Birgitta and her three sisters, her daughter and Ronney, the ancestry-loving husband who connected us in the first place.
I explained to my family that these people were the descendants of Karolina's older sister, Anna Maria Lundberg, who stayed behind when Carolina emigrated to the U.S. in 1892.
They all spoke enough English to have a wonderful conversation with us. We learned that the generations that followed did so in step, but on opposite sides of the Atlantic.
My mom and her siblings were born in the early 1950s, the same time as Birgitta, Ronney's wife, and her sisters. Birgitta's daughter and I were born the same year, and we both are moms. Nearly all of them are teachers of some kind, just the same as in my family.
The initial shock of the moment hit all of them, and then as the reality of what was happening set in, it became more emotional.
On both sides of the Atlantic, we were grateful, excited and curious relatives, who share more than a family story.
We started pulling down photos from the walls and dragged out the prized possessions that Karolina brought with her from Sweden to Springfield, where she settled with her husband and growing family.
The bread knife and rolling pin.
The Jenny Lind painting on the wall.
Some little pink teacups. We didn't even get to that raggedy old quilt of Karolina's quilt that we sleep under every time we visit.
When our Swedish relatives saw the pink china, their eyes lit up.
They recognized the pattern from their grandmother, who had inherited them from her mother.
It was a most remarkable afternoon. A once-in-a-lifetime gift.
Add the element of surprise? Unforgettable.
Two things to add now that we’re back in 2023: Birgitta’s grandmother was my Aunt Anna’s namesake. The Aunt Anna whose ring I received as a wedding gift two weeks ago.
I’m about to finish The Last Letter Home, the final book in the famed Emigrant series, and it made me think about our own last letter home.
I don’t know when Karolina sent her last letter. Or if one of her children sent a letter back to Sweden upon her death in 1932.
But at some point, there was a last letter home because Sweden stopped feeling like home.
It’s so moving to me to think that it wasn’t really the last letter. And that I can rediscover a small sense of home in this process of learning Swedish and finishing quilts and liking every last one of those long-lost cousins’ posts on Facebook.
My mom, sister and I are planning a trip next year to travel to Sweden to meet our cousins and show Mom around the ol’ stomping grounds. The homeland.
I hope you enjoyed hearing about this ancestral rediscovery.
I’ll be back next week with a new story about life through the generational lens.
Thank you for your subscriptions! I’m having so much fun getting the zine together to ship off to the printer while we’re on our honeymoon next month. I’ll tell you more about that next week, though. Be well and tack så mycket…
Addie
Thanks so much for sharing. My sister left for Sweden after college and is still there. I have a Swedish Bother-in-Law and our Skype family time is truly magical! My son has had the great fortune to visit them in person. All our other get-togethers and family celebrations are all Skype, all the time!
I never get tired of reading these stories and I learn something new every time!