When I first starting looking into my ancestry, I followed the male line. I was especially excited about the number of great men and women who made up my family thorn bush. But, it was the rebellious ones, the disgraced ones who really created a complete narrative. Embracing my life as a thorn in my family hasn't been as empowering as I would have liked. But being the odd duck of a dying dynasty has been tragically delicious.

      I spent my first years rejecting the notion that I was inherently "different" from those around me, contorting myself into various shapes and sizes to appease their standardized expectations. 

     But it never added up to comfort for me.

     Here's the math:  My dad was physically present (occasionally) but emotionally MIA (always). My mother was a textbook narcissist (nonstop), and I was treated like an inconvenience (constantly). 

      Sum: Prove yourself worthy of basic decency, and even then, you're on borrowed time. Carry the one.

      By the time I was old enough to leave, I had already mastered solo survival — reading a room, adapting my personality, walking on eggshells, diffusing bombs. Yet, no matter how good I got at it, I was never enough to fit in. I was always the outlier.

     I grew up where love was either conditional, nonexistent, or something I couldn't afford. My caretakers were ghosts and grifters, and I bloomed while being ignored by those who should have been protecting me. I was pawned off, passed around, and put up like baggage nobody wanted to carry but couldn't throw away. 

      Fortunately,  I was regularly farmed out to the perfect parents--my Geddis/Thornsberry grandparents. They taught me about unconditional love and family first.  They saw the role I had been given and then gave me the tools to escape it. They were my safety net and most steadfast fans. So, as a way to honor them,