Sometimes life throws events your way that defy not only your expectations but your understanding of reality. We never really expect accidents or sudden strokes of luck, but generally they fall within the domain of things your brain is capable of processing as “real”. However, there are some things that just sound so implausible that it requires reassessment of that reality. One of those happened recently when we found out that my extended family – an extended family consisting of truckers, housekeepers, and construction workers – might have been in the running for owning a substantial chunk of land in west Texas due to a distant relative that absolutely none of them had ever heard of. Effectively, a cliche came true: they had an uncle who died nearly 80 years ago and someone was looking for his living heirs.
Suddenly, everyone in the family was scrambling to figure out just what the hell was going on. No one had ever heard of this man, let alone of the fact that he apparently bought a few hundred acres in Texas around a century ago. He had no children, he left no will, and it wasn’t immediately apparent just who owned the land after he died. Various companies, hoping to identify just who exactly owned this land, tracked down every surviving branch of his family tree and contacted them to try to make a deal. Blindly searching for heirs, they were hoping that someone in my extended family would know who owned it today. Unfortunately for everyone, that family tree was a bit gnarled and we didn’t even know some branches existed. Let’s just say it got a bit weird.
I wish I could say that we got that all sorted out. However, to the best of my knowledge, the only way to know for a fact just what happened anymore would require a Ouija board and a very well paid legal team. What I can say is that it means nothing for me personally at this point. I’m so far removed from the man that, even if any of it somehow ended up in my hands, I would probably have just enough land to erect a tool shed and an outhouse so that I would have exactly two places to keep my shit.
Still, I try to find a positive spin on things. Despite everything, I can say that I at least learned a couple things along the way. First, I have a lot of cousins I had no idea ever existed. Second, the definition of “cousin” is fairly pliable and means different things to different people. And finally, after reading quite a few legal documents over the last couple months, communicating with lawyers gives a pretty solid insight into what it must be like to make contact with aliens.
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