“This is the coolest thing that’s happened in a really long time. Welcome to family.”
Comments shared with Rudy Owens by his distant cousin shortly after meeting his Finnish family in Finland in September 2023
By Rudy Owens, MA, MPH
A sign commemorating fallen Finnish military who died in the wars with the USSR between 1939 and 1944, at the Museo Militaria, in Hämeenlinna, Finland
For years I have repeated a phrase that speaks an eternal truth known to many cultures, globally.
In the English language that wisdom is: “Blood is thicker than water.” In Finnish, they say, “Veri on vettä sakeampaa.” Other languages also explore this idea about the primacy of kinship, such as Mandarin. The Chinese expression translates to: “Family relationships are stronger than any others.”
It is an expression many of us know, almost by instinct.
Its meaning is universal. It reflects how we have evolved, through evolution and our common, shared history, grounded in our closest relations. It also defines how humans have and continue to relate to those closest to them, especially their biological family and blood kin.
For me, that truth became even more clear following my incredible 11-day trip in September 2023 to Finland, one of my ancestral home countries. In this Nordic nation, six years a row voted the world’s happiest country, I had this truth reaffirmed in unforgettable ways. I shared these life-affirming moments with the people I met and with whom we collectively share relatives dating back more than two centuries.
They are and always will be my “family.” They are and always will be my kin.
Ultimately, biological family connects all of us, no matter our age, race, country, or culture.
Family is universal. We all have family—biological family. It’s the common glue that binds us to others.
The acclaimed writer Alex Haley, author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family, succinctly described our collective humanity after the publication of his globally beloved family history of formally enslaved west Africans brought to America. “We are first many millions of families sharing this earth,” said Haley. “After the miracle of life itself, the greatest human common denominator is families.”
Rudy Owens in Helsinki, Finland, one of his ancestral countries of his biological relatives
Adoption secrecy hides my Finnish family story
As an adventure of discovery and learning, my trip to Finland in September 2023 exceeded my wildest expectations. In less than two weeks I drove more than 2,000 kilometers and met and befriended my distant Finnish relatives. I had not known they existed for certain less than a month earlier.
We created bonds, and they felt sturdy. I instantly felt I was standing on a solid foundation that had been missing for decades, to an ancestral land and a wider kin network. This footing was as solid as the granite rocks that cover the Finnish landscape.
More than six weeks after my wonderful meetings with my kin relatives in Finland, I am still struggling for words to describe the undeniable reality that the trip proved to me about blood kinship and life.
Among the most certain and provable facts before me are photos, showing my resemblance to my relatives, removed now by three generations.
The evidence that I am related to my Finnish kin is visible to anyone looking at our photos. The strongest similarity is my uncanny facial and even body similarities to a younger male distant cousin, who I did not meet. One of my other distant cousins, who is his sister, tells me, “The resemblance is uncanny.” In fact all the family members who have met me agree on this visual reality they can confirm with their eyes.
The other fact I can grasp with a firm grip is the shared joy we all felt by simply connecting. It felt organic and without effort.
But how should one describe soul-felt joy meeting one’s blood kin one has never met in more than a half-century? How should a person explain how he is greeted warmly as family, with a new nickname “Uncle Rudy” (“Rudy-setä” in Finnish) among the youngest newfound relatives?
More importantly, how do you tell people like disinterested media, public health officials, and lawmakers about this feeling, particularly when such kin ties have been denied to you by state law and the power of a state and its public health bureaucracy for decades?
Despite all of the positive experiences I can share about connecting with my kin, they don’t change that I am still denied the legal right to have these blood and family relations and knowledge of my identity and—in my case—Finnish ancestry by the full force of Michigan state law.
… GO HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY PUBLISHED ON MY WEBSITE.