So, I met him. The somewhat wonder of my father's family tree. The illustrious, elusive Guion Bluford. My uncle. Took an interest in me out of the blue and sent me an email saying he was coming to town and would I like to have dinner with him and his wife and of course I said yes. Tonight was the night.

It was a major moment in my life, I must say.

I had never met him before, nor am I all that likely to meet him ever again.

Most of my relatives look very much like my mother. I look very much like my father. It was unusual for me to sit down with a relative I've never met and have him look so very much like me. So much like my father. I tried to find myself in him. He is the only blood relative of my father that I have ever met. It felt like a coming home.

He and his wife from the get-go were quite warm with me. And had wonderful senses of humor. I didn't expect that. I had been nervous before meeting them, afraid of making a poor impression. I think that I rather imagined it would be like meeting with my dad. Except without any familiarity whatsoever. Consequently, while I was excited about it and thrilled about it, there was also a large part of me dreading it. Terrified that it would go badly or that it would be uncomfortable or that we would find ourselves with nothing to say or that they would ask me questions to which I had no good answers. That I would appear small, boring, stupid, useless, disown-able.

But I did not. I think I may have been charming. I forget that I have a way with older people I don't know. People in my parents' generation or above who don’t know me. I'm not sure what it is. A particular way of listening, perhaps. Very interested, very easy with the smile and with the laughter, very concentrated. I try to be friendly, laid-back, easy-going, to follow the cues laid out in the conversation with respect to humor and whatnot, to ask questions, and to hold eye contact. That sort of thing.

It worked! We had quite a congenial time. When I would be speaking, to answer questions or offer information or to indicate that I could relate to what he was speaking to, they would laugh when I said things that I secretly thought might be humorous. It was great! And I laughed at the things that he had said, intending to be funny (because, well, they were). It was delightful.

I think I just wanted to be likeable, really. Likeable enough.

I think I expected him to be taller. He told me that my father is the tallest of the three siblings. I believe he said that he is in the middle, but he might have said that he is the shortest. I can't remember. He's a little softer in the middle than my dad and his lower lip is thicker. Otherwise, they are strikingly similar in appearance, although their mannerisms and their way of maintaining a conversation differ significantly. Though, again, there are some similarities. A way of looking, a way of working the neck, small inflections in the voice.

I was drinking it up. I was speaking to this man. My father's brother. Who looks like me. I have an uncle!

Neither he nor his wife Linda seemed overly attached to the notion of family. There was no sentimentality there. They spoke of living in Cleveland where the people who grow up there tend to stay forever (as in Pennsylvania). On the holidays, Linda told me, everything's family, family. They all get together. And they *hate* each other! They're just miserable. And yet when you talk about them leaving Cleveland, it's as if they couldn't breathe anywhere else, and they've got to be close to their family.

They have two boys, which my father told me they recently disowned.

I wonder how you get disowned from Guion Bluford's family. I did not inquire about this.