Sister, sister.

Last night, my mom called me at 11 p.m. I didn't get the message at the time, but called her back a few minutes later while I was filling Betty's tank in preparation for the impending nor'easter.

"You remember I told you about your father having two other girls, Deanna and Rachel?" she said. "Well, I got a call from Deanna today."

Oddly, I did not feel that shock of adrenaline that usually accompanies news of this magnitude. I still feel no shock.

She wanted to know about me. She said I was the last one they had left to find -- her mother had had other children, too -- and Mom told her some stuff: where she could find my writing online, what I had done with my life, I guess, and probably something about what I'm like. ("She's smart, too," my mom said.)

She just got married two weeks ago, to a Jew, and Rachel got married last year and now has a baby boy. Neither one of them drinks. My father has been sober for fifteen years.

She didn't tell him that she was looking for me, since she didn't know how he'd react. I'd bet he repeats what Mom used to, an old Navy aphorism that doesn't really apply to these situations: "Loose lips sink ships."

Her mother had a breakdown or something when they were younger, my Mom said, and their father (our father) ended up raising them for some time.

It was strange hearing from my mom that some other woman had had a breakdown, and that his presence had made a difference to those kids -- surreal, even. I'm not wondering right now what it would have been like if he had been around while Mom was in the hospitals, but I wonder if I will wonder later, when it all sinks in.

So I'm going to write her and see what she's like.

I have nothing to lose.