DNA results are in and I am a mongrel like any other human being

My uncle and World War II hero B.J. Murano, Uncle Rocky and his wife, Helen and B.J.'s wife, Eddie.

My father, Big Al, (left) and my mom, Louise (red shirt) and our neighbor Maureen at a Columbus Day Parade in Revere, Mass.

My father, my son and I stand during a Columbus Day Parade in Revere, Mass., back in 1997.

A proud father with his daughter and son in 1962.

“There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his.”    

                   — Helen Keller

“If you want to understand today, you have to search yesterday.” 

— Pearl S. Buck

                                                                                                     

“We all grow up with the weight of history on us. Our ancestors dwell in attics of our brains, as they do in the spiraling chains of knowledge hidden in every cell of our bodies.”

— Shirley Abbott

AUBURN, Maine — After receiving my DNA results from ancestry.com, my perspicacious son, Anthony, pointed out that all my ancestors exist in my spit that was just tested in a lab.

To me, it was a profound statement from my son. He continues to meticulously chart our family tree and has given me a new appreciation of who I am and how I got here.

When we look back at our biological history, I think we forget that humanity is composite of our ancestors who have given us life — and their traits — for better or worse. 

Evolution (only science works for me) has been kind to us — for the moment.

The saliva test was a Christmas gift from Anthony and it really is the gift that keeps on giving. I found there is an endless parade of fourth and fifth cousins out there and some have contacted me. My son has taken his quest further and reached out to living relatives around the globe.

We are all probably related (although we don’t like to admit it), but these conclusive results haven’t stopped us from killing each other over ancient hatreds, race and pride.

When the findings arrived, Anthony and I reviewed the breakdown of who I am and we found our ancestors come from all over Europe, the Caucuses and the Middle East.

According to Ancestry’s ethnicity estimate, my ancestors are from these regions:

Europe South 50 percent (no surprise there)

Southern Italy

From your regions: Caucasus, Europe South, Middle East

Europe West 24 percent

Caucasus 15 percent

Low Confidence Regions

Great Britain 4 percent

Middle East 2 percent

Scandinavia 2 percent

Finland/Northwest Russia < 1 percent

Ireland/Scotland/Wales < 1 percent

Iberian Peninsula < 1 percent

My ancestors’s biology is tucked away deep inside my DNA. Take the test and you will find we are all mongrels and the thought of being a purebred is absurd.

The DNA results arrived in time for the holidays, which can be a painful time of year for those who continue to grieve for lost loved ones.

I miss my parents and Christmas isn’t the same without them. I was raised on a street where nearly dozen Italian relatives lived and all had a hand in my upbringing. But their life force still courses through my veins and they will be with me this holiday and for all eternity.

Exchanging spirits and cooking enough food to feed a battalion of hungry soldiers was just a few ways my family celebrated the Yuletide. It was a two-day event on McClure Street and it featured a Christmas Eve supper with super-sized servings of fish, and for an encore, there was an afternoon Christmas meal featuring pasta, ham and turkey. You didn’t eat for days after gorging yourself in the afterglow of the holidays. 

But my neighborhood is filled with new faces, and those people I loved and cherished, are now wonderful memories of my past. The holidays resurrect those fond recollections and are a source of joy, pride and sadness for me.

But you have only two choices when confronting the holidays and loss: Close the shades in your room and disappear into an abyss of depression — or go forth and enjoy those special moments with your child and wife that only exist for a brief instance in the universe.

It is not a comfort to me and doesn’t ease my grief, but my DNA made me realize that my parents live on inside me. I begrudgingly accept that life is ephemeral, and if you live long enough, your loved ones and close friends fall away like the passing seasons.

But I made a promise to myself to make every day count, including the holidays.

My DNA test also revealed that I am related to England’s King Richard the III and Edward the I, who was also known as Edward Longshanks.

I sometimes feel like a royal, but my throne is a recliner in my parlor. 

I am also grateful to an ancestor, Middlesex County New Jersey Militia Capt. John Payne, who squared off against King George’s Redcoats. Anthony’s careful research of Payne led to our admittance to the Sons of American Revolution this year. He also went on to prove through our DNA that we are indeed related to Payne.

So I will raise a toast to my ancestors and my family and enjoy another Christmas with all of them.

A flag for my father

Shifting the Sun


When your father dies, say the Irish,
you lose your umbrella against bad weather.
May his sun be your light, say the Armenians

When your father dies, say the Welsh,
you sink a foot deeper into the earth.
May you inherit his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Canadians,
you run out of excuses.
May you inherit his sun, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the French,
you become your own father.
May you stand up in his light, say the Armenians.

When you father dies, say the Indians,
he comes back as the thunder.
May you inherit his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Russians,
he takes your childhood with him.
May you inherit his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the English,
you join his club you vowed you wouldn't.
May you inherit his sun, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Armenians,
your sun shifts forever.
And you walk in his light.


Diana Der-Hovanessian

AUBURN, Mass.— A five-hour round trip and a heart-warming graduation party over the weekend kept my mind off the conspicuous absence of my late father on this special day.

If you are a father who has been a guiding light to your children and made sacrifices for the sake of your union, you deserve this one-day tribute — Father’s Day — that rolls around each June. But any more than 24 hours of celebrating fatherhood and most dads lose interest and find it annoying. They want to go back to sports page or the last two innings of a Red Sox game. 

A one-day fuss is all we need.

Good fathers really don’t rely on an at-a-boy or a slap on the back for a job well done. Good food, a tie, socks or a trip to a local eatery will satisfy the most dedicated fathers.

We are not looking accolades, but a good beer always brings a smile to our worried faces.

It is a tough job, but we are obligated to do it — and it is a one-shot deal in our short lives. Good fathers know this and that’s why they want to get it right. There are no do-overs.

To fathers who don’t take an interest or simply ignore their children all together, then you should be water-boarded by people who are morally bankrupt like yourself.

I have no respect for abusive or disappearing dads who don’t understand the responsibility of raising a child they created. When fathers fail because they don’t give a damn, we all pay for their stupidity and their callous nature toward their children.

Society bears the brunt when a precious child is ignored. The human cost is high for all over us thanks to distant dads.

My father was a highly intelligent man who tried to be there during those watershed moments in his children's lives. Sure, he had faults, but he was there for us. He was the guy bringing up the rear and made sure there was food on the table and clothes on our back. He worked hard as a schoolteacher and coach and kept a marriage together for nearly half a century.

That’s why I missed the gray-haired man who gave so much to his family, community and country. I wanted to see him working the room and talking to relatives about sports and this crazy, mixed-up world at Saturday’s party. He died nearly eight months ago of Alzheimer's, and there is not a moment I don’t think of him, especially on my the first Father’s Day without him.

My father had the kind of loyalty that you never see in our Congress — where 535 guys and gals run the show with the “what’s in it for me” attitude.

That is why he never considered being a politician. Telling the truth and being truthful with his students and players was his way of life.

I am lucky I have a son to remind me of my father.

Two weeks ago, I ordered a flag case for the flag that draped his coffin when he was buried with full military honors on Nov. 15, 2014. My son helped me write the engraved inscription. Albert John Blasi served with the Big Red One — a unit that served with valor during D-Day at Utah Beach on June 6, 1944 — during the occupation of Germany in the 1950s.

He wasn’t at the party on Saturday and there was no need to call him to wish him happy Father’s Day on Sunday. His house is sold and McClure Street in Revere, Mass., seems empty to me.

But my dad’s spirit and smile were present in the faces of my nieces and nephews, and of course, my sisters.

He lives on in them and I was lucky to have known him for 55 years.

All I can do to honor him is continue to be a good father and carry on his loving legacy of commitment to family. That was his inheritance to me and it is worth a small fortune to any good father.

A reminder from winter

Snow provokes responses that reach right back to childhood.

Andy Goldsworthy

AUBURN, Maine — We have felt like the prisoners of Zenda for the past 14 hours as a blizzard sputtered in the Gulf of Maine and pummeled the Pine Tree State with more than two feet of snow in some areas.

We got tired of looking at each other. We eventually found something to do as the winds howled outside and the snow piled up.

We were inmates in our home and wondered if the warden ordered a lockdown because Mother Nature dished out a can of whoop ass to the good folks of Maine. The streets are deserted and remain impassable — unless you are driving bulldozer. Only a fool would take a chance at getting behind of the wheel of a car during this stubborn storm.

It is now 7 p.m. Eastern Standard Time and the snow is still whipping around thanks to 35-mile per hour winds that built tall drifts that resemble mountain range on my street.

The snow plows have made several passes and a few of the behemoths came to sudden stop when they hit a wall of snow.

Lucky New York City! The Big Apple was spared and weathermen are issuing mea culpas as I write, but the rest of New England took one in the kisser.

My stalwart son and I decided to brave the icy wind and grab a shovel to clear the walkway to the front door of our snow-white home.

Before we stepped outside, we pried open the door, which was barricaded by two feet of frigging snow. Stepping outside and into the wind felt like a fusillade of glass shards, giving us second thoughts, but the walkway couldn’t wait, especially if we wanted our a mail and the paper.

For nearly 30 minutes, we were like a pair of jackhammers whacking away at two feet of the white stuff. The cold reminded us that we belonged inside our toasty home.

The snow on the walkway was as tall as the Great Wall of China. I thought about a stick of dynamite to blast an opening to the street, but explosives would make everybody nervous.

But we were so close to a breakthrough that we kept shoveling until we made it to the street.

Today was a “potato, corn and shrimp chowder” day, which took the chill out of bones and triggered several boyhood memories.

Tall tales

For the past 14, hours, Anthony endured stories of the Blizzard of 1978 — a storm that knocked Boston and surrounding communities on its asses for two weeks.

Of course, this was the perfect time to bore my son with tall tales of a snowstorm that nearly snuffed out the Blasi family.

Despite his annoying looks, I reeled off snippets of the greatest storm in my lifetime. Thanks to the snow, there was no place for him to hide.

It was Feb. 6, and there was that quiet that is familiar to any coming New England storm. You know you are in harm’s way when everything goes silent and the skies slowly darken.

The blizzard plowed into the Massachusetts’ coastline late in the morning. I sat in my parents’ cozy cellar listening to a Boston AM station — WRKO. I soon switched to WBZ when the flakes started falling. At first, the weatherman called for 6 to 12 inches. Two hours later, the snow totals began to rise: 12 to 16; 18-24; 25-30 inches.

They weren’t wrong. The storm stalled off the coast and delivered snow that shut down the Greater Boston area. Cars and trucks were stopped in their tracks on Routes 128 and 1. People lived in their cars for hours before help came.

Thirty six hours later and there was over two feet of snow on the ground. My Uncle Tony could not leave his house and my grandmother’s home next door became impregnable thanks that to huge drifts that reached the rooftop of her home.

Our first priority was getting to my uncle’s home. It took four men and over an hour to get  to Uncle Tony’s front door. Mr. Martinetti — a big man with powerful arms — was like Big Bad John slinging iron in a coal mine.

I was an 18-year-old who shoveled for the eight hours that day, helping 17 relatives clear the snow from their driveways on McClure Street. For two weeks, Revere High School was shutdown because it became an emergency shelter. Loud U.S. Army Huey helicopters landed all over the city and a handful of tanks roamed the streets. Revere was now under martial law after Revere Beach became flooded during the height of the storm. It was intimidating to see an armed National Guard patrolling the main streets of Revere.

For an entire week, people were forced to walk every where. No vehicles were not allowed on the road. Bread and milk were scarce for a few days because of panicked people making food runs.

But everybody helped out despite the snow and cold.

Months later, when I began a small landscaping service to pay for college, I mowed lawns along Revere’s coastline that sweet summer. I soon discovered hardened star fish and other marine life being broken apart by my lawnmower. These were the yards that were flooded by the rising tide during the Blizzard of 1978.

Sometimes it takes a storm — and home-made chowder — to bring calm and allow us to look back those special moments of our past.