I found the answer to my existence, the core of my being, in a box of century-old news clippings last week. Now I want to shout it from the mountaintop: My name is Jeff, and I am Canadian!
To understand this epiphany, you must consider that I’ve spent a lifetime trying to figure out just who I am.
It’s not that I didn’t receive proper instruction. As a child, sitting at the gnarly feet of parents, grandparents and even great grandparents I was patiently instructed in who I was: A descendant of Mayflower pilgrims, Germans, Scots, Irish, Hoosier pioneers and maybe even – gasp – a Native American. An ancestor from New England was reputed to have “liked Indians, ” and one from Kentucky was known to have dark hair, eye, and skin prompting speculation among his kin.
I learned that my ancestors were much like my parents, siblings and even their children: Exceptional without exception. Not a common or ordinary person among them.
In early grade school, my great-grandmother came to live with us. I knew she was the daughter of German immigrants and that some of her brothers had been born in the old country. She made great potato pancakes and fried chicken which I took that to be irrefutable proof of her German-ness. However, I was mildly disappointed that she could not, or would not, translate the German spoken in Hogan’s Heroes.
Also as a youngster, a feisty, short, red-haired great grandmother would often visit and occasionally babysit. She was old as dirt but played a mean game of tag with us little ones. Her feistiness was attributed to the fact that she had red hair and Irish ancestors. As a preschooler I found the red hair issue confusing as I knew her to wear wigs over her gray hair. But, she was feisty and definitely had an Irish ancestor, so the two clearly must go together.
When I was in junior high, my most beloved grandmother moved in with us. She was a wonderful storyteller and writer of children’s stories. I spent hours in her room soaking up family history and descriptions of turn-of-the-century life in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. It was from her I learned I was not so much Irish, German or Hoosier pioneer, but Scottish. She was born a MacLachlan, and her great-grandparents had immigrated from near Strathlachlan.
Her stories were always vibrant and captivating for a small town kid growing up around the cornfields and union automotive plants of the Hoosier agri-rustbelt.
I would fantasize the lives of my Scottish ancestors as I plodded through life in my small town. My bicycle became a sailing ship crossing the Atlantic as I passed newspapers. In my mind, I became a small crofter as I cared for the livestock I showed in 4-H. And in hours of swimming practice, I imagined I was pulling across some ancient loch, though the threat of a Nessie attack failed to help me develop any speed.
With such a rich background, I knew as a young adult I must be anything but an ordinary Hoosier. I loved beer and potato pancakes, and that was proof of my German-ness. And, my penchant for single-malt whisky was clearly derived from my Scottish genes. The dark brown, nearly black, hair I had before going gray betrayed a Native American heritage. And, my father’s ancestors – who settled Indiana in the early 1820s – were all the evidence I needed that my stubborn perseverance comes from good pioneer stock.
You would think that all that good breeding would have filled me with the genes to stride through life as a confident Germano-Celtic-Hoosier. But something always seemed missing. Somehow the knowledge that I was a G-C-H couldn’t seem to overcome the sense that I wasn’t complete. There just had to be more to me; one little, extra special ingredient that truly defined me to myself and the world.
Then it happened. Just a few weeks ago, I found that special ingredient in a box of my grandmother’s yellowed newspaper clips. It seems her grandfather’s birthday was written up in the local Sault Ste Marie newspaper. And, while celebrating his Scottish-ness, that article said he’d come from Canada.

Canada! As soon as I read it, I knew that was the answer. Proof positive that I am Canadian. With the help of that yellowed news clip, I realized the truth that had always been there, hidden just beyond the obvious.
- I’m the only male in the family to have a beard. And Grandfather MacLachlan – a Canadian – had a beard.
- During the Lake Placid Olympics, I loved the I Ice Hockey event. And Canadians love Ice Hockey. And let’s not even begin to consider my fascination with the sport of Curling.
- I like maple syrup, and Canadians make a bunch of it and even have a maple leaf on their flag.
- I love the Great Lakes, and my Grandfather had to cross one of them – from Canada – just to get here.
- I drove to Toronto – Canada – once and enjoyed tracking my speed in kilometers per hour and buying fuel in liters.
As I explore who I am as a Canadian-American, I’ll clearly have to embrace the culture … my culture. I’m headed to the store now to seek out some Molson and wonder if I can find some snowshoes here in Indiana.
My name is Jeff … I am not ordinary … I Am Canadian!
This is adorable.
Now…head north, settle in for a Montreal or Ottawa winter. Brrrrrrrr (says a fellow Canadian, now in NY.)
Canadian, huh? You must have gotten all of it, because I do not like -20F temps. Are you going to take up mushing? I would join you on that, as long as it isn’t -20F, or -28.8888889 C. as you Canadians would understand.
Hah! So this explains everything! Dig out your parka so that we can send you off with my husband to the north Ontario. It’s time to embrace your heritage!