On this episode, we’re talking family. Finding, reconnecting, and standing up for family. From a conflict in Eastern Europe, to a surprise email, we're learning why family matters. This episode was hosted by Jodi Powell. Storytellers: Alicia Kenworthy gets some unexpected news from Germany. Stacy Staggs learns to live with her nephew. Marko Ivanov takes care of his brother in a war-torn region. Podcast # 910 To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the theme of this episode of The Moth Podcast?
Welcome to The Moth Podcast. I'm Jodi Powell. And on this episode, family matters. Yes, we're talking family. Finding, reconnecting, and standing up for family. First up, we've got a story about family finding you. Alicia Kenworthy told this at a D.C. Grand Slam where the theme of the night was between the lines. Here's Alicia, live at The Moth.
Chapter 2: How did Alicia Kenworthy discover her unexpected family connection?
So one morning about a year ago now, I was lying in bed and staring at my phone when I received a message via the contact form on my personal website. And now to be honest, I'm not sure why I even keep a contact me form available for the world wide web. Mostly what I get is spam.
Although one time a lady from Vancouver, Canada wrote to let me know she shares my name and also receives my Papa John's delivery notifications. to her inbox. She just wanted to let me know the pepperoni pizza I ordered was on its way. So it has its uses. This message that I got, though, was different.
It was well-written and with almost impeccable grammar, so clearly not spam, and it hailed all the way from Munich, Germany. Dear Alicia, it read, I do some family research and I would really like to drop Ken Kenworthy a line. Ken Kenworthy may have known my biological mother. Ken Kenworthy is my father.
So I googled this German gentleman with almost impeccable grammar and I came across his LinkedIn and there was a photo of a man who is the spitting image of my father staring right back at me. And I took a deep breath and I thought how exactly to tell my father he too had missed a delivery notification for a son. The thing is, my dad and I don't really talk.
Like, not in any kind of dramatic sense. We talk. He's a retired Air Force veteran. He's done three tours in Vietnam. And if you put in the movie Top Gun, he can tell you all about which scenes are the most realistic and why. And from his stories, I've kind of gleaned the grand outlines of our family history.
I know that he raised my three older half-siblings as a single father, that he met my mother in a bar, and that I obviously am the best thing that ever happened to him. But other than that, he's very business-like and direct and to the point, and we just don't really do, you know, conversation. So I decided I would just forward the email with minimal commentary.
So just sent it along and said, hey, Dad, looks like this is meant for you. And he replied about 15 minutes later, and he said, hi, Alicia, I will follow up on this. And so I waited for him to follow up.
And as I was waiting for my dad to kind of process the idea that this German gentleman with almost impeccable grammar was most likely his long-lost son, I just started thinking about what the guy had written in his email. He claimed he didn't really want anything much from my dad, maybe a photo and some information about our family history.
And I had lived 35 years up to this point without knowing this guy even existed. But in all of five minutes, I found myself wanting everything from him. I wanted to book a plane ticket to Bavaria and buy a dirndl and exchange stories in a beer garden. But from my father's end, there was radio silence. And my 82-year-old dad seemed to be taking his sweet time. One day went by and nothing.
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Chapter 3: How did Alicia's relationship with her father evolve after the unexpected news?
And this being COVID, we both donned our N95 masks and we rolled down the windows and we didn't say a word to each other for the entire half hour drive in the car. And we drove down to Haynes Point and got out of the car and we walked around until we found an empty bench that seemed suitable for conversation.
And there my dad launched into the most convoluted story about airplanes I think I have ever heard. He explained all the different fighter jets they were developing in 1968 and what his personal training had been and why he was selected to train on one of these planes and sent to Germany and how he did a 4G inverted dive on a MiG-28.
That's actually a line from Top Gun, for those of you who know the movie. Eventually, after about 20 minutes, I interrupted him and I said, Dad, do I have a brother? Two weeks ago, this German gentleman with impeccable grammar landed via a Boeing 787 at Dulles International Airport, and my dad and I were there to welcome him at the arrivals gate with a sign that said, welcome home.
He was accompanied by his wife, Melanie, and the most beautiful 13-year-old little girl named Louisa, who is my father's only known grandchild. And we took them back to the house where Louisa's promoted to grandpa mug that she gave my father sits on the mantle. And after dinner, we sat around and watched Top Gun as a family.
And then I got an email notification from 23andMe that said, this guy is a total scammer and he's not your brother. No. The truth is I don't really know how to end a happy story. I've been waiting for some sort of like twist the past few weeks to make it more interesting. But the truth is that Lutz is my brother and he fits into our family like a puzzle piece that we didn't even know was missing.
And my dad and I are still searching for the exact expression to encapsulate that feeling. But I'm sure there's a German word for it out there somewhere.
That was Alicia Kenworthy. Alicia is a writer, storyteller, former matchmaker, and once-upon-a-time reality TV talent based in Washington, D.C. You can read her newsletter, Catalectic, on Substack. If you'd like to see photos of Alicia, her father and her brother, head over to themoth.org slash extras. We emailed Alicia to see if there were any new developments since she told this story.
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Chapter 4: What happened after Alicia's brother Lutz arrived in the USA?
Here's Alicia.
It's been five years since I woke up to that unexpected email. Since then, we've been to Munich, Barcelona, and even Disney World as a family. We still talk every week in the family group chat, and my mom loves to brag that Lutz is a younger, even handsomer version of her husband. My dad turns 86 this fall, and we're hoping to celebrate all together in person here in D.C.
Dad still needs to watch Top Gun 2.
But Alicia wasn't the only one who let us know how they were doing.
Through all these years, we've tried so hard to find a suitable German word for it. while we had to admit that there's simply not any expression for that feeling.
Also, we cannot really tell how the situation exactly evolved because everything just simply fits. In Germany, we have a word for things falling into place on its own. We call it Sebsläufer.
Yes, that was Alicia's brother Lutz and her niece Luisa. And if everything should one time click into place for me, I'll definitely know exactly what to say. Sebsläufer. Up next, we have Stacy Staggs, who told this story at the Louisville Grand Slam, where the theme of the night was a point of beauty. Here's Stacy, live at the Moth.
So, before our mom passed, she once said, your brother will fight his way out, your sister will con her way out, and then there's you. You're the one I worry about. It was as if I didn't have my own superpower, but all foster children do. It is how we remain resilient when life forces us to adapt. What was my superpower, you ask? I'm tenacious. I don't give up.
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Chapter 5: How did Stacy Staggs come to live with her nephew?
If it's something I really want, I'll make it happen. If my initial way doesn't work and I see a loophole, best believe you can consider that hole looped. My brother, the fighter, had chosen his path. His son was following in his footsteps. He was in safe custody and was at a treatment facility. My nephew George calls me one night from there.
He sounded scared, didn't know where he was headed, and asked to move in. I might go loud, y'all. This triggered something in me as I thought about this life-changing decision. I was single, lived alone, just a vegetarian lesbian auntie minding her own business. I'd cuss, read tarot cards, and see a psychic. However, she did not tell your girl about this, so I may need a new one.
As I thought about this decision, I had a lot of questions that ran through my mind. I've never been a parent. Will I be any good at this? What do they eat? And is my social life over? But the main question I kept coming back to was, could I live with myself if I didn't at least try? The answer was always no. So George moved in. It's interesting living with a boy. I've never really done that.
I don't know a lot about these creatures. They do eat meat, apparently, but joke's on him. I don't even know how to cook it. Chicken is not supposed to be pink, and I thought I was doing hot girl shit by trying a new recipe, and he thought I tried to kill him. He puts empty cereal boxes back in the cabinet. I do not understand this. He announces when he has to dookie.
I've literally never asked, not once have I ever asked, hey George, do you have to poop soon? He stinks, calls me bruh. and obsesses about going through puberty. Just recently, he told me about his newly acquired armpit hairs. He should be a man any day now. I think that's how it works. So this whole parenting thing, I think, is the hardest thing I probably will ever do.
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Chapter 6: What challenges did Stacy face when her nephew moved in?
I don't even know what I'm doing half the time or if it's the right thing to do. And I'm just out here trying not to traumatize a child any more than he already has been. I have a lot of push and pull with my own decision making. You see, at his age, I was in group homes, residential facilities, one last foster home, then independent living before aging out.
So my sense of normal is a bit non-traditional, I suppose. It is important for me, for George, to have normal childhood experiences. We did go to the beach last year, and it was his first time. He had a very sweet video that he had taken documenting his time at the beach. And just the pure joy that was on his face brought joy to my face.
And I was like, oh, this must be the great part of parenthood. To see your child happy, right? And to think that I had given him that memory. I did. How cool is that? Thank you. It will not be a part of George's story that no one stepped up for him. When I made that decision, I not only did that for him, I did that for my own inner child to heal.
You see, no one stepped up for me, which left me feeling hurt, abandoned, and angry. As a child, I thought my family didn't love me. And after a while, you realize no one is coming to save you. Survival is different than living. I've only recently learned that I've lived most of my life in survival mode, always waiting for the shoe to drop. I'm working on living now.
My mother doubted my ability to survive. Not only did I do that, but I'm bringing her grandchild with me to empower him in hopes that he will not just survive, but also live.
That was Stacey Staggs. George and Stacey live in Kentucky. Stacey works in corporate, leading people. George attends school, plays video games, accepts hot Cheetos as currency, but has no idea why his tummy hurts. He still gets nervous when Stacey cooks. Their favorite pastime? Mocking each other. We also checked in with Stacey to hear a bit more about how her nephew was doing. Here's Stacey.
George is good. He has officially entered the next phase of his life with becoming a young man. He has shot up at least a foot. He towers over me now. His voice is changing. And he lovingly says he finally has more mustache hair than myself. He likes to spend his time playing with friends, playing basketball, playing video games. And roasting me. It's great. I love it. Yeah.
Life is good. We're so glad to hear that. We'll be back in a second with another story all about family. or final stories about relying on and taking care of family, even when the world is in a pretty dark place. Marco Ivanov told this at a Chicago Grand Slam, where the theme of the night was between the lines. Here's Marco, live at the Moth.
My brother, Nikola, is laying in bed in front of me, crying. And it is not one of those whiny, cranky cries. It is this deep, inconsolable cry. And he's whispering, I want my mom. I want my mom. He's eight, and I'm 13, and we are alone. We're in this apartment, just the two of us. I make sure he eats, he brushes his teeth, he does his homework.
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