Thanksgiving is a great time to reflect on family history. Covid affords us, regrettably, more time to do so. To pore over old photo albums, view what our parents and grandparents and great-uncles looked like in their youth and parenting stages.

Last week I wrote about the cousins who have stood in as sisters for me. This week, I'm thinking about all the men I came to love and adventure with through my father's family's relations.

My father grew up in Cromwell, the son of a Danish immigrant - a skilled carpenter with a sixth-grade education - and his college-educated wife who was Cromwell's En...