Meet Chris and Jodi. Super nice, super cool, musically inclined, tooth-achingly-adorable couple. They just moved into a new place together and had us over for supper last night. Partway through the meal we were talking about how our paths have crisscrossed over the past decade, long before we actually met many years ago… how Mikey used to know Jodi’s cousin… how she grew up with my best friend’s ex… how some of Chris’s family graduated with Mikey’s sisters… and lots of other small-world anecdotes. I tell them about the blanket, whose status I am now updating to The Blanket. Capitals.

About a minute into the tale I start to mention names and places, and Chris throws has hands out like a traffic cop.

“Wait. What? ………….. I know them. That’s my family.”

Different last name, family by marriage. He knows every single person involved. The blanket maker and her husband, the priest cousin of her husband… everyone. I showed him a photo of the blanket, and he said his grandma had one just like it in autumn colors. Well… of course she did.

“So wait, there’s more. We’ve also found out that Mikey’s dad went to seminary with this pair of brothers, Matt and John. How are they related?”

“Those are my dad’s cousins!”

So we think my father-in-law’s adolescent buddies are the blanket maker’s nephews, but we’re beginning to get mixed up in a web of cousins.

Kevin Bacon, you’ve got nothin’ on this woman.

Incidentally, thanks to these two lovely ladies for the blog mentions :)