One of my cousins emailed today that he has made contact with some second cousins we knew about, but they were the black sheep branch of the family because their mother wasn't very choosy about who she slept with.

Here is how my cousin described the conversation with the 89 year-old son of this woman:

"You know my Granddad married my Mom after my Dad left".  I told him that I was aware of that.  Later he said, "My mom married old Bob and he was the father of Glenn, that was kind of a messed up deal." 

One of the sons was born blind because his mother had venereal disease. I never met any of them, even though we passed their place on the road from town to my grandparents' trading post, but I saw one of them once at a funeral.

I'm glad we've made contact after all these years. The colorful history doesn't matter, just makes the stories more interesting.