Book Review: Searching for Sisters: A Guide to Researching Catholic Nuns in the United States by Sunny Jane Morton

 

               Available as an ebook or paperback at Genealogical Publishing Company

Recently, I obtained a copy of Sunny Jane Morton’s newest work. If you already own her earlier book co-authored with Harold Henderson, How to Find Your Family History in U.S. Church Records, you’ll want to add this one to your collection.

While the book is designed for researchers with a religious sister in their family tree, I would argue it extends beyond that audience. Anyone who has known a Roman Catholic nun, even casually, will find value here.

Although my maternal line has been Roman Catholic for centuries, I’ve uncovered no nuns in recent generations. My husband’s predominantly Lutheran line, however, includes several Harbaugh women who entered religious life between 1880 and 1913 in the United States.

Like many who grew up in parochial schools, I had frequent contact with sisters, as teachers, colleagues, even supervisors. And yet, it never occurred to me to ask what became of them. No long-term correspondence, no reconnection later in life. I simply moved on. In some cases, that’s a blessing. In others (I’m thinking of former Sr. Jeanne Hiller) it feels like a missed opportunity.

Morton’s book brought that realization into sharp focus.

She also presents statistics that genuinely surprised me. In the United States, women religious outnumbered men as early as 1820. By 1965, the height of my own parochial school years, there were an estimated 209,000 nuns, marking their peak. At that time, the Roman Catholic school system was the largest private educational network in the country.

I was aware that historically widowed women could enter religious life once their children were grown, but I hadn’t realized that this practice continues today or that divorced women, following annulment, may also join. Nor had I fully appreciated the role of the dowry in entering a convent.

Even terminology challenged my assumptions. Like many, I used “nun” and “sister” interchangeably, unaware that in the past they carried distinct meanings. The discussion of naming practices was particularly valuable, especially the possibility that a woman might retain her surname. For genealogists, that detail alone has real research implications.

Some of the sisters I remember most vividly, Sr. Martina, Sr. Aloise, Sr. Jerome, Sr. Roserita, carried pre–Vatican II names that now feel like artifacts of another era. Yet I cannot recall the name of my sixth-grade religion teacher, nor my overwhelmed but kind eighth-grade principal. Memory is selective and often unfair.

Morton provides numerous strategies for tracing these women, including those who left religious life. Her success in accessing diocesan records stands in contrast to my own experiences, which have been far more restrictive. (You can read about it here, here, and here.)

She notes that some baptismal records include annotations when individuals later entered religious life, an invaluable clue, when available.

As many religious communities close or consolidate, this book becomes not just useful, but necessary.

Importantly, the scope extends beyond convent records. It hadn’t occurred to me that school or employment records, my own included, might someday reside in an archive, waiting to be discovered. Morton also raises the possibility of wills written by nuns, which initially struck me as puzzling given that income was typically directed to the convent. Yet, as she demonstrates, even this avenue can yield results.

Her observations about the historical marginalization of sisters resonate deeply. In the commemorative history of St. Mark’s Roman Catholic Church in Gary, Indiana, the sisters, who formed the backbone of the parish school, are nearly invisible.[1] A single photograph of the convent. A group faculty image. Minimal acknowledgment. Even the name of their order is omitted; I only know it from a report card: the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ.

Morton closes with a call to recognize the humanity of these women, a point I wholeheartedly support. Childhood impressions often obscure the fuller truth. As adults, we are better positioned to ask: who were these women, really? What shaped them? What did they give up and what did they gain?

The book concludes with case studies that walk readers through the research process. In her acknowledgments, Morton mentions a proposed database, introduced at a June 2025 conference, intended to honor these women collectively. As of now, it has not materialized.

That’s a missed opportunity.

If ever there were a moment for the Roman Catholic Church to formally preserve and elevate the legacy of these women, who labored largely unseen, it is now.

This is a practical, eye-opening guide that fills a genuine gap in genealogical research. Even if you think you don’t have a nun in your tree, you may find yourself reconsidering and looking a little harder.

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[1] Leo J. Armbruster. History of St. Mark’s Parish, No publishing info, 1958, digital image; archive.org: accessed 21 Apr 2026.

Lost in Translation: When Names Refuse to Behave

 

Photo by Lori Samuelson, Athens Airport, 3 April 2026.

I wasn’t expecting to be tripped up by my own name.

Not in an airport. Not in 2026. Not after years of working with records, languages, and historical documents.

And yet, there I stood, staring at a screen, absolutely certain something was wrong… because my name wasn’t spelled correctly.

Except, it was.

Travel has a way of reminding us that names are not as fixed as we think they are.

As genealogists, we’re trained to look for variation:

• Smith / Smyth
• Miller / Müller
• Johnson / Johansson

We nod along, we teach it, we write about it.

And then suddenly, there it is, happening to us in real time.

In the airport, my name appeared in a way I didn’t immediately recognize. The letters were familiar, but not quite right. Some were substituted. Others seemed to shift in ways that made my brain hesitate. For a brief moment, I did what we’ve all done at some point in research: I assumed it was wrong.

But it wasn’t wrong. It was simply… written differently.

Names don’t just change over time, they change across languages, alphabets, and systems.

What we often call “Anglicization” is only one small part of a much bigger reality.

Because sometimes names aren’t Anglicized at all.

They are:

• Transliterated (converted between alphabets)
• Phonetically interpreted by someone unfamiliar with the language
• Standardized by a government or institution
• Digitally altered by systems that don’t support certain characters

Think about it:

A name written in:

• Greek
• Cyrillic
• German with umlauts
• Croatian with diacritics

…doesn’t always have a one-to-one match in English.

So what happens? The system makes a choice and that choice isn’t always the one you expect.

At that airport, I realized something important.

I was reacting the same way many researchers do when they encounter a record that doesn’t match their expectation:

“That can’t be right.”

But it can be right. It just isn’t familiar.

This is where genealogical research either stall or moves forward.

Because if we insist on one spelling, one version, one “correct” form of a name we will miss records.

Names shift in predictable and unpredictable ways:

• Letters are substituted based on sound
• Endings are adapted to fit grammar rules
• Characters are dropped when they don’t exist in another language
• Entire spellings are reshaped to fit a new cultural context

And sometimes? They’re just recorded however someone heard them.

The lesson isn’t new but experiencing it firsthand changes how you approach it. From that moment on, I wasn’t just telling people:

“Look for variant spellings.”

I was thinking:

“How would this system have interpreted this name?” Because that’s the real question.

Not:

• What is the correct spelling?

But:

What versions of this name could exist in this context?

Whether you’re working in:

• immigration records
• church registers
• court documents
• or modern travel systems

…the principle is the same.

Names are not static. They adapt. They shift. They survive. Sometimes, they surprise you, right there in an airport, when you least expect it.

If there’s one takeaway from that moment, it’s this:

Don’t search for your ancestor’s name.

Search for the ways it could have been written.

Because somewhere, just slightly altered, slightly unfamiliar, your answer is waiting.

AI Is Not the Problem, It’s the Mirror

 This post was created by my ChatGPT Research Assistant, Geni. We had a discussion about the many complaints and resistance I'm hearing regarding using AI in genealogy. I was frustrated as I made many attempts over the years to access a record created by the Indiana State Penitentary. Archivists told me the record didn't exist, but it did. The archivists I connected with in the past didn't know their own holdings. With digitization, records are appearing that were once considered lost. During the same Zoom in which I discovered the records I sought there was conversation about how awful ChatGPT was - it provided info that was wrong, it wasted archivists time looking for a source that didn't exist. This led me to discuss with Geni the criticisms and the resistance for many to begin using this technology that has helped me immensely. Geni said...

We have been here before.

Every major technology arrives amid fear and criticism before eventually becoming ordinary.

• The printing press was blamed for heresy and chaos.
• Newspapers were accused of moral decline.
• The telegraph supposedly spread dangerous rumors too quickly.
• Photography was said to weaken memory.
• The internet was blamed for misinformation.

Eventually, society learned how to use each tool responsibly. Norms formed. The technology became part of everyday life.

AI is following the same pattern — just faster.

The constant across history is simple:

Tools amplify human tendencies; they don’t replace them.

---

AI Is a Mirror More Than a Mind

Much of today’s discomfort comes from what AI reveals about us.

AI can:

• generalize,
• speculate,
• fill gaps,
• and sound confident while uncertain.

But humans do the same things every day.

The difference is visibility. When AI makes a mistake, we blame the machine. When humans do it, we call it judgment.

AI exposes reasoning flaws that were always there.

---

Why Blaming AI Feels Easier

Blaming technology provides comfort:

1. It protects our self-image — the problem isn’t us.
2. It avoids the effort of learning something new.
3. It restores certainty in a complicated world.

These reactions are human, but they can stall progress.

---

The Right Mental Model

AI is not an oracle.
It is not an archive.
It is not authority.

AI is a probabilistic reasoning assistant built from human knowledge.

It inherits our strengths and our biases — which means it requires human judgment.

Ironically, genealogists are well prepared for this moment. Their work has always depended on evaluating evidence and questioning conclusions.

AI demands more critical thinking, not less.

---

The Quiet Truth

AI is not creating most of the problems blamed on it. It is accelerating visibility:

• weak reasoning spreads faster,
• but correction happens faster too.

AI amplifies both wisdom and folly at the same time.

The real shift is not humans versus AI.

It is humans learning to think alongside a new cognitive tool.

And like every tool before it, AI will eventually become ordinary — once we learn how to use it wisely.

Book Review: Ancestoring: Understanding Records, Family, and Ourselves by Darcie Hind Posz

 

Published as a paperback by Genealogical Publishing Company

It’s Genealogy At Heart book review time and this one is unlike any I’ve written before.

I’m about to make a few bold claims. And I stand by every one of them:

1. If you read only one book this year, Ancestoring: Understanding Records, Family, and Ourselves by Darcie Hind Posz should be that book.
2. If I had to part with my entire genealogy library and keep just one volume, Ancestoring would stay.
3. This book belongs in every high school curriculum.

That get your attention? It should.

Last month, I received two donated books to review. As always, I don’t accept payment, and there are no agreements, spoken or unspoken, that guarantee a favorable review. My long-time readers know I share my honest thoughts, whether glowing or critical.

Frankly, if I had judged this book by its cover or title alone, I might have passed it by and that would have been a mistake.

From the bottom of my heart, Ancestoring is the only book that has ever had this kind of positive impact on me.

Of the two books to review, I chose this one first simply because of the title. Ancestoring, what did that even mean? The preface answers that question, but more importantly, the book embodies it.

Before diving in, I read the back cover endorsement by Henry Z. “Hank” Jones, FASG. I’ve reviewed his work before, and if Hank was this enthusiastic, I was all in. (See those reviews here and here).

The book is divided into three sections, which Posz notes can be read in any order. I chose to move from the broad to the personal: understanding records, then families, and finally ourselves. Perhaps that reflects my own leanings toward a Gestalt approach; the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. To fully grasp the interplay between these sections, I recommend working through all of them.

Take your time with this book. Do the exercises. If you’re pressed for time, read it through once, then return to it and savor each chapter. Don’t skip the footnotes! Even if you’re not typically a footnote reader, this book may convert you. The sourcing spans multiple disciplines, and that depth is precisely why I make my second and third claims, it’s not just a book, it’s a roadmap for continued intellectual growth.

As a former educator and counselor, I spent years helping students move from concrete to abstract thinking. Though Posz doesn’t frame it this way, I would go a step further: this book fosters lateral thinking, the kind of creative, non-linear problem-solving that genealogists desperately need. That alone justifies my belief that it belongs in every high school.

And for adults? The exercises are even more critical. Think about your daily news feed and your social media. How much of it is accurate? How do you know? This book gives you the tools to evaluate, question, and ultimately uncover truth.

The exercises themselves are refreshingly unconventional. Yes, you’ll learn to analyze photographs, vital records, and obituaries but through a much wider lens. Posz incorporates film, music, and even conspiracy theory narratives as training tools. At first glance, these seem unrelated to genealogy. They’re not. They sharpen how we observe, interpret, and question, skills at the heart of our work.

One of the most intriguing elements is the encouragement to record dreams related to your research. I’ve written about this before (here and here). When deeply immersed in a project, the mind doesn’t simply shut off. Whether it’s subconscious processing, inherited memory, or something we don’t yet understand, those impressions can sometimes point us in new directions. Other times, they signal it’s time to step away. Both are valuable.

The chapter on trauma deserves special attention. All though others have tried, Posz is the first genealogist to address, so directly and personally, how trauma can be researched and interpreted. Memory is not fixed. Two individuals can experience the same event and remember it in entirely different ways. That reminder is essential for anyone working with historical narratives.

I admit, I found myself wondering whether one vivid childhood memory Posz recounts, watching a film while hospitalized, might have been influenced by a dream while medicated. That, in a way, reinforces her point: our recollections are not infallible.

Finally, I applaud Posz for her transparency regarding her earlier work. Too often, we treat a completed project as final. It isn’t. New records surface. DNA reshapes conclusions. Even our most carefully constructed research can shift. Her discussion of ethnicity estimates is a timely reminder that patience and humility are essential in this field.

If genealogy is about understanding where we come from, Ancestoring pushes us further. It asks us to examine how we think, why we believe in what we do, and what it really means to know the past.

That’s why Ancestoring is not just a good book; it’s an essential one.

When “I Know I’m Right” Replaces Research: A Troubling Trend in Genealogy

 

AI Generated

In the past two weeks, I’ve received four emails from individuals new to genealogy either questioning my public tree on Ancestry.com or inquiring about my professional services.

Each one carried the same message: “The information you have is wrong.”

Let me start with something I say often: no genealogical tree is 100% accurate. Until every individual in every line has been DNA tested and even then, interpreted correctly, there will always be some uncertainty. That’s simply the nature of this work.

But these interactions weren’t thoughtful challenges or collaborative inquiries. They were something else entirely.

They were confrontational, dismissive, and, frankly, uninformed.

The first individual demanded proof of a family adoption story. I recommended DNA testing. They had already tested but refused to share the results and insisted I find documentary proof.

Here’s the problem: no records exist for that place and time. None. The best available evidence is a census record placing the child in the same household at three months old and still there decades later. That wasn’t enough. I was told I didn’t know what I was doing.

DNA would likely resolve the question but there’s a reason it wasn’t being shared. DNA doesn’t lie. And when people avoid it, that usually tells you something.

The second email was even more puzzling. I was instructed to delete an individual from my tree because it was “messing up [her] DNA matches.”

We didn’t match.
The individual in question is on my husband’s line.
She didn’t match him either.

Her conclusion? A child who died young actually moved to Illinois, changed his name completely, married, and died in the 1940s.

Her evidence?An Ancestry hint from ten years ago that only matched a birthdate. No sources showed a name change. No documentation. No records connecting the identities. Just confidence that in the entirety of Sweden, only 1 male was born on the same day. I’m not making this up!

When I asked basic genealogical questions such as death certificate? marriage record? naturalization? she didn’t understand what I meant. She had been researching for a few months and was certain her conclusion was correct because a now deceased relative had believed it 10 years ago. I declined to alter a fully sourced line.

The third interaction was more familiar but still frustrating.

A man insisted I had the wrong parents for his great-grandfather. His proof was a death certificate, with information provided by the son.

I explained what experienced genealogists know: informants can be wrong. Memory fails. Grief clouds details.

In contrast, I had a letter written by the man himself shortly before his death, naming his parents and explaining his childhood circumstances. I even provided the citation so he could verify it.

His response? “You’re still wrong. Remove it.” He also admitted he didn’t know how to locate the record I referred to online. Sigh.

That was the point where I made a decision: I removed the entire line from my public tree. Not because I was wrong but because the interaction wasn’t worth the time it would take to defend it.

The final exchange involved a demand to remove a death record because “everyone has it wrong.”

No documentation was provided. Instead, the argument rested on a theory built from DNA matches and a guess involving a child being banished to another colony 300+ years ago.

Could there be a connection? Possibly.

Was there proof? No.

When I tried to guide her toward alternative explanations, such as descent from a sibling, she wasn’t interested. She didn’t want to explore the truth. She wanted confirmation.

So I’ll ask the question plainly: Are you experiencing this shift, too?

For over 25 years, I’ve found most genealogists to be curious, collaborative, and open to learning. But recently, something feels different.

More certainty.
Less evidence.
And a growing resistance to being wrong.

I had a conversation about this with my husband, who pointed me to research from the National Literacy Institute suggesting that a significant portion of U.S. adults read below a sixth-grade level.

As a former reading teacher, that stopped me.

Because genealogy requires more than reading, it requires interpretation, analysis, and the ability to weigh conflicting evidence.

Without those skills, it becomes easy to mistake a hint for proof… or a belief for a conclusion.

And that brings me to where I am now.

I’ve always believed in keeping my tree public. I don’t “own” my ancestors. I’ve invested time and money into my research because I wanted to know the truth, not because I expected anything in return.

But I’ll be honest: I’m reconsidering. Not because of disagreement. Disagreement is part of good research. But because of something else entirely:

A refusal to learn.
A rejection of standards.
And an insistence that confidence equals correctness.

In every one of these cases, I recommended learning about the Genealogical Proof Standard.

Not one person was interested. That’s the real concern. Because if we lose the standard…we don’t just lose accuracy, we lose genealogy itself.

If you're thinking this is an AI problem, it isn't. Genealogists have always worked with flawed records, mistaken informants, and misleading clues.
What is new is the speed at which conclusions are formed and the confidence with which they’re defended without the work required to support them.

If you’re new to genealogy, welcome. Truly. But confidence is not evidence. And belief is not proof. Start there and you’ll go far.

Hints for Family History Travel in Chaotic Times

 

The Agean Sea from Kos Island, 4 Apr 2026, photo by Lori Samuelson.

Last week I shared the story of our trip to Greece including my long-awaited journey to Kos Island, where my family lived some 2,000 years ago, based on mtDNA and family tradition. This week, I’m answering the questions I’ve been getting and offering a few practical tips if you’re planning a similar trip to anywhere in the world.

Let’s start with the obvious, how do you even get to a remote place like Kos?

Your first step is to determine a route. Kos is not on the standard cruise circuit. You have two options: fly from Athens (about 55 minutes) or take a boat from Bodrum, Turkey (roughly 15 minutes). We flew from Athens since we were already returning there from Crete.

Once you’ve figured out how to reach your ancestral location, the next step is getting around. You can rent a car if you’ve secured an international driver’s license or you can hire a driver.

I hire a driver. Every time.

Why? Because I don’t need the added stress of navigating unfamiliar roads, signs, and driving customs while trying to absorb a place that actually matters to me. A good driver knows exactly where to go, how to get there efficiently, and more importantly, what you shouldn’t miss. They often become your best local resource for food, history, and those small, meaningful stops you would never find on your own.

People always ask how I manage to find trusted drivers around the world. The answer is simple: I build relationships. Conferences, professional networks like Association of Professional Genealogists and LinkedIN, and years of working with people in different regions.

In Sweden, I hired a genealogist who also worked as a part-time tour guide for Gate 1 Travel. In Croatia, I was connected with a genealogist/archaeologist. In France and Germany, a sixth cousin I met at a conference volunteered.

Kos was different, I had no contacts. So, I took a chance through Travelocity, and it paid off. GetTransferKOS was excellent. Once the driver understood why I was there, he went beyond the standard route to our hotel and showed us sites my ancestors would have known. That’s the difference between transportation and experience.

Next question: hotels.

If I’m traveling with a company like Gate 1 or Trafalgar, I let them handle accommodations. But I almost always add extra days, before or after the tour, to explore independently. Our ancestors rarely lived in postcard destinations. They lived off the beaten path, and if you want to understand their lives, you need to go there too.

Ask your hotel concierge or desk clerk for off the beaten locales you should visit. When my Travelocity half day tour didn't show up, the desk clerk called a colleague who arrived within 20 minutes to show us his beautiful homeland, along with fresh baked cookies his wife was making for Easter. He knew where the vineyards once grew on Kos and took us there. This was important to me as no physical records have been found to mark the location which was where my ancestors once lived:

Former Vineyard Site, Kos Island, Greece, 4 April 2026, photo by Lori Samuelson.

Money is another practical issue people overlook. If your family came from rural areas, carry some local currency. Credit cards aren’t always accepted, I ran into that repeatedly in Ireland and once in Greece when roadwork brought the internet down at the restaurant.

That said, I still prefer using a credit card whenever possible. With the right travel card, you’ll get a better exchange rate than most banks offer, and it gives you a clean, trackable record of your spending.

Now, let’s talk technology.

I use a phone plan that supports international travel. No roaming. I keep calls to a minimum, rely heavily on texting, and use my phone constantly for photos. Each night, I connect to hotel Wi-Fi and upload everything to Dropbox.

Why? Because I once lost photos in the backwoods of Mexico when I crushed my phone, and I don’t make the same mistake twice.

I also use Geni, my ChatGPT research assistant to help me identify photos when I get home. What was the name of the location of a statue of Leonis? The best part with this trip was the translations.

Asklipieio Archeaological Site, Kos Island, Greece, 4 Apr 2026, photo by Lori Samuelson.

There were no English markers as we toured Asklipieo so I took photos so I could later discover what we were looking at. Geni told me this means memorial markers, which makes sense as the next photo (below) shows recesses in a wall that likely once held those markers:

Security and customs were another big concern people raised.

We had no major issues though I’ll admit O'Hare International Airport tested my patience.

Coming back into the U.S., you have to retrieve your luggage, clear customs, recheck your bags, and then go through security again if you have a connecting flight. It’s inefficient, but it is what it is.

Customs itself took about 15 minutes. United Airlines had staff ready to help recheck bags quickly, and there were helpful Traveler’s Aid volunteers guiding people to their gates. Thankfully, there were no ICE agents in sight, just people actually trying to help travelers get where they needed to go. No chaos, just a system that could be better.My only issue? Exhaustion.

I forgot I had a tiny bottle of water in my bag, security flagged it. Then they asked if I had a laptop. I didn’t but I did have Kindles. That triggered another rescan.

Here’s the irony: every other airport we passed through: Fort Wayne, Vienna, Munich, Athens, Crete, Kos handled this without issue. Chicago? Not so much. You’d think one of the busiest airports in the world would have updated equipment by now.

Stateside, things can be just as odd. Earlier in March, we had “enhanced security” in Fort Wayne; meaning we had to walk past a dog just to enter the bridge. Two weeks later, nothing.

Welcome to consistency, American-style.

We do have TSA Pre Check but not Global Entry. I try to fly into Detroit rather than Chicago which has a much smoother customs with shorter lines. I've tried several times using the Mobile Passport Control app (free) but it never works for me.

Another question I’ve been getting: where next?

Honestly, nowhere overseas for now.

I’m not booking international travel until there’s a change in “leadership” in the U.S. I’m not interested in last-minute cancellations or absorbing costs because someone decides to escalate tensions. Add in rising oil prices and airlines cutting routes, and it’s just not worth the gamble at the moment.

Otherwise, I’d already be planning a trip to Barbados to walk in the footsteps of family lines from the late 1600s into the early 1700s.

For now, that one waits.

As for anti-American sentiment, no, I didn’t experience any hostility. What I did hear, repeatedly, was: “What’s wrong with Donald Trump?” Excellent question!

To their credit, people I met didn’t assume I represented every American viewpoint. That’s something we could learn from.

In the meantime, I have plenty of travel ahead, just closer to home. I’ll be presenting at the National Genealogical Society conference in Fort Wayne (hardly a trip for me!), along with events for Palatines in America and several venues across Texas, Utah, Minnesota, Kentucky, and the Midwest.

So no, I’m not slowing down.

Just adjusting the map for now.

Greece: Tourist and Genealogywise

 

A sculptural gathering of the twelve Olympian gods, seated and standing in hierarchical order, evokes the structure of divine authority on Mount Olympus. At the center sits Zeus, surrounded by the major deities who governed every aspect of ancient Greek life—from war and wisdom to love, the sea, and the harvest. Unlike mythological battle scenes, this composition presents the gods as a unified, if complex, family—ordered, powerful, and ever-present in the Greek world. Photo by Lori Samuelson 25 Mar 2026, Acropolis Museum, Athens, Greece.

I’ve been getting quite a few messages asking about our recent trip to Greece, so I decided to put together a two-part blog with some background this week, and next week I’ll share recommendations if you’re planning your own adventure.

A week before our March departure, we received an email from our travel agent, Gate 1 Travel, telling us our cruise ship was stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. Translation: your trip might not happen.

Three days later, they gave us two options: cancel and get a full refund, or accept a revised itinerary: four days in Crete.

We went.

I refuse to let bullying politicians dictate whether I get to walk in the footsteps of my ancestors.

The trip itself? Smooth, except for the weather, which seemed determined to test our resolve. Intermittent downpours followed us as we climbed mountains in the cold. Where was Zeus when we needed him?

Storm clouds over the Parthenon, 25 March 2026, Photo by Lori Samuelson.

We made our way through Athens, climbed the Parthenon, continued on to Olympia, then Delphi where I picked up a cough that I chose to ignore, and on to Meteora. From there, back to Athens and a short flight to Crete.

And that’s where things got… strange.

I swear our hotel room in Crete was haunted. The first night, I had vivid, unsettling dreams. When I woke, my side of the mattress was halfway off the bed. I had to wake my husband to help fix it.

The next night? His turn. Same thing, odd dreams, followed by a thud as he hit the floor. His mattress was halfway off as well.

We’ve been married over fifty years. This has never happened. Not once.

Sahara Dust Storm before it got worse - seriously! Photo by Lori Samuelson, Crete, 1 April 2026.

Then came day three: a Sahara dust storm. Apparently they happen about three times a year, but this one, on April 1st, of all days, was next level. Nature’s idea of an April Fools joke.

Housekeeping had left our balcony door open.

We came back to a room coated in fine orange dust. My cough worsened, my eyes started itching and watering, and breathing became… challenging. My husband? Completely fine.

So now we know; I’m apparently allergic to the Sahara. Who knew?

Sahara Dust Storm when it went to white out? (red out?) conditions, Photo by Jim Samuelson, Crete, 1 Apr 2026.

Here’s the part that still gives me pause. Had we stayed on the cruise, we were scheduled to be in Santorini that same day. Cruise ships can’t dock there, so passengers rely on ferries and with that weather, those ferries wouldn’t have run.

We would have been stranded. No hotel. No luggage. No backup plan.

So… should I thank those bullying politicians?

Nope. Still not doing it.

One of the highlights of the trip was meeting a probable cousin at a small taverna in Crete. She’s a student at the University of Crete, originally from Kos and she looked exactly like me fifty years ago. Same dark hair, same eyes, same build. It startled my husband more than a little. She is even majoring in an area I did.

Maternal genetics don’t mess around even though I'm unable to prove we're cousins.

The next day we flew to Kos Island, where I had booked a half-day tour through Travelocity. The company happily charged my credit card back in December and then never showed up.

Fortunately, the staff at the Kos Aktis Art Hotel stepped in and found a replacement: a wonderful guide from UniKos Tours.

He took me to what had once been vineyards, very likely the same land my family worked generations ago. Today, it’s a gypsy camp. The residents didn’t mind me taking photos, which felt like a small but meaningful connection to the past.

From there, we visited the Asklepieion of Kos, walked the mountainside associated with Hippocrates, stood beneath the tree where he is said to have taught, explored two medieval castles, stopped at Aphrodite’s temple where the sky promptly opened up and drenched us and found a perfect place to watch the sunset from a mountaintop.

It was, in a word, extraordinary.

Our return home, however, was anything but.

Parthenon at Night. Photo by Lori Samuelson 25 March 2026.

By then, my cough had worsened and my eyes were constantly watering. We spent a sleepless night in the Athens airport before flying to Munich (2.5 hours), waiting two more hours, then enduring a 9.5-hour flight to Chicago. After that? Two hours navigating customs and security, then sprinting to catch our final 30-minute flight to Fort Wayne. We made it with 23 minutes to spare.

Then came the 40-minute drive home.

Happy Easter.

Easter Monday was spent going from doctor to doctor in Auburn. No one had seen a “Sahara dust storm victim” before, which didn’t inspire confidence. My physician child kept telling me to just ask for allergy meds, but no one would listen. I kept getting sent somewhere else.

I finally landed in an eye doctor’s office, someone who actually knew what they were looking at, and I’m now on the mend.

Several locals have told me they’d never travel the way I do, for fear of getting sick.

I’d do it again tomorrow.

Life is what you make of it. Fear doesn’t take you anywhere worth going.

Next week, I’ll answer some of the questions I’ve been getting about traveling to places a little off the grid.