The Labyrinth of Identity: Unraveling Family Secrets and Discovering a Greek Heritage

Have you ever felt like you were born into a mystery, one that has defined your entire life? Walk with us into the labyrinth of James's life, a fascinating story that unravels his search for identity and uncovers deep family secrets. In a world where we're often defined by our lineage, imagine waking up one day and realizing you're not who you always thought you were. 

Join us as we follow James and his girlfriend Shana on an intense quest to Denver, Colorado. With a few clues and a bit of online sleuthing, they trail through Greek markets and cafes, hoping to find someone, anyone, who knows James's biological father. This episode is a roller-coaster ride of emotions, as James navigates the delicate balance between his adoptive family and his newfound Greek heritage. From a gripping court case to an unforgettable trip to the Denver Aquarium, the journey is as heartwrenching as it is thrilling.

The climax of our story takes us into a hidden bar in Greek Town, where James finally meets his biological father's family. Despite a language barrier, the joy of reunion is palpable. Yet, the episode is not just about finding a lost father but also about the realization of James's true identity in the grander scheme of the Jones family legacy. As we wrap up, we explore profound lessons of hope, resilience, and the power of truth. So come, join us on this extraordinary journey of self-discovery.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 5:03

Well, hey guys, thanks for tuning in to the Straight Out of Prison Podcast.

Speaker 2: 5:07

My name is James K Jones and this is my story and this is Hailey Jones, and this is his story. That has now become a part of my story.

Speaker 1: 5:14

Well, you have been wanting to tell this story since we started the podcast.

Speaker 2: 5:17

I tell everybody this story actually.

Speaker 1: 5:19

I mean it is a neat story, but I mean it's more than neat.

Speaker 2: 5:24

It is a miraculous story. I mean the whole. I mean you have several of those but this one. When you first told me I think I don't know, did you tell me this after we got married?

Speaker 1: 5:34

No, it was when we were dating.

Speaker 2: 5:37

When we were dating, okay, so my mind was just freaking blown, I mean yeah.

Speaker 1: 5:43

Actually, if you look at it from the needle in the haystack type of thing that it was, it is.

Speaker 2: 5:48

It was a needle in a haystack. It was.

Speaker 1: 5:51

Well, let's jump in. So we left off.

Speaker 2: 5:53

People are like what are you talking about? Yeah, we didn't tell about what it is.

Speaker 1: 5:57

So in the spring of 2007, I just got clarity that it was time for me to go to Denver, colorado, and uncover some family secrets and find my biological father. We got to the end of the last one. We just talked about my first six, seven months in business and all the struggles and the stuff that I had and we talked about. I got arrested for some of my previous stuff and something shifted in me after I was arrested, with Steve and with Lenora and with his family and I really, after this, I just I made peace with them and you know, I realized that.

Speaker 1: 6:35

You know, steve really loved me and at that time I was dating Sean and we were looking to get married, so he was going to be my father-in-law. So I had to try to figure that out. But, just bottom line, I loved him and I needed his. He had a stabilizing presence in my life and I knew I just needed to get over whatever was bothering me and move on. So you had a little jolt to your system, man. I did. It was, it was, it was shocking and traumatic but it, you know it, it changed some things and it really increased my faith and, like God is, Jesus has me in his hand.

Speaker 1: 7:10

He's not going to let these things happen to me. So we got to the summer of 2007 and I always closed a week in the summer. I learned that from Mr Follett. I always shut down for a week and take a vacation and I knew I needed to go to Denver and find my dad.

Speaker 2: 7:28

Okay, so before we do that, I feel like we need to unpack that.

Speaker 1: 7:32

How I got here.

Speaker 2: 7:33

Yeah, how you got there, how you knew that your dad, james Keith Jones senior, was not actually your biological dad?

Speaker 1: 7:44

Well, when I was 17, I didn't look like people in my family. You know, on both sides of my family everybody's white people.

Speaker 2: 7:51

Well, let me, let me unpack that. So here your. James Keith Jones senior is a tall man, over six feet tall, with blonde hair blondish hair blondish hair, and so is your aunt, his sister and your mom is blonde, and yeah, yeah. So that's what you mean is a lot of blondes and blues.

Speaker 1: 8:11

Well, just very white people, right, and I'm obviously I have dark skin very white people have dark skin, I have dark eyes, I have dark hair. You know everything about me. I'm short, you know I don't match anybody. So they always said you know, we got Indian in our family, and you know that's.

Speaker 1: 8:28

people in the South say you know, if you have somebody, oh, that's that Indian, that's that Cherokee coming out of that, which is hilarious to me I mean, but some of it's true, Some of it's just, you know, like legends and stuff that people say, and I think there was some Indian really on both sides of my family, but that was not the case with me. That was what they told me. I never really questioned it. My dad had a sister, my aunt Denise, who was one of my when I was a kid. She was Nisi, she was my person, you know. She loved me and she had dark hair. She didn't have dark skin and I always thought, just in my mind I look like Denise, I identify with Denise. She has dark hair, but then I thought she had green eyes for summer, because I have green eyes.

Speaker 2: 9:11

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:13

And we were doing something at my grandmother's where everybody was there and I said something about Denise having green eyes and my dad said Denise don't have green eyes, her eyes are still blue. And it bothered me and Denise wasn't there that day. So that night, when everybody went to bed I got out all the picture albums and I started going through all the, because Granny would have a picture album devoted to each one of her kids and grandkids and just like their pictures from birth to you know whatever. And I realized, like her eyes are blue, why don't I think her eyes were green? But it's like I'm gonna start thinking where did my, where did my eyes come from? Like well, I look like nobody. And I just had like this flash of a memory from I was in the third grade. I think I was seven or eight years old.

Speaker 1: 9:59

My stepdad was. He worked for a pipeline, current Houston, like he would have to follow it and work and sometimes we would go with him. Sometimes we wouldn't, but when he was going far off we always went with him. So when I was in third grade he was going to be in Colorado and Utah for like a year. So my mom, me and my brother. We all went with him and we were in Colorado and while we were there I don't know if it's just her something about being in Colorado was bothering her, but we were riding down the highway Because me and my mom, I think my brother was asleep in the back and she told me the story of living in Colorado when she was young, right after she married my dad, and that they split up and she met this Greek guiding, jimmy, and that he might be my dad, but probably not. But he might be my dad.

Speaker 2: 10:53

So hold on, is this like morning time or nighttime?

Speaker 1: 10:58

I mean, this is a very like bomb dropping thing for her to say right, no, but I didn't take, I didn't, it didn't mean anything to me. I thought it was crazy.

Speaker 2: 11:05

I guess if you were only seven or eight, it didn't register with me.

Speaker 1: 11:09

I never thought about that conversation again until this time I'm 17. So that'd be like almost 10 years later and just trying to figure this out and it just came back to me and it scared me because I was like who am I? Am I? You know what's happening here?

Speaker 1: 11:25

So I went to my dad the next morning and told him all this stuff and he told me say, your mom and I, when we were in Colorado, she didn't want me to be in the Air Force, she didn't want me to take away, to take her away from Alabama and away from her family. And she was mad at me and we split up when we were there and she went and got her own place and she started carrying on with some guy and then it didn't work out. We got back together, we went to Tampa but when you were born we both knew that he was your biological father. I loved your mom and I loved you, so I decided it didn't matter and we just decided never to tell you and not make a thing of it. But then we're thinking about that is, they were divorced two years after that but nobody had ever thought to tell me and that secret was a secret between him and her that never went any further, like do you think you say that no one thought to tell you?

Speaker 2: 12:20

it's more. I feel like that's more of like a decision not to tell you.

Speaker 1: 12:23

Well, they just hit it, they like made it where it wasn't a thing and just buried it Right. So it never was never brought up, it was never talked about. I fully believe if my mom hadn't of like said that to me when I was a kid, I never would have remembered that and it would have just been something that I always thought about.

Speaker 2: 12:40

Well, your memory is unbelievable. We've talked about this.

Speaker 1: 12:43

I can't not remember stuff.

Speaker 2: 12:45

That's kind of a blessing and a curse.

Speaker 1: 12:47

It can be like the stuff you want to forget. This was something that she wanted to forget, but when I got home that Sunday night, I confronted my mom.

Speaker 2: 12:56

So this is still in your 17, after you talked to your dad.

Speaker 1: 12:58

He told me the full truth. He told me everything you knew, like he told me details. I said did you ever meet him? He said I met him one time and I said what did he look like? And he said well, he was short and greasy, not much to look at. And you know, after that those words always like haunted me because I'm short and his definition of greasy is like ethnic, like you know dark hair, dark skin. And so I'm short and greasy. So I'm not greasy.

Speaker 1: 13:29

but according to like you know how people label people for certain things. And so I mean that would always bother me.

Speaker 2: 13:37

I mean that's a little racist, it's very racist.

Speaker 1: 13:40

But when I got home, I confronted my mom and she freaked out Like she had a meltdown and freaked out and started screaming, crying and you know, if you go back to like season one, like, I always felt like it was my job to protect my mom, right? So after she went crazy, you know, tried to talk to her about it and I just saw that she was very unstable. Did not want to talk about this and it was just something I just needed to let go.

Speaker 2: 14:08

Okay, really quick. When you say she started going crazy and screaming and crying, I mean I think I don't know, and others don't know, like was she? Like denying?

Speaker 1: 14:16

it Was she. Oh, she was denying it.

Speaker 2: 14:19

What was she saying when she was?

Speaker 1: 14:20

screaming Like that was crazy talk. We're just coming from. You know all that. Oh, okay, so denying it basically, but it was very much, upsetting her, to the point that she was just like freaked out and like a meltdown, like meltdown, crying, you know, like one of our kids might do if you don't let them have the iPad. So it was that, and then my dad decided that, since I knew he wasn't going to pay child support anymore, so I still had two years but he never really paid child support much anyways, so it's kind of one of those things.

Speaker 1: 14:54

And so she went and got a lawyer and took him to court. They went to court. He told the judge my son came to me wanting to know who my, who his daddy was. And I told him the truth. And he's not biologically my son and I'm not giving her any more child support.

Speaker 2: 15:07

So the judge was like uh, Cause this is several years after the divorce, so there's a lot of bitterness there. Yeah, that's between them. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 15:14

It was bad. But she, uh the judge, said look, he's 17 years old. If you want to know all that, you should have did that when he was born. Like we're not, we're not going to go backwards. So it became a thing where he called me and wanted me to choose between him and my mom over this court thing, and then all had to do with money. But I had to choose my mama because she was the one that you know he wanted. He wanted to pull me up in a courtroom and take a DNA test and do all this stuff and I just I couldn't do it. I couldn't, uh, I chose my mama because my mama was the one that had raised. She'd always.

Speaker 1: 15:48

My dad had never really been there for me and I had this weird memory of being. It was before I started school and it was before my brother was born. So I had to be four or five of this conflict with them over child support and him standing on the porch bringing me home and my stepdad looking at him and saying you don't ever have to pay child support or give us anything, but from this day forward you don't have any say in his life. Like I'll tell you when you can see him. My dad said okay and I just felt like you know you already sold me off once to my stepdad, so I can't, like I can't go back and you know, side with you over this. So it became a big deal. But after that, you know, they settled all that court stuff. You know I turned 18, 19 was over with the end.

Speaker 2: 16:33

Really quick. I can see, like, as you're telling this, I can like sense I'm just calling it out Some kind of emotion in you, but I can't identify it.

Speaker 1: 16:42

Like you're a little bit, I feel like rejection from your father, oh yeah, and I've always felt that from him, and we never really had a relationship. But once I found out that he wasn't my biological father, it all started to make sense. But I'm also his only son too.

Speaker 2: 16:59

He has no other children. So do you still feel that?

Speaker 1: 17:02

Do you like the rejection piece Like, does that still sting, or it does when I put myself back in the emotions of the present time.

Speaker 2: 17:10

What you're doing, that now I can almost feel that coming off of you he does.

Speaker 1: 17:14

I mean that's. You know. When I started counseling in 1998, that was my biggest issue. I had daddy issues Right and that was the beginning of like healing for me. But like present day, I'm almost 50 years old and I still love my dad and I want the best for him. But we have no relationship and that's okay. It's fine, but he was always more to me like a like, a maybe, a feeling you would have for an uncle, not even a close uncle.

Speaker 2: 17:40

So I was going to say, but not the fun, uncle, no, like a distant no, when, when we're together.

Speaker 1: 17:44

he was always wanting to like fuss at me and discipline me and stuff like that, and he just didn't. He, we didn't have a connection. So in 1998, when I started my counseling with Steve you know, he wanted me to tell my secrets and get all that stuff out. And when I didn't think I needed to tell this part, when I did, he was like that's a big deal, like. So he felt like I needed to find him and I thought, well, I've always wanted to know. I felt like I wanted, I want to know who I am. So we went through a process during that time of I had some. I was still in prison, though it was hard to do anything. You're still in prison. Oh yeah.

Speaker 1: 19:40

I had some, some of the volunteers there who helped me. They talked to a private investigator but I couldn't get any details out of my mama, Like I could get nothing from her, not even a last name, Like she knew. His name was Jimmy and I remember being on the phone with her begging her to remember, because I felt like this if this was my deep, dark issue, that if I could find my biological father, it would heal it, Like it would be like, yeah, the thing that got better for me. But she couldn't, she couldn't remember. She had it buried for so long, you know, for decades it had been buried and yeah, because at this point you're how old when In 1998?

Speaker 2: 20:20

I was in my 20s.

Speaker 1: 20:22

Okay, but she couldn't. And she couldn't give me a last name. So I was like, if you could give me anything, give me a last name. So I know, you know, so I know until I know something. But she couldn't. And I got to a place where I felt like Jesus was like one day that'll happen, but the time is not yet. And then you know, I got out of prison, I'm going through the process. So you know, live my life for seven or eight years and I would pray about it, think about it, fantasize about it. But every time I started to make a move towards like trying to find us out, I felt like there was something inside of me saying not yet, it's not, now's not the time for that Not yet, Just wait.

Speaker 1: 21:02

But in the summer of 2007, I was 35. I thought I was fixing to get married to Shauna and I've been waiting on this for years and years. And I felt like Jesus said now's the time go. And so I. It was weird because I, you know, I made my plans and here we go.

Speaker 2: 21:22

Okay, so go. So what does that look like? Like, what was your plan? Like, where do you even start when his name is Jimmy and that's it?

Speaker 1: 21:30

Well, I made my plan. I only talked to Steve initially, and Shauna, my girlfriend. I didn't want my mom to know, I didn't want anybody to know. It's like this is I'm going to do this and it was for you, I guess. Yeah, I just need to know, like I wasn't looking for like a relationship Even though that would have been nice I wasn't looking for. I wasn't looking for anything but the truth, like I wanted the, like, the secret to be uncovered. I want to know what I told myself at that time was. I want to know who I am.

Speaker 2: 21:59

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 22:00

You know, I want to know what family of origin I came from, right Cause you know, like I worked with Tony, he was from Sicily and he could tell you the town, and you know, all that stuff is just neat.

Speaker 2: 22:11

Okay, so step one. What did you do?

Speaker 1: 22:14

I sat down you know I am. If I'm going to do something, I'm going to study everything out. I'm going to have a strategy and a plan and you know that's the number 11 key. So it was. I was very lacking in what I had.

Speaker 2: 22:28

So did you have anything more than his first name at that point?

Speaker 1: 22:31

No, well, I'll tell you what I had. Okay, and I put it into a like a Manila folder and that was what I took with me to Denver, Colorado.

Speaker 2: 22:39

Back in the day. I had a picture of my mom when she was 18 because I figured if it was going to jog some of this memory.

Speaker 1: 22:47

She don't need to look like she looks in 2007. I mean cause you know it's 30 years, oh yeah.

Speaker 1: 22:52

Yeah, by this time it's 35 plus nine months. So I was 36 years later, smart, I had a picture of her. I had a contact that mom. Mom remembered a name of a woman that she worked with. Her name was Doris and I can't remember her last name, but somehow I found her. I went through. That was when Google was the internet, was starting to help you with stuff like that. Went through I think actually Sean helped me with that went through and called 45 people until we connected this person that worked at the white spot in Denver, colorado, in 1971. Wow, and I had her. I had a contact with her.

Speaker 1: 23:28

I knew his first name was Jimmy. I knew that at the time mom was 18, he was 27. I knew that he was Greek and that he was from Greece and spoke broken English. I knew that he was a bartender and that he was in the restaurant business, that his whole family was in the restaurant business, that his dad was there with him with some cousins. They were also Greek and mom said his dad was like mean. I knew that they came to the white spot. That was where mom worked Every night when the shift was over. That was there like hangout. They came there after their bar or restaurant or whatever. I think he was a bartender's dad, was like a server manager or something. But every night after their shift ended they went to the white spot, which was like a cafe where mom was a hostess. I knew that he won a cutlass, supreme, a car, a new car, in a poker game and I knew that she never told him goodbye. That's all I knew, that was all I had.

Speaker 2: 24:27

So your mom had never told him that she was pregnant?

Speaker 1: 24:31

No, he had no idea that I existed, which made it another thing. I want to know if I had a kid somewhere. Right, right. I would. It's crazy.

Speaker 1: 24:43

But that's all I had from him. But then I had some. I met some Greek people, I think it was at Leonardo's. So in Birmingham, in Birmingham, that told me that Greek people are very family oriented and that if I had a dad that was Greek, that he would want to know, he would want to know me. And I contacted the Greek Orthodox Church in Birmingham. Like you know how not 100%, but 99.9% of Italians are all Roman Catholic. Like that's their cultural religion, that's the church, that's who they connect with. Well, I learned that Greeks, 99.9% of them, are Greek Orthodox. Like that's their cultural religion, that's the church, that's who they connect to.

Speaker 1: 25:30

So I contacted the Greek Orthodox Church in Birmingham, alabama, and I can't remember the guy's name, but he was like the bishop over the Birmingham of this area of the Greek Orthodox Church, and I just told him my story and he asked me what I did and I said, well, I have a restaurant downtown, kairos Cafe, and he had heard of it. So he was like so you have a restaurant. Of course you're Greek. Like all Greeks that come to America, they have, they have restaurants, and it's true. So he was excited to help me. Like he was just very like, just go, he wants to know, go, go figure it out, go find out.

Speaker 1: 26:11

Yeah, so he set me up with an appointment with the bishop of the Greek Orthodox Greek Orthodox Church in Denver, colorado. So those were my two things that I had. I had the meeting with the co-worker doors and I was sure she could remember something Right, and then I had the meeting with the Greek Orthodox Church and then I had the few things that I knew about him. So here we go. We're headed off to Denver, colorado, rented a car. Steve, of course, made me take a chaperone because he didn't want me and Shauna Okay so you and your girlfriend.

Speaker 2: 26:43

Shauna and then the chaperone. We're going to Denver.

Speaker 1: 26:46

Yeah, wanda who worked for me Mm-hmm, she was my best person. Yeah, she was gonna be our chaperone and you're 35.

Speaker 2: 26:53

I was 35. I thought I'd.

Speaker 1: 26:55

Reiterate, I was 35, shauna was 27, but Steve, you know that was his Thing, that made him feel better. And plus, you know I loved Wanda and she had heard to this part of my story and she was excited about going with me. Yeah, so I didn't tell my mom, I told her we're going to Denver. Didn't tell her what for, but it was like ask.

Speaker 1: 27:16

No, she didn't want to know, she knew. She knew what I was doing. Oh, actually she read the car for me and bought us like a bunch of snacks and bags over to go have fun, all the stuff. But I could tell mama knew what I was doing, but I didn't tell her, we didn't talk about it, but she acted like she didn't know. Yeah, she knew what I was doing, she.

Speaker 1: 27:40

There's no other reason for me to be getting in a car and driving randomly going to Denver. Yeah, and if I had it that to do over again, I probably would have flew. I didn't know it was that bad of a drive, but I had another. Like you know how I am, I try to fit as much stuff into An event as I can. Yeah, like to get things done and Patrick will act, who you heard me talk about in season one, the French chef. He was the chef. Yeah, he was in Kansas City, had been there for about 10, 12 years by that time and and we were gonna go straight up to Kansas City and then cut across to Denver because I wanted to see him.

Speaker 1: 28:19

No and so we did that and it was really neat. We stopped at his restaurant in Kansas City.

Speaker 2: 28:24

So how many hours drive was it?

Speaker 1: 28:26

It was two days like we drove from mid-morning all the way through, stopped somewhere like st Louis or somewhere Missouri. We didn't have like a Itinerary, we just we were gonna stop when we were tired and just get a motel for the night. Yeah and then get up and keep going. So we did that, and then it was something strange about After we left. It was the second day of our trip, we left Patrick's and we were driving straight into Denver and it was just something surreal about. Have you ever drove into Colorado?

Speaker 2: 29:00

I've never drunk driven in, I've flown in.

Speaker 1: 29:03

Okay, you know they call they called Denver the mile-high city, and the reason they call it the mile-high city is because it's a Mile-high from most other. You know, like when you're driving in it's a slow incline, but you're going out, you feel yourself going up, and then you start seeing the Rocky Mountains, and it was as we were getting in a Colorado, getting into Denver. The sun was starting to set and so it was just the most beautiful Sunset I'd ever seen, and it was just. There was something so alive on the inside of me. I was so excited. I just couldn't believe that after all these years, I was finally we were gonna figure this out like I was going. Maybe by the next day I'd be having dinner with my biological father.

Speaker 1: 29:45

You know, because we didn't know. We didn't know anything. I had all these like dreams, I guess.

Speaker 2: 29:49

Yeah, no, it was.

Speaker 1: 29:51

It was exciting yeah very exciting time. So we got into Denver, we Got a hotel, got settled in and you know we're gonna start the next day and I guess that's where it got confusing.

Speaker 2: 30:05

Okay, so where did you go first?

Speaker 1: 30:07

Had made contact with the lady Doris and she set up a lunch meeting with us somewhere in Denver.

Speaker 2: 30:13

And Doris was just someone who worked with your mom. Yeah, not even a white spot.

Speaker 1: 30:17

Yeah, she was like there was like two hostesses there was mom and her, okay and so, but mom remembered her name and I can't remember last name now, but she remembered her last name and I found her and had set up a lunch meeting with her.

Speaker 1: 30:32

But I thought, well, let's do the lunch meeting with her me and Shauna but I want to try to contact the Greek Orthodox Church so I can get there early. So when I called that morning I had the number, everything the guy gave me. And I talked to this man and he was. He was very harsh with me, very mean. I told him the name of the bishop in Birmingham and he said, well, you can come in and meet, but it's not gonna do you any good. And I said why not? And he said why I could never share any of my parishioners information with you, like I would never get involved in such a thing. And I was just like, did you just hear me tell? I just told you my story. Like this is my biological father. He doesn't even know that I exist. And he said, well, I wouldn't know, I wouldn't be getting involved with that. And I said I'm coming anyways, like I you know. I got like kind of angry and then I Called him back again because I was aggravated with it.

Speaker 1: 31:29

And I was I guess I was pretty stern with him. But I was like, so you're like the pastor of this congregation of Greeks in Denver, colorado, and he was like yes, and I said, so, then technically you're supposed to represent Jesus. And he said, technically yes, and I said, well, then you wouldn't know he was, he was, he was not nice. And so I said why wouldn't you want to help me uncover the truth? I mean, this is not just, this is a truth about who I am, and if this guy is in your congregation, he has a son that he doesn't know exists. Don't you think he would want to know, right? And but he, he flat refused to help me. So I ended up I think Sean had taught me into, like, why won't we waste our time there if he's not gonna help us?

Speaker 2: 32:11

So it's kind of the opposite of the bishop. If that was his title in Birmingham.

Speaker 1: 32:15

Yeah, no, the guy in Birmingham, like he was like head over it, but he he kind of like felt it and he was like who wouldn't want to know that, like right, any anybody in their right mind who wouldn't want to know that they had a son, right you know? So, anyways, set up the thing with the door slady. We went and met her, sean and I went. She was there With her husband and we talked for three and a half hours and she could not remember one detail. It was crazy, but it was like she was trying to remember what did you talk about?

Speaker 2: 32:47

for three and a half hours trying to get her to?

Speaker 1: 32:49

jog her memory. Like you know, I Mean you're in Denver, where people don't even they don't speak like we speak in the south. Like that first morning we were trying to wand and I got in the car to go get something to eat, and this was before GPS and we're trying to find McDonald's. And we got to a red light and there was a lady next to us with like a convertible and Wanda said ma'am, can I ask you a question Because you know?

Speaker 1: 33:20

Wanda's from Monroeville, alabama. She's like similar to how my mom and them talking Phoenix. So she was the lady was like sure, and she said Can you tell me where the nearest McDonald's is? And she, the lady was like excuse me. I mean, she was like one of those like kind of hippie types, you know mountain person, and she was like excuse me, and one who said McDonald's and she couldn't understand what she was saying. I said Wanda, she's asking if there's a McDonald's anywhere around. Then the lady pointed us. So I was like you would have to remember my mom because she talked like that right, right, but she couldn't.

Speaker 2: 33:56

So Doris couldn't even remember your mom, she couldn't remember my mom.

Speaker 1: 34:00

Oh wow, she couldn't remember anybody named Jimmy or Greeks that came in, that were restaurant people like she just and she had been smoking up.

Speaker 2: 34:07

I can't remember. No, I mean this was.

Speaker 1: 34:12

This was 36 years prior. I mean, you go think back 35, 36 years. What you know? How could you remember, unless something jogged your memory? Yeah, so I was spending time with her trying to jog her memory. She'll have pictures, telling the stories, and nothing, nothing. She was blank. But she, she wanted to help and she was sad that she couldn't help. But you know, I was like, well, I can't keep sitting here talking about this. So we left.

Speaker 2: 34:38

Okay, so Doris was blank. So where, what did you do next? And the Bishop? There was a loser.

Speaker 1: 34:44

So what did you do next? I Kind of gave up. I was like, why am I here? Why did I even try this? Why am I here? You know, this just seems hopeless and I got you know how I am I get aggravated, I get depressed if something's not working out. I do know, and I, yes, you do me better than most, but uh better than anyone. I would say I just got I got grumpy, I got aggravated and we took one and we went out to dinner or something, you know.

Speaker 2: 35:13

we just let's try to have fun while we're here you say you took Wanda like come on Wanda. No, I know Well she was on vacation too.

Speaker 1: 35:23

I mean, there was like a pool and hotel. There were things to do. Yeah and Denver is a nice city, but okay.

Speaker 2: 35:29

So what was your next step? Finding them. We got a note.

Speaker 1: 35:32

That day I gave up. I woke up the next morning, I went outside and was drinking my coffee and just thinking and trying to pray and just just aggravated, just you know, just down right, and I got a call from Steve, and he don't usually call me especially early in the morning, so I answered my phone. He said I need to tell you something and I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but I was praying for you this morning and I felt clearly that Jesus told me that if you don't give up, you will find your father. And you have to understand. Steve didn't talk like that. He didn't say he, he was never the guy with the Jesus told me card. He would say, I think or this is wisdom or this is what we need to do, but he never said Jesus told me this. And so that got my attention and and I said well, I don't know what else to do. I mean, I'm out here, I'm stuck, I don't know what else to do.

Speaker 2: 36:27

Because you really thought, I guess, that Doris would maybe give you some direction, either her or the Greek Orthodox, the church right but nobody.

Speaker 1: 36:35

You know, I didn't know what to do, so I said, okay, I'll Pray and ask Jesus to help. I don't know what else to do. But when he hung up the phone with me, he called Shauna and I didn't find us out till later and he told her don't let him give up. Like, let like push him, like Don't let him stop, like Nag him, do whatever you need to do, don't let him give up. Because I was ready to pack up and go home. Right, I was ready to. You know this is stupid what I'm doing here, but I really felt like that. You know, like Jesus told me to do it. So I was like Jesus. What do we do? What do we do? And so I was trying to pray. What can I do? So the only thing I need to do? I went into the lobby that a computer there and I Google putting Google, greeks and Denver, colorado and a mashed print on it, and it printed out like 12 pages of just kept printing.

Speaker 1: 37:30

So, I took my little, my little Google sheets and I told Shauna, let's go, because Wonder want to stay back at the hotel and Sun Bay either, whatever she was doing, because there was a nice pool there, and so we got in. The first stop it was the Literally, it was the top searches. The first stop of Greeks in Denver, colorado, from Google was a Greek market downtown. So we went to the Greek market Open, went in the place. It was like it had like Greek food and cheese and it had a little like deli and it was.

Speaker 1: 38:01

It was neat and there was a guy behind the counter serving people that had like dark skin, dark hair, dark eyes. So I was like there's my people, my Greek people. I didn't want to like bombard him with my story Because there were people he was waiting on people. I waited until everybody cleared out and it was just me and him and Shauna there and I told him my whole story, just the whole story, just gave it all to him, the whole story, and he was into the story, he was listening and he looked at me and he said well, actually I'm Lebanese, he said, but I bought this market from a Greek guy, but he's passed away now.

Speaker 2: 38:46

But great story, thank you but I would encourage you.

Speaker 1: 38:50

This is what you should do. You should go to the Greek Orthodox Church. They'll be able to help you. So I was just like, all right, I might. I didn't even tell him, I'd already tried that, I just didn't. So we walked out of there. This was when Sean started pushing me a little bit, like come on, let's just, this is what we're here for, let's do the thing, let's do it and good honor.

Speaker 2: 39:10

I mean, that's no. It was, I would have given up.

Speaker 1: 39:12

It's what you needed, yeah if she had me with me. So the second stop on the search list was Pete's Greek cafe or peaks Greek town cafe, I can't remember, I have to look at the pictures, but it was Pete's Greek cafe. So we went there, started looking at the thing. I said most of these things are like food, places like I can't, I don't have enough money to go everywhere and order food, like. So she was like let's just get a, an appetizer. I was like, okay, whatever, sit down. But I was discouraged. I didn't feel like this was gonna produce any results like that. My worst feeling in the world is like spending my wheels for no reason, right? So we ordered appetizer. The girl came up to wait on us Again, I thought I'm just gonna tell my story. So I told her my whole story and this was the second time this happened to me and in like two hours she was like well, actually I'm Persian, so I don't know any Greek people. And I was like per, what is Persian at Pete's?

Speaker 2: 40:08

Greek cafe.

Speaker 1: 40:09

She was a server.

Speaker 1: 40:10

She worked okay so I was like see this ain't working out. But then a second waitress came over and and Shawna told her my story and the first, the first server, said you know Greek people on the cafe, but there ain't no Greek people here. This is where tourists eat here. But then when the second waitress came up, shawna told her like an abbreviated version of my story and this lady was like, oh, let me go get Dino, he's Greek. And I was like I thought I said one, no Greek people here. Like what's happening here? But she went and got the guy that was the manager of the cafe.

Speaker 1: 40:42

He came out. He was a little short guy, probably in his, maybe in his 60s, had had like salt and pepper hair, very nice, and he wanted to know my story. He started asking me questions. So I pulled everything out and Told him the whole story, showed him everything that I had, and he Wanted to help me. You could tell he wanted to, but he didn't know like how to right. So I think we sat there for about 10 or 15 minutes. He came back with another guy and this guy did not look like a you know what you would think a typical Greek person looked like. He was like six foot three. I mean he was very tall, blonde headed, had dark skin and like green eyes, but he didn't. He didn't look Greek to me, yeah, but when he started talking he talked to Greek because he, you know, his English was broken.

Speaker 1: 41:31

Yeah so he actually sat down at the table with us and started asking me questions. I think our conversation lasted about four minutes and he said you don't know his last name. And I said no, and he said this is like a needle in a haystack if you don't have a, if you don't have a name, you have nothing, you have nothing. And he like got up and left like stomped off, and he turned around, said you don't have a name, you have nothing. And You're like, wow, you're kind of aggressive. Well, he was just being blunt.

Speaker 1: 42:01

Yeah don't waste my time Basically what he's saying. But shawna picked up the paper that I had in the folder and she yelled out to him he won a cutlass in a poker game, in a card game, and the guy stopped Like froze and he flipped around. He looked at me and he said it was red cutlass and I said I think so.

Speaker 1: 42:25

And he came running back and he sat down in front of me and he told me who my father was and it was crazy, it was just crazy, um, but he was like Like beside himself, like put on his hands around, and like excited or upset or what.

Speaker 1: 42:44

No, he was excited. He told me that I looked just like him. So I was like what was his name, what's the last name? And he said Periske Bopoulos and I was like wow. But then he was getting me excited and he was telling me like he remembered the card game, like that's a big deal for somebody to win a whole car in a card game, yeah. But he freaked out and was like just going on and on and on. Just you know, it was crazy before.

Speaker 2: 43:15

Okay, so before she said that he won a car, do you think? And he said you have nothing if you don't have a name. But do you think he suspected at that point?

Speaker 1: 43:24

No, he was done talking about.

Speaker 2: 43:26

So you think that just like turned on a light bulb when she said that.

Speaker 1: 43:29

Yeah, it jogged his memory. This was 36 years. Yeah, 35 plus years. Yeah that when this happened. So it was hard for people.

Speaker 2: 43:38

So it just kind of hit him.

Speaker 1: 43:40

I'll give you a is 2021, so that'd be like go back to like 1986. Do you remember something that happened in 1986? I mean, I was sick, so now I mean, but somebody else Right it would be.

Speaker 1: 43:50

It's a long stretch, as decades have passed and this jogged his memory and he came back. But he knew, but then, as fast as he like put me on top of a mountain Telling me who my father was. Dino was there and he was like no, no, no, no, james, you know, listen to him. He's a big talker. He thinks he knows everything. He doesn't. And they got an argument back and forth and he was like I will put my hand on the table and let you cut it off. This is Jimmy, this is Jim. You know my dad. He said my dad's name, this is his son, and Dino was like look cuz he. Dino was like More like conservative, I guess right, yeah, I know but this.

Speaker 1: 44:31

This guy knew that. He knew that he knew, and Dino was like you, but you don't know. You're just saying you know, you think you know, you don't know everything. So he asked me that they got an argument and then he stomped off. The blind guy stomped off and Dino asked me to leave, like Can y'all just go do something? I have other people that I can talk to and I'll call you when I get some information. I'm not, I'm not sending you away that, cuz this has turned into an explosive situation with this guy. If y'all can just go do something and I'll call you and I and so I didn't really want to leave, but I was. Well, who am I to argue for somebody that's trying to help me? Cuz this is, we're right on the cusp.

Speaker 2: 45:07

But oh my gosh, though like emotion, like someone like I know who your dad is like yeah.

Speaker 1: 45:12

But then after he explained to me like he's just a big talker, like I thought, well, maybe he's just talking like he don't really know. So we left. I was Feeling guilty about having Sean out there for that and not like doing stuff. So we went to the Denver aquarium like something she wanted to do. She want to see the aquarium. So we went in there. We walked through the aquarium. There was like a zoo. How do you even focus after that?

Speaker 2: 45:38

though.

Speaker 1: 45:39

I don't know I was. I Was excited but at the same time was like it can't be that easy, like that right. That didn't really happen that easy. So we went in, we went through the aquarium probably about an hour and a half and we sat down to eat dinner. It was dinner time and as soon as our food came I got a phone call from Dino and he said come back. I need you to come back right now. I know your father is, and so I was just like Ow I mean, she was wanting to finish eating her little mozzarella sticks and all.

Speaker 2: 46:09

So I was like no way we got to go.

Speaker 1: 46:12

We got to go back, so we got in the car. I think it took us like 25 minutes to get back. When I got there, he met me at the door but he asked me to go around the back. So there was like a tourist Pete's Greek cafe in the front but there was a bar in the back that people didn't know. Was there hidden bar? Yeah, it was where all the Greek people went. Yeah, like all the cuz, there's a huge Greek population in Denver. Actually, denver came through and name those streets.

Speaker 1: 46:41

They named that area Greek town because, there's so many because they had like signs and flags say Greek town, denver. But he brought me into this back part was a bar and it was like dark and it was kind of. It was Kind of scared me for a minute. So we walk into the bar. There's like 20 or 30 people there. They're all standing there, all looking at me.

Speaker 1: 47:03

This lady comes up to me and she's the wife of the blonde guy that made the connection right and she's like grabbing me by my face and hugging me and she's got tears in her eyes and she's taking my face and turning it up and saying all these words that I didn't understand and she but she didn't speak English. Yeah, so I was like what is she saying? And she said she's saying that you look just like your father. You have his eyes, you have all his features, and she lives in Greece six months out of the year and she lives in Colorado six months out of the year and their neighbors in Greece. She lives two kilometers they said kilometers. She lives less than two kilometers from your, from your dad.

Speaker 2: 47:48

So she and that she's married to the blonde guy who made the connection lives. Yes, basically neighbors.

Speaker 1: 47:52

They were never his neighbors half, half half the year Some they live in. They lived in Greece six months. They lived in the US for six months. I don't know how that. I don't know why you would do that, right, I mean, maybe you do, you understand, like Europe and all that type of stuff.

Speaker 1: 48:08

Well, yeah, they could probably make money, and I don't know but anyways, she said that she told his wife recently that he was so wild when he was in Denver that he probably had kids All over America that he did so. I was like, well, where is it? You know I want where is he? Like I'm where's he at? He's in Greece. He doesn't live here. He hasn't lived here since 1978 and so I was like trying to figure out like what's my next thing I need to do. So they sat me down on the table with like the godfather. He was like in his 80s but he was like like the oldest Greek man there and he talked to me for like 30 minutes telling me all about my dad his day. He knew all.

Speaker 2: 48:48

He gave me pictures, Just unloaded and did you feel like? You look like him.

Speaker 1: 48:54

Well, the pictures he gave me were kind of faded but you could see definitely, at least from the top of my eyes, forehead up, it looked just like him. I mean I couldn't really make out a lot of the other stuff. But they sat me down and said, look, this is the way this needs to do. We could get on the phone right now and call him. But he said I'm afraid the emotions of this would give him a heart attack. So we think it'll be better if you give me all your stuff, because the blonde guy and his wife, they were two weeks from going back to Greece for the rest of the year. Let me take it to him, sit him down, get him in a comfortable place and tell it to him and give him all your stuff. And so I said I was a little disappointed but I was like, I guess. I mean, I guess that's the best way, the best way to do it. So that's what we decided on, that's what we landed on.

Speaker 2: 49:46

So what kind of stuff did you give them? Just pictures of you. I gave them everything.

Speaker 1: 49:49

I had, and then they were taking pictures of me and then we all exchanged numbers, connected, did all the things. So it was a little bit of a bummer.

Speaker 2: 50:00

Right yeah.

Speaker 1: 50:02

But it was also just like thrilling. I had these two pictures I could look at and know who my biological father was. It was crazy, but then so really quick.

Speaker 2: 50:13

How did they, how did Dino get convinced that that was your dad?

Speaker 1: 50:18

Oh, I'm sorry. The godfather, the older guy, okay, he was the one that confirmed everything the blonde guy was saying and made the connections.

Speaker 2: 50:26

What did he confirm?

Speaker 1: 50:27

What was the blonde guy? It started with a poker game. Okay, none of them could remember my mom, but if you go back, she was only there for like six months. Like what's, six months out of 35 years, right? That's nothing. He knew who my dad was because of the poker game and his name was Jimmy. His last name was Pereskyvopoulos. Yeah, you said that, but when you come in those days, when you came to America, if you had a long name like that, they changed your name. So when he came through immigration or whatever, they changed his name. His Greek name was Dimitri Pereskyvopoulos, which translates into Jim, jimmy or James. Okay, and it was. How ironic is that.

Speaker 1: 51:08

Because the Godfather guy was like. So your name is James.

Speaker 2: 51:12

I didn't know that until right now.

Speaker 1: 51:14

But he said so your name is James, so they named you after him. They named you after him and I was like, actually they did not. My dad's name is James Keith Jones, and then my granddaddy's name was James C Jones. So it was. There was a lot.

Speaker 2: 51:27

But that is insane. I did not know that piece of the story.

Speaker 1: 51:31

So that's how his English name translated into Jim Peres. That's why mama couldn't remember his name, because she told me it doesn't sound like a foreign name, it sounds like Magoo or McDonald or something.

Speaker 1: 51:44

She couldn't remember his name, but it was his English name or American name was Jim Peres, which doesn't sound Greek at all. I don't tell you to get Greek out of that. So I spent the rest of the evening with them. I felt like I was like Like Tony always talked about Mr Fuleta when he would get around his Italian people and they would tell stories, and they told stories and there was a lot of beer.

Speaker 2: 52:08

Stories about your dad.

Speaker 1: 52:09

Yes, but then just like stories of why Greeks came to America and the restaurant business and just I had a lot of questions and it was a neat evening, yeah.

Speaker 2: 52:21

I mean, it's really neat.

Speaker 1: 52:23

And Dino wanted me to stay. My mommy promised to stay connected to him and he wanted to know how it all came out and worked out, and I said I would, and we loaded up I believe it was the next day and headed back home.

Speaker 2: 52:36

So you don't remember the blonde headed man's name. We keep calling him the blonde headed man. I have pictures of him.

Speaker 1: 52:41

Okay, we took a lot of pictures that night.

Speaker 2: 52:43

I want to see those pictures. I don't think I've seen those pictures.

Speaker 1: 52:46

I'll show them to you.

Speaker 2: 52:47

So okay, so you had to wait. In other words, you had to wait two weeks till they went home. I mean plus.

Speaker 1: 52:51

At least At least. Well, he said he knew they were friends, right.

Speaker 1: 52:58

They were man friends, yeah man friends, but he said he knew him. He said if I called him on the phone and told him, he said it was shy I'm afraid it would give him a heart attack, like it would. This would not be something he would, but he told me that he was married to a lady that was Greek, that he married in Denver. They had a son named Costas. No scratch, that he was married to a lady in Denver, they had a son named Nikos. And when they got back to Greece they got a divorce and he had gotten remarried some years later to a lady named Debbie and she was Greek and they had a son named Costas. So basically I have two half brothers and my dad's got three baby mommas my momma, nick's momma, debbie, costas mom. So that was neat, like trying to think about that, like I didn't even think that there would be like siblings and stuff like that Right Right.

Speaker 1: 53:51

So we get back and we're headed home and of course you know I did during the process. When we left there, after talking to the blonde man, before we knew for sure I called mom and said, hey, remember that guy you was dating in Denver. Was that a red cutlass? Because I only remember that it was a cutlass. Was it a red cutlass? What are you doing out there? I was just like, tell me, was it a red cutlass? And she said yes, and I said okay, I'll call you later. But she knew what I was doing. She knew what I was doing. So after I called Steve because this was the night of the morning where he called me and told me not to give up and I would find so, he was overjoyed. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 54:29

And they were having dinner the next day and Derek, his son, said that was listening to them talk, not every. I didn't want this to be a public. You know, I told him you can talk about with your family, but don't make this public because I'm still trying to protect my mom. They were talking about that dinner and Derek was like hold up, let me get this right. So James got in the car and drove across America to Denver, colorado, and he didn't even have a last name and he found his father. How does this have? This is a testimony. But when I got home, steve wanted me to tell it at church and I said I can't, I'm not, you know, because I was still. I wanted to protect my mom. She was fragile, I didn't want her to have like a meltdown or something. And then also the other part was I wanted, I didn't want my granny didn't know, because you know I was her favorite.

Speaker 2: 55:27

And it was your dad's mom dad's mom.

Speaker 1: 55:30

And I just felt like I didn't want her to know and so like we're not going to make this a public thing. I mean, we can celebrate it, but I don't want everybody, it's not everybody's business. And he didn't really understand that. I wouldn't have understood that either. Well, then he had a meeting with mom right after that because I knew she needed to talk to somebody, because I told her.

Speaker 1: 55:52

When I got home, I found him. She was like I'd have to have a DNA and I was like well, we can do that if we need to. But that's pretty clear that I found him and he tried to get to the bottom of what was bothering her so much about it. And she said she said I just don't want people to think I was a whore. And he was like Norma, everybody's made mistakes in their past. And she was like but not like this, like this is bad. And he said so then you're saying that James was an accident, his whole life is an accident. And she was like no, that's not what I'm saying. He said well, you know that happened.

Speaker 2: 56:30

That's a great lens to put on it.

Speaker 1: 56:32

But talking to my mom after that, she finally opened up to me and she was like number one, she didn't want it to come out because it sounded so bad. And number two, she said I was always afraid that they were going to come and take you. Those Greek people are mean, like if they found out, if they knew I was afraid they would come and get you because that's, you know, that's what they do. And I said that's not what they do. He probably would have wanted to be involved in my life. Right, you know you're my mom. But slowly, over time she got over it and then it took me years to tell anybody. And then I mean out of that circle, right. And then it's kind of crazy that I'm telling the story now on the podcast. It's a I've come a long way.

Speaker 2: 57:16

It's a big deal Okay, but we have to. I'm like dying two weeks of past.

Speaker 1: 57:20

It was actually about two, I think, when I got to the two week point, because we were busy, kairos was bumping at that time you know we're working all the time and it was in the middle of the lunch rush and the lunch rush of Kairos was crazy because it was like everybody came in at one time and you know you're cooking and doing all the things. And Lenora came to the back and said James, you have a phone call. And I said I can't talk on the phone, I'm cooking. And she said I think you're going to want to take this call. And I said I think you're going to want to take a message.

Speaker 2: 57:50

And she said that sounds like you.

Speaker 1: 57:51

She said you're going to want to take this call. It's coming in from Greece and I don't know. I almost felt like I almost passed out and I took the phone and I was looking at it was on hold, but it was like a number with like 75 numbers. I got never seen a number like that before and I went in my office and I locked the door and I said, hello, this is James. And he said, hello, james, this is your father. And he's like hollering in the phone and then I'm like I'm trying to talk, I'm like did you cry at that time?

Speaker 1: 58:28

I did. It was. It was very emotional, but I couldn't understand what he was saying. Like I couldn't. We couldn't have a long drawn out conversation because there was like a language gap barrier. So he said I'm going to put you on the phone with Costas. This is your brother's, your baby brother. And so Costas got on the phone and he couldn't speak English either. Like I did not know what he was saying and he didn't know what I was saying and later on he would tell me I speak. He said. Costas said I speak English. I speak real English. You speak American English. It's not the same.

Speaker 2: 59:01

British English, I guess.

Speaker 1: 59:04

I don't know, but we decided to connect through email. He wanted me to give me his email address because it was hard to communicate over the phone.

Speaker 1: 59:14

I couldn't talk, and so I was. I kept giving him my email address and he couldn't understand what I was saying and I said OK, stop give me your email address and I'll email you right now. So it was. He said G wrote down GO, I wrote down O and then he said Zed and I was like what are you saying? Like that's how they say Z. It was GOZ, something at Yahoo or something.

Speaker 1: 59:39

Yeah, I was saying Zed, like GO, and wanted to sayZ, but it was GOZ and I was like I don't, I don't, that doesn't mean anything. Zed, no Zed, but it's just the language, the language gap. So I sat down and I emailed him. He emailed me right back and he could write perfect English.

Speaker 1: 1:00:01

So I was like why can you write English but you can't speak English? And he was like no, no, I speak English, you don't. So we sent three or four emails back and forth and he was like, do you have MSN messenger? And I was like I don't know what that is and he asked me to go download it. So it was like an instant message thing. So I got on the MSN messenger and we talked for like eight hours.

Speaker 2: 1:00:24

You mean that, so you just stopped working. I was done for the day. I can't imagine.

Speaker 1: 1:00:29

No, I never left my office. I still had on my apron. We talked back and forth for about eight hours. It was like midnight when I left. Wow, Just couldn't stop because I had so many questions. Yeah. And you know, here's the neatest one that I found, because me and Costa we could communicate.

Speaker 2: 1:00:48

Oh, so you talked that long with Costa, not your dad.

Speaker 1: 1:00:52

Yeah, but he was with him.

Speaker 2: 1:00:53

Oh, okay, yeah, we're together. So I would ask questions and he would write it.

Speaker 1: 1:00:55

I mean he was in his 60s, like he wasn't up on the technology and all that stuff. So we connected. I sent him a letter with all the questions. He asked me to write a letter and do all the questions. He sent me a letter back and answered all. I don't want it to know where he's from. I wanted to know who his parents were. I wanted to know his siblings, you know. And he sent me back all that stuff and you've read that letter.

Speaker 2: 1:01:18

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:01:19

He was like, as far as the stuff with your mom, she just left. I don't know why she has all the answers. I have none.

Speaker 2: 1:01:25

So did he ever suspect she was pregnant, or did he? Did you ask that? No, he didn't. He had no idea.

Speaker 1: 1:01:31

He said that he knew something happened that was weird and he said he had like a fleeting thought that she might've been pregnant. But it was not. A it didn't stick with him Because she just disappeared. She was there one day, the next day she was gone.

Speaker 2: 1:01:43

So did he look for her.

Speaker 1: 1:01:45

Yes, he said he did. I mean maybe in the recap we'll read the letter.

Speaker 2: 1:01:49

Yeah, oh yeah, that's a good idea.

Speaker 1: 1:01:51

It was neat, but he told me everything I wanted to know. He gave me the answers.

Speaker 2: 1:01:59

So, circling back to the beginning of our conversation, where we talked about like the needle in the haystack, I mean that's what kind of Derek Steve's son summed it up, just you know. So you're saying that you went to Denver literally. I mean, when I tell the story, I say like with five or six pieces of information like not like very random, not detailed piece of information, you went and I mean it was really just kind of a divine find. I'm gonna call it that.

Speaker 1: 1:02:25

I mean, there's no way. There's no way I could have found it. There's no way I could have found him. But bottom line, we made plans they were either gonna come here, I was gonna go there. I found out I was still in parole at that time and you can't get a passport when you're on parole unless you go through a judge. So I just said I didn't even tell him I was on parole. I was like I'm gonna need to wait on that.

Speaker 2: 1:02:48

Yeah, by the yeah, since we're as podcasted, you tell him that you had been in prison.

Speaker 1: 1:02:51

Later on.

Speaker 2: 1:02:52

Okay, so not in that initial time, not right away.

Speaker 1: 1:02:54

No later on we it was mostly MSN messenger back and forth. And then there was a weird thing for me was I always thought. Once I found my biological father, like whatever was bothering me would be healed, and he asked me to get a webcam. I'd never done webcam and stuff like that. And we did a webcam one evening and I saw into their world and it was like I just realized this is Greece and I'm not Greek, I'm American, like it just looked foreign to me, like this you could just feel it wasn't your home.

Speaker 1: 1:03:33

No, it wasn't anything. I was like they lived in, they lived like on the beach outside of Athens, greece, and it was like a three story house, like they lived on one level, debbie's parents lived on the next level and then Costas lived on a level by itself and it was like the way they were cooking and the windows were open and just looked hot. And just it looked hot. No, but it just made me realize I'm an American, right, I mean I can go visit, but I ain't even doing all that Like I can't be. I'm an American, I can't be nothing else. And there was something about that. Then, after that, that made me realize like God has a plan for my life and I was born James Keith Jones. For a reason I am a Jones, and mostly because of my grandparents, not so much because of my dad.

Speaker 1: 1:04:26

But right after that, tony and Jeremy were going through a rough time. They were trying to have kids and she had a miscarriage and then they basically told them you can't have kids. And so they started the process of adoption and they adopted two beautiful boys, twins from forget, where they were, from somewhere in Mississippi, but they were like five or six, but they looked like Tony and Jeremy, like they had blonde hair and blue. They looked like they're biological kids and it was just.

Speaker 1: 1:04:56

It was phenomenal to me like how their family just got so set so quickly because they wanted kids for years and years and years and just it was a struggle for them. And even their names it was Kate and Ashton, I believe, and I was like Tonya, that sounds like a name you would have picked out. And she said I would have, like that is, I love their names. But there was something about that that got me thinking about my granny, my granddaddy and my aunt, quenice and Denise. You know my family and there was a picture of my granny in Kairos when she was young and she had dark hair then. And.

Speaker 1: 1:05:31

I was looking at her and, like, looking at her nose, I was like I could pass for Jones, you know, like it ain't so foreign. I mean, I found out, you know, that it's true that I'm biologically not her grandson, but I just felt like that Jesus just said I knew where to place you, I knew what family you needed to be in. You're in the family that you're supposed to be in. So it gave me peace with that Like, but I still want to know the truth. But it did bring a level of healing. But it wasn't like I needed to be off, moving to another country or changing my name or any of that stuff, because I'm a Jones and I can. I still to this day I can't hardly spell periscopolis, but I had a half brother. His name is Nick, he lives in Thessalonica, and then they lived outside of Athens. So I was like that's, those are all biblical, that's all in the Bible, and it was just neat.

Speaker 2: 1:06:26

So I have two things that I want to close with this episode that are pertaining to this, which I just find fascinating. The first one is the craziness. You just talked about your Jones and you felt like you. Just he said I put you in the family I wanted you in. So now obviously we have sons with the last name Jones and on that Jones side, which you actually don't have any Jones blood per se, because Jimmy Percival is your dad. But your granny had how many sons.

Speaker 1: 1:07:01

Five.

Speaker 2: 1:07:02

Five sons, and none of those sons have sons to carry on the Jones name, except you, the one that's not actually a Jones.

Speaker 1: 1:07:11

Yes, well, let me, let me retell that. Yeah please Make it, make more sense. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:07:15

So there's a lot of girls in the Jones family. On my dad's side I have one cousin. His name is Sean. He's my uncle Ricky's son. His parents got a divorce and he was adopted by stepfather and his name was changed to Treywick, so he's Sean Treywick. Now he's got a son, logan Jones. He gave him the middle name Jones Treywick because we reconnected years later, so he can't carry on my grandfather's name. I have another cousin, boomer. He's my uncle Roger's son. His nickname is Boomer. He's Roger Jones Jr, but we call him Boomer. He had a girl, a daughter, so he didn't have any sons. I'm the only one with boys to carry on my grandfather's name, so it's pretty cool.

Speaker 2: 1:08:01

Which is very cool and just like another little like caveat to that is that my I'm a Jones now, obviously cause I married you, but I was a Hobart before and but my mom was a Jones. That's so cool.

Speaker 1: 1:08:15

My mom was a.

Speaker 2: 1:08:15

Jones before she married my dad.

Speaker 1: 1:08:18

She was the young Jones.

Speaker 2: 1:08:19

So the only Jones blood my kids have is from my side of the family, but the carry the name and the legacy of this, this name, yeah, and I wanna like wrap it up with you had mentioned that you didn't want your granny to know because you were her favorite and you well, I guess maybe deep down you were afraid that was gonna change something or whatever, or not knowing that you weren't her biological grandson.

Speaker 1: 1:08:44

Well, at her age she was when she died in 2012,. She was almost 90. So I just didn't want her to know.

Speaker 2: 1:08:51

Right, and I mean I understand that. I mean there must be a lot of fear there, but okay, but I love this. So how did you discover that she actually knew?

Speaker 1: 1:09:01

After her funeral in 2012, when she passed away, we all went to the Olive Garden to eat like family friends. I mean, there were probably 70 of us there and I sat next to my cousin, daniel's second wife, who had been divorced from for 10 or 15 years, and Jenny. I love Jenny. She was so sweet, but we were. She was asking me about Ky Rose and we were she had been following me on Facebook. You know about the time Facebook had been out and she was just looking at pictures of the food and she was like this is so beautiful. You're just a beautiful chef like your real daddy. And I was like what are you talking about?

Speaker 2: 1:09:40

Like your real daddy. I was like what are you talking about?

Speaker 1: 1:09:43

And she was like, oh, me and Granny were close. And I said, I know, and she was like I said, but Granny didn't know that. And she was like, yes, she did. And so I got a little hot and bothered, like went to my aunt Glennis's that night and needed to talk to Glennis, and I just told her you know what I had discovered. And she said, well, mom always knew, but it didn't matter, mom's job, she always wanted to protect you. And I cried my eyes out that night and I said, well, I guess it was like if you got adopted and you know my aunt Glennis, she loves me she was like you weren't adopted, you were born. So it was just like stuff. Like that stuff that I thought might matter didn't really matter.

Speaker 2: 1:10:33

So she always knew yeah, it is, and like that was, I don't know. I feel like there's a profound lesson there. I don't know what it is.

Speaker 1: 1:10:42

But I was her favorite, and some of my cousins that are listening to this podcast, Cassandra, I know you don't want me to say this, but I was Granny's favorite, not because she favored me, it was because she took care of me when I was a baby. So we had a connection that was different than my connection with her was more like a mother. I mean, I had my mom.

Speaker 2: 1:11:00

She took you on as her own.

Speaker 1: 1:11:02

Yeah, she was my. She's my granny I love my granny my granny loved me, but anyway.

Speaker 2: 1:11:07

So I mean this whole story really is just and I feel like I've said it before, but just it's a story of just such incredible hope. I mean really just like getting emotional, just neat. Yeah, just that anything is possible when we face the truth and and don't give up and move forward. Yeah, exactly, I mean just it's a miraculous story. It's really neat.

Speaker 1: 1:11:31

Well, I was committed, I'm gonna find, I'm gonna figure this out, I'm gonna get there one day, and I did so. It would have been easy to give up, easy not to know, but-.

Speaker 2: 1:11:43

I feel like the song needs to break out right now. I'm still standing by Elden John.

Speaker 1: 1:11:50

Well, we say, I'm still standing. This is actually the season finale of season three.

Speaker 2: 1:11:56

Yes, and for those of y'all who have been asking, cause there has been a lot we will have one more season.

Speaker 1: 1:12:04

Season four.

Speaker 2: 1:12:04

Yes, and then we have some really exciting thing coming up after that. So podcast story to tell.

Speaker 1: 1:12:12

I think I might wanna tell other people's story too, but we'll talk about in the recap. So there will be a recap of season three next week and we'll push through all that and what do we need to say? How do we need to wrap this up?

Speaker 2: 1:12:26

I mean, I guess just thank you again for listening. This has just been incredible. It's been incredible for me, I have to say, cause there has been pieces of people ask me all the time that when you're telling the story even though we talk a lot, obviously, and you've told me everything you think of, I guess, but there's things that when you put yourself back there, like you said, new details emerge and there are things that I haven't heard before. So that's been super fun for me.

Speaker 1: 1:12:51

Well, I prep for each one. I mean, I spend some time leading up like pictures are good to look at, Cause pictures can jog in memory, have journals and then, even before we do one, I'll spend an hour or two taking some notes and just trying to just put myself back there in that place and this was one of the neatest miracles and I mean Jesus is always doing miracles in my life but this is one of those things just like wow, yeah, awesome, All right, well, we're looking forward to season four and we appreciate you're just wanting me to keep telling the story. Thank you, Thank you for listening. All right, bye, guys. See you soon. Bye, hey guys. Thanks so much for tuning in to the Straight Out of Prison podcast. For more exclusive content, head over to our website, teamjonespro.

Speaker 2: 1:13:47

Yes, you can subscribe by clicking on the become a patron button and that's gonna get you access to our for real. Real, which is very different than the highlight.

Speaker 1: 1:13:56

Real, real, real real, Some very juicy content there. Good stuff, or you can look us up on Facebook and Instagram. Straight Out of Prison podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:14:05

Yes, that takes the story to a whole new level, where you can see some of the people that James talks about in his story and see some of the places that he's been. I've been loving it and you will too. Prison recipes.

Speaker 1: 1:14:17

Yeah, well, thanks, Good stuff. We'll see you soon guys.

Speaker 2: 1:14:20

Thanks, bye, bye-bye, bye-bye. Sixty Fehler.