I was nervous about getting the paperwork complete and sent off, and holding the passport in my grubby little hands in time for the trip, so as soon as I knew I was definitely going, I started the paperwork process -- the two-day paperwork process -- which included getting a hold of a certified copy of my birth certificate. Fortunately, I didn't have to drive three hours to the town of my birth, all I had to do was drive across town to the Texas Vital Statistics office to make my request. Six hours, 30 miles and 22 dollars later, it was printed and in my possession. I had never seen a copy of my birth certificate before.

I was born at 6:45 p.m. I weighed 9 pounds and 10 ounces (my poor mother), and my father was the first dad ever allowed in the delivery room at the hospital where I was born. Before that, expectant fathers just paced the waiting room handing out cigars.

There are two signatures on my birth certificate: the delivering physician and the city secretary who entered my birth into city records. The city secretary at the time was my great uncle Virgil Gray. I never expected to see his name on my birth certificate and I immediately called my mom to tell her about my discovery.

I also later that day emailed Great Aunt Grace (Virgil's wife and my grandmother's sister) to let her know.

"Virgil made 50 cents on you the day you were born," she told me in a reply email. "He made 50 cents for every birth he entered back then."

Virgil and Grace's home was the place where my cousins and I always ran loose in the backyard and came inside to fresh-baked cookies and homemade banana pudding when I was a kid. We had "ice cream suppers" at their house where we got to choose from five delicious flavors of hand-cranked ice cream for dinner. And more of Grace's homemade banana pudding for dessert. Seriously. Virgil was a deacon in the church that I grew up in, and I don't ever remember seeing him without a smile and a hug to give.

Virgil worked the rest of his life for the city where I was born, the small-town Texas city that he loved. He retired as City Manager in the early '90s -- there's even a street named after him there -- and he passed away a couple of years later following complications of Parkinson's disease. It was such a precious and sweet surprise to find his name on my birth certificate, a great reminder of the connection we had since the very day I was born.