As I was growing up in California, I heard about Vang i Valdres where my great grandfather grew up in the late 1800s. In 1999, I began researching my family tree. For the first time, I was connecting with people that were unfamiliar to me that had my same last name (Lockrem). The interesting
mystery was to figure out how we were related. In December 2016, I sent
Facebook messages to strangers living in Norway that shared my last name. I was hoping to find more details about Vang. I received a message reply through Facebook from several people. Some contacts were easy to
communicate with while others more difficult. Two Norwegians, sharing my last name, both first asked me which Lokreim farm my ancestors were from. And after some discussion, we figured out that our families were from two different Lokreim farms next door to each other. These new Norwegian friends and I communicated through Facebook quite often, as
it was interesting to talk about how our lives were different yet similar living 5000 miles apart in different areas of the world. Through our conversations, we figured out that we are 3rd cousins through the Gjevre side of our families (and not the Lokreim side even though we share the
same last name).
On February 18, 2017, I was talking via Facebook messenger with one of my Norwegian 3rd-cousins, when his best friend, John Rogn, showed up at his house. John friended me on Facebook thinking it would be interesting to talk to someone that lived in sunny California and I thought it would be fun to have another Norwegian friend. In March 2017, I planned a trip to see the beautiful places that John and my Norwegian cousins told me all about. And I wanted to meet these far-away friends in person. Soon John and I were talking on the phone consistently and eventually daily. In June 2017, John and I thought that we had a real connection and discussed what life might be like if we ended up liking each other after we met in person.
On June 19, 2017, I landed in Norway and drove to Fagernes to meet John for the first time. After a hug and a kiss, we knew we had that chemistry we were hoping for. We spent a month in Norway and John also came back to California with me for a couple weeks. We continued to talk about the future and how we could work this out. In January 2018, John asked me to marry him, and we eventually chose June 19, 2018 as the date for our wedding. This is our story of unexpected love through exploring my Norwegian ancestors.
Lori Lockrem Rogn
Published Budstikken, December 2018