I have some friends that don’t understand my obsession with genealogy
(yes, it is an obsession!). One of those friends comes from a
large family, and she tells me it is difficult enough keeping up with
all her brothers and sisters, she doesn’t need to find new relatives.
Several other friends see it as living in the past, while ignoring the
present or future.
But, I disagree with both. From my perspective, they just don’t
get it. For me, the process of discovering new ancestors or relatives is
akin to playing detective. I love the challenge, piecing together
the bits of information I’ve discovered, using deductive reasoning,
solving a mystery and uncovering a fascinating story.
As for living in the past, I have always been a firm believer that the
ability to meet the future depends on our understanding of the past.
History, and the lessons it teaches us, can unlock many of those
questions we face in our day to day life. If we understand how we
got here, perhaps we can better choose the roads we will take in the
future.
When uncovering the stories of my family’s past, I will confess I
readily embrace the pride of their accomplishments and sacrifices.
Yet, I have never felt the need to take on the guilt for some of their
actions. I try to keep history in perspective, and understand that the
world my ancestors lived in, was not necessarily the same world, nor the
same code of ethics, that I live in today.
What does amaze me, is how the story of some long ago ancestor has the
ability to reach across time and evoke a sincere wave of compassion and
sorrow. One example of this was when I realized my great-grandmother was
younger than my daughter when she died, and was a mother of four, with 6
pregnancies. Her story was like so many of the young women of that
era, where birth control was taboo, and women often died from
complications of child birth.
And there is another reason I am hooked on genealogy. People need
to be remembered, not just presidents and movie stars. Average,
everyday people, need to be remembered. They were here once, and
some people like me, hear them calling out…remember me….remember me….
(The photograph is of my father-in-law as a baby.
He died when my husband was a young child...we want future generations
to remember him.)
- BAJH
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