The Story of A Genealogist

The Story Tellers...

We are the chosen.
 My feelings are in each family there is one who seems called to find the
ancestors.  To put flesh on their bones and make them live again, to tell
the family story and to feel that somehow they know and approve.

To me, doing genealogy is not a cold gathering of facts but, instead,
breathing life into all who have gone before.  We are the story tellers of
the tribe. All tribes have one.  We have been called as it were by our genes.

Those who have gone before cry out to us: Tell our story.  So, we do.  In
finding them, we somehow find ourselves.  How many graves have I stood
before now and cried?  I have lost count.  How many times have I told the
ancestors you have a wonderful family you would be proud of us?  How many
times have I walked up to a grave and felt somehow there was love there
for me?   I cannot say.

It goes beyond just documenting facts.  It goes to who am I and why do I
do the things I do.  It goes to seeing a cemetery about to be lost forever
to weeds and indifference and saying I can't let this happen.  The bones here
are bones of my bones and flesh of my flesh.  It goes to doing something
about it.

It goes to pride in what our ancestors were able to accomplish.  How they
contributed to what we are today.  It goes to respecting their hardships
and losses, their never giving in or giving up, their resoluteness to go
on and build a life for their family.

It goes to deep pride that they fought to make and keep us a Nation.  It
goes to a deep and immense understanding that they were doing it for us.
That we might be born who we are.  That we might remember
them.  So we do.  With love and caring and scribing each fact of their
existence, because we are them and they are us.

So, as a scribe called, I tell the story of my family.  It is up to that
one called in the next generation to answer the call and take their place
in the long line of family storytellers.

That, is why I do my family genealogy, and that is what calls those
young and old to step up and put flesh on the bones.

                                                               Unknown