Thought all of you might enjoy this. Karen
The Chosen We are the chosen. 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. Doing genealogy is not a cold gathering of
facts but, instead, breathing life into all who have gone before. We are the storytellers
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 thethings 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 bone 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 the fathers fought and some died to make and keep us a
Nation. It goes to a deep and immense understanding that they were doing it for us. It is
of equal pride and love that our mothers struggled to give us birth. Without them we could
not exist, and so we love each one, as far back as we can reach. 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 they and they are the sum of who we are. 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 my 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
restore the memory or greet those whom we had never known before. Author Unknown
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