Sunday, September 21, 2014

Journaling and Family History: Join me!

I love stories. I love learning about people, their adventures, their struggles and the lessons they learn. I'm pretty sure some of that is due to my grandma having an awesome collection of pictures from her young adulthood. Black and white pictures of people on farms, visiting big cities in New York, old trucks, glamorous girls in very classy and modest bikinis, amazing hairstyles, big fat cigars sticking out of the men's smiles--oh man, I love it. Knowing that these people literally are my past makes me want to learn all about them.
(Seriously, what's not to love about the '40's? My grandma's coworkers for a summer)

Unfortunately, that's not always possible. I've been having a lot of fun searching through old documents trying to learn about my recent ancestors and have found a lot of cool stuff, but I want more. I want to know why there is a New York Census from 1892 that lists my 3rd great grandparents Charles and Anna Light with all their kids, then in 1900 a NY census says she's a widow, BUT THEN (oh, the intrigue!) the 1900 Pennsylvania census lists him as a widow and living with his cousin. Their towns are just under 50 miles apart. Charles' death certificate from 1912 in Pennsylvania says he was widowed. I know it was him because it was filled out by his son. You'd figure a son would know if his mom had passed away, right? So, were the census takers in 1900 just a bunch of dummies and screwed it up? Were my grandparents separated and didn't want to admit it? Did the kids think their dad was dead? Did she fake her and her last two kids death and run away from him for some reason? Was that really his "cousin?" You can see my imagination runs rampant if you don't give me an ending. Hopefully some of those scenarios aren't true, but seriously--I want to know why the heck these don't line up.

This leads me to my next point: why the deuce didn't anyone in my ancestry keep a journal? I want the dirt! Even if it was just that everyone knew the other was alive and they just preferred to say they were widows instead of divorced, that is still so interesting to me. And let this be a lesson to all that if you don't leave a journal, then your descendants are going to think crazy things about you. 

(My life journals, oldest on bottom to the newest on top. There are a couple other study journals I've used too, but ain't nobody got time to dig those out!)

 I love writing in my journal! Over the years I've been awesome at it and I've been bad at it. And holy cow there are some entries that make me cringe to think my kids will read one day. I can already hear "Mom, you were so weird and boy-crazy." Yeah, thanks, I know. Hopefully they think that along with recognizing my cool moments, the things I've learned, the kind of person I tried to be, my adventures, my heartbreaks, and I hope they see some of themselves in me. Louisa May Alcott said,
"Preserve your memories, 
keep them well, 
what you forget you can never retell."

So, write in your dang journals! It can be a notebook, hard bound journal, a blog, a word document--whatever. Just find somewhere you can preserve your memories and write. I have a goal to use a journal prompt once a week to help me think more outside the realm of "this is what I did today." Join me if you want! This week's prompt is:
 What skill or talent do you wish you had and why?

Remember, without writing in your journal, you're giving your descendants free license to make assumptions about your pictures. Take this guy, for example: butcher, terrifying jungle surgeon, or a psychopath caught on camera? The world may never know...

No comments:

Post a Comment