Genealogy is my pastime, I shall not stray.
It maketh me to lie down and examine tombstones
It leadeth me into still courthouses. It restoreth my Ancestral Knowledge
It leadeth me in the paths of census records and ships' passenger lists for my surnames' sake
Yea, though I walk through the shadows of research libraries and microfilm readers
I shall fear no discouragement, for a strong urge is within me
The curiosity and motivation, they comforteth me
It demandeth preparation of storage space for the acquisition of countless documents
It anointest my head with burning midnight oil
My family group sheets runneth over
Surely, birth, marriage, and death dates shall follow me all the days of my life
And I shall dwell in the house of a family history-seeker forever.
--unknown--
Dalziel Parish
1798
1836
Lord, help me dig into the past,
And sift the sands of time,
That I might find the roots that made
This family tree of mine.
Lord, help me trace the ancient roads,
On which my fathers trod,
And led them through so many lands,
To find our present sod.
Lord, help me find an ancient book,
Or dusty manuscript,
That's safely hidden now away,
In some forgotten crypt.
Lord, let it bridge the gap that haunts
My soul, when I can't find
The missing link between some name
That ends the same as mine.
-Author Unknown
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 or 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 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 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.
THEY did not choose us, nor we them; we never knew them, nor they us; yet we are inextricably bound together for all eternity and there is no law in the universe,no metamorphosis physical or spiritual, that can ever alter this inalienable truth.
OFTEN we may wish for different ones and feel moved to deny the ones we have, but this is as futile as it is foolish to invent spurious ones, for our deception will surely be unmasked, if not by others, ultimately by our own conscience.
WE owe everything, our very existence, to our ancestors, and yet we know next to nothing of them because mostly their lives were so humbly recorded. It is good that we seek to expand our knowledge of their lives so that we may better understand our own.
THEY made us, body and soul, and we must accept without complaint or rancour what they were and what we are, for nothing and no-one can ever change this fact and it is barren folly to dwell obsessively upon it.
WE recognize that the legacy of genetic inheritance is a double-edged sword. We should be grateful for those gifts of personality and disposition our ancestors bestowed upon us which we find beneficial andnot rail against those traits we find less appealing, for it is surely in our own hands to change them.
WE should take pride in our ancestors and their achievements wherever possible, whether high-born or low, rich or poor, prince or pauper, and not seek arbitrarily to revile or condemn them for acts of which we know nothing of the causes.
WE must learn from them, from their mistakes as well as their successes; from their tragedies as well as their triumphs; from their sins as well as their virtues; from their hopes as well as their fears.
POSTERITY and history are irrevocably interwined in the present. No coherent vision of the future can exist without an affinity for the past and cognizance of the lives of our forebears.
REMEMBER that we, too, are the ancestors of those yet unborn and we should seek to leave for them a heritage of which they can be as proud as we are of that which our forebears bequeathed to us.
WE bless and thank our ancestors for the legacy of the good things they gave us, forgive them their errors and pray that we will endeavor to use wisely the knowledge which they handed down to us.
Time, though a stern teacher, is partial to none;
And the friend and the foe pass away one by one.
DELTA (D.M.Moir)
