"The Lessons of the Search" (from Afternoon Rocking series) Afternoon All, I think sometimes, that the greatest lessons to come from a search for our roots, is an understanding of our place in the life that blossoms forth from them. It often occurs to me, the older I grow, that what we really are on earth to each other is no more than a loan...or perhaps, more appropriately, a gift. And I think that the longer we live upon the earth, the more people we see pass through our lives....leaving their memories secreted in a special corner of our hearts, the more we come to realize that. Few of us have lived very many years without having to give up someone we love deeply...and we go through all the facets of accepting that we must. We begin with the disbelief of it when it is sudden, and we live a long time with the pain of knowing what is going to happen and the pain of watching suffering when it is not. Our emotions run the gamut from deep depression to anger...and at some point, most of us begin to realize the inevitability of it all. At some point we truly deep in our hearts realize that death is simply a part of living, and with faith, we realize it is only a gateway to another form of living. And if the sadness never leaves completely, and if even years later we can open a box or a trunk and find ourselves again overwhelmed with the original grief for a short time...well at least we come to an acceptance of it as we go on living day by day. But it is true, at some point a voice becomes harder for us to conjure in our minds, although we think often what that loved one would have said, would have done at any given moment or event. We run our memories through our minds like snapshots of the past that only we can see...and we come to a point that we feel it very important to pass on those snapshots, those ideas of who that person was to a younger generation who either had not the opportunity to know this person...or was far too young to really have the vivid understanding that we have. At some point it concerns us that the snapshots in our minds are ours alone...and will leave when we do. It is at this point I think...that many begin to do the things that we are doing...searching our roots, preserving those who have passed before us, and with far greater depth of empathy, we also try to preserve those we did not ourselves know that passed before us...the loved ones of our grandmothers and our grandfathers...because they mattered to those we loved...and to those who loved them...and so on, in an endless chain. We gather the pictures, the documents, the letters, and even things...anything we can find that will make the "realness" of these people real to us and real to those who come after us. And even those who do not turn to genealogy, do with age begin to talk more and more of the past, more and more of the people they knew who are no more....much to immaturity's dismay. For only those who have lived to see people they loved dearly pass, ever can evolve to either dwelling on passing the memories...or appreciating what they hear when they hear it. I think often of the hours my grandfather sat telling his stories of people none of his grandchildren or even children could remember...and now I understand why. He had realized with his passing those loved ones were essentially "lost"...no more than a date and name on a tombstone, no more than what "official documents" existed somewhere in a dusty courthouse basement. I think of a man who lived near me when I was much younger. At the time it occured to me, as I watched him on his daily walk past my house when he was well about the age of 90...how sad. How sad to live so long that almost all of the people who peopled your childhood are gone, how sad to outlive most of the friends of your youth...how sad to see many of your children gone and your wife, the places totally different...to actually live in a world where nothing or no one bears a resemblance to how it was when you began. And I have often wondered...did he, like my grandfather, try to pass on that world so it would not be forgotten? I suspect he did. And I know, now that I am older...I would rejoice as much for him as feel sadness...for as a distant cousin who also has reached this great place in life frequently says, "I want to see what is going to happen next!" <smile> And wonderful that attitude is, and a lesson for us all! But I would also rejoice because of what he could teach..what he could tell...because he was a living embodiment of life of the past, the present, and could yet touch the future. Yes, our elders are truly gifts...and special ones, because more than the presence of someone we love remaining with us, they are also links to a past. But so are we all gifts.... Death is no respector of persons, and it comes knocking at doors at the least expected times, and is always unwanted. But it comes, and so I often think as I look around me at those I try so hard to give the gift of the past...perhaps there is also a time to understand the gift of the present. We are only gifts to each other...temporary gifts, gifts that will pass... We are on loan to one another for a bit of time in order to get through this world... and waiting until that time is over may be far too late to realize.... while we yet had that gift, we little realized how soon the time might pass. And I also have thought, that if when we look in our loved ones faces, if we realized fully in our hearts that this person really was ...only a gift, a loan....how much differently we would react in so many situations...how much differently our responses would be, our choices would be. But perhaps that too, is something we learn, as assuredly as we learn why it is important to the elders to pass on the past... and we learn it by the same acceptance... I think sometimes, that the greatest lessons to come from a search for our roots, is an understanding of our place in the life that blossoms forth from them. just a thought, jan (Note: Afternoon Rocking messages are meant to be passed on, meant to be shared...simply share as written without alterations...and in entirety. Thanks, jan) c2000janPhilpot John 3:16 Future Resident, artist, scribe-in-residence, general troublemaker of the Old Genealogists Home, best kept secret in America Listowner: [email protected] [email protected] Listowner: [email protected]