[Granville-Hough] 26 Mar 2009 - The Story Tellers

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Thu, 26 Mar 2009 06:35:37 -0800
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: [Fwd: [Fwd: The Story Tellers] - 26 Mar 2009]

I am indebted to a friend and fellow genealogist for the following, and
I do not know the original author.

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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 teller 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 I am and why 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 ones 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 story tellers. 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.

Are you a story teller? Are you the one who visits grave yards, courthouses, 
archives, libraries, digs through old records, musty books in libraries, 
hunts relentlessly for your great grand mother's marriage date? If you are 
then you are one of those "story tellers." Welcome to the crowd. Send us some 
of your stories on your hunting and finding of your ancestors.