YETMO

"How Soon We Forget"

The New Year arrived with a note of sorrow. My wife learned that her uncle died that night. He was the oldest of eight siblings, a product of the Depression and World War II, and a harbinger of things to come for the rest of the family.

It's not like we believe we're immortal. We know better. But it's like car accidents. It happens to someone else.

Now my wife, her dad, and the rest of the clan have to deal with death's dawning and knowing that it will, sooner than anyone wants, repeat its terrible work until that generation is no more.

It was the latter point that depressed me. I lost both my parents nearly 14 years ago. Occasional regret still washes over me for not being able to talk to or see them. I'll have to wait for my next life to do that.

My parents and my wife's uncle will be remembered by us and our children. But what about their children?

Recent genealogical interest hasn't changed the fact that very few of us 'know' very much about our ancestors. And I'm not talking merely family trees. I'm talking intimate, personal stuff.

My wife knows that she's closely related to Daniel Boone. So what? What do we know about him? In his case, of course, books have been written, but what exists about Boone, the family man, the man, the everyday mortal? What did he like? What interests did he have? How did he think?

Was he a romantic? He married Rebecca Bryan. Is there a large oak tree somewhere in Kentucky bearing a carved message, D.B. loves R.B? Did he go to Wednesday night prayer meetings? Were there even such gatherings back then? If he went to church, did the family do something in the afternoon? Or did fighting in the frontier keep him away from his family so much that the cost of his legacy was the loss of a true family life? Did the wife and kids miss him terribly? Did they accept what he did? How did the family feel?

That's the type of insights and information I'd like to know about my family of old.

My wife thinks I think too much. She knows why we don't have such personal insights into our ancestors. They were too busy working and keeping their families afloat. There weren't modern day hang-ups about identity, leisure time, etc. Heck, leisure time wasn't even in their dictionaries. That can't exist when your main pre-occupation is basic survival.

She's got a good point, but that doesn't stop me wondering why we don't know more about our great-great-great-great grandparents as individual characters, not just as people who were born on this date, married on that, had kids with these names, and then died.

There's got to be more. Where's the beef? Where's the oral tradition? I want to know about the heart and soul of my ancestors, but I never will. My parents are long gone, I'm an only child, and my memory isn't what it should be. Whatever little information my parents may have shared with me was probably lost on a kid who thought such talk was silly, pointless, and overly nostalgic. It's interesting how closely intertwined are age and attitude.

What lessons did we or should we have learned from our ancestors? Were there special teachings? Jokes? Expressions? What, if any, family attribute, tradition or behavior exists today because it was started by ultra-great-great Aunt Agatha? Can we know that we are who we are because of choices made by our predecessors or specific traits they modeled?

As for me, I'm gonna make certain my kids tell their kids, who'll tell theirs, and so on, what made me tick. I watched golf on TV (future generations will ask, "What was TV?"), played it occasionally when I could tolerate the embarrassment, and wrote periodic commentaries because I thought everyone was entitled to my opinion.

That's the best any of us can hope for. Leave a piece of our soul for all time within our family circle. We'll always be there as a living part of the clan. It's the closest to immortality that we can get.