There is something profoundly moving to me to see photos like the ones below. I look at the faces and I search for things like my chin, my father's curly hair, my mother's nose, my brother's mouth. I study their faces, and even their lives, with utter fascination.
I have cousins who literally have no interest in knowing anything about their ancestors, and I find that completely puzzling. How do you know who you are, if you know nothing about those who came before you? I truly believe that the DNA we all carry in our bodies contains not only genetic materials, but memories. How else to explain my father's severe claustrophobia that he hid from his children until the day he died?
How else to explain the wisdom passed down from mother to daughter, to granddaughter? "Let the man think he's the head of the household while you do what you want. If he thinks it's his idea but it's not, so what?!"
[those are only two examples of many]
I wonder why great grandmother Ginnie Hasty lost one of her twins, but one survived, and how did she feel about that? I think she gave birth to 11 or 12 children but only 8 lived to adulthood. How incredibly sad. Things we don't have to deal with any more like diphtheria and whooping cough and measles actually killed children 120 years ago. (Maybe that's why I could never let my children opt out of vaccinations. Too risky.)
Sometimes I will see an image or a view and I will shiver as though someone is walking on my grave, as the saying goes. I feel a deep sense of connection to the image even when it's [oftentimes] a place I've never been before. My mother and I used to just gaze in awe at the Smoky Mountains when we rode around East Tennessee when I was a kid. Many of our ancestors came from the Scottish Highlands. When I was in England years ago, riding on a bus touring the utterly gorgeous English countryside, I got this sudden wash of sadness and this thought popped into my head: how could they have left all this beauty? How bad must life have been for my ancestors to get on a ship and endure weeks or months of hardship to arrive in America, a place filled with disease and danger in the 18th century. How badly did they want to get away, make a new start?
My ancestors lived in conditions that most people today cannot really fathom. I can't imagine not having an indoor bathroom, or running water, or access to an education. I cannot imagine not going to the library every week as a child and getting all kinds of colorfully illustrated books. When my grandparents were children books were still rare and precious. Ironically, some of my happiest memories are of my grandparents reading to me.
I think traits like determination and courage and love of music and artistic talents can all be passed down through the generations, just like hair color and eye color. My forebears were smart, hardworking, and moral people. They persevered in the face of some incredible hardships.
Their greatest talent they passed down to me? The ability to love. That has to be consciously passed along to the succeeding generations. It isn't automatic, like the fight or flight response. My parents were flawed and they made mistakes (like all parents) but one thing they got right was they showed us how to be loving and how to accept love. It shouldn't be taken for granted. My children lived in orphanages before coming to live with me and I had to teach them how to be loving. It was easy because they needed love, and they absorbed it so quickly, and returned it so easily. Because my parents were so good at it, my children blossomed beautifully under the loving care of me, my mother, and my brother. So even though my children aren't connected to my ancestors by blood, they are connected by love.
As long as I have breath in my body I will long to know more about my ancestors.
photo below, the only photo I have of my great grandparents on Dad's side, James and Martha Henderson. James had red hair and my hair is auburn, just FYI. The shorter lady behind the little girl is my grandmother Cordelia. The little girl on the far right is Virginia and her granddaughter is one of my dearest friends today.
bottom photo, my grandfather Bob Hasty and his family
top photo, my grandmother Wilma Butler Hasty and her sisters
