The Chosen

We are the chosen. 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. 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 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.

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Dear Ancestor

Your tombstone stands among the rest

Neglected and alone

The name and date are chiseled out

On polished marble stone

It reaches out to all who care

It is too late to mourn

You did not know that I exist

You died and I was born

Yet each of us are cells of you

In flesh and blood and bone

Our blood contracts and beats a pulse

Entirely not our own

Dear Ancestor, the place you filled

One hundred years ago

Spreads out among the ones you left

Who would have loved you so

I wonder how you lived and loved

I wonder if you knew

That someday I would find this spot

And come to visit you.

-Walter Butler Palmer

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