the memorykeeper (every family has one)

My Great-great Grandfather James Frederick Post 1852–1946 Man, handsome men in my lineage!

There's one in every family.  The person who holds on to the pictures, stories and memorabilia that are the threads, which when woven together, become the fabric of a family's history.  It's the person that has the stacks of photos and notes and records that have been passed down from generation to generation, not always sure what to do with them, but knowing that there's a responsibility that comes with those items.  In our family, that person seemed to be and still is...me.

I don't know how it happens in any given family.  I look back and for myself I think it was the bond I had with my Grandparents.  Having been so lucky as to have grown up in the same yard as Granny and Grandpa, countless hours were spent with them in their home, learning from them as we grew up.  I still hold that time with them as some of the most wonderful hours of my life.  They were my teachers in the lesson that time spent as the most valued gift of all.  

Grandpa was passionate about his ancestry and history, and loved to share all of that with us.  I remember him spending painstaking hours, tracing and investigating leads to the family’s ancestors, at a time when it was not nearly as simple as it is today. Chronicling, documenting, then researching some more. 

Year’s later, after reading a book called ‘The Homestead’ that had been written by a local man, Wilbert Aitkens, I remember a story he’d written about his watching my Grandmother playing baseball when he was a young man.  Of course by that time, Granny was long gone, and although I knew much about her, I realized there was so much more that I hadn’t taken the time to ask.  When I looked at what we had for the ‘English’ history (which was her maiden name) it didn’t go very far, so I started my own journey of discovery.

I remember at that time, sending out the letters, to names in phonebooks across provinces, hoping to get leads that would fill in the blanks for me.  I got lucky, and did connect with Claire English, wonderful man, not all that far from where we lived, who had more information than I could even imagine.  It was exciting and rewarding to learn more,  but life took a turn and got busy.  My quest for information on those that went before me got put aside  as the business of making a living and raising a family took over.  Inside, I still found it all fascinating, but priorities for time were taken up elsewhere. 

Now, time is much easier to come by again, as we’ve entered this next stage of our lives.  I realize that I’ve still maintained the roll of the ‘Memory Keeper’ for this leg of our family, as I seem to be the one that has ended up with so many of those memories.  I’ve also come to realize that if I don’t share them, they’ll be gone with me.  In this time of high technology and low real contact, there seems to be little interest from the generations that are following me in all of this stuff.  But I’m not convinced that it will be that way always.  I think it’s going to come back around that people will want and need to know where they came from to carve out a certain amount of meaning for their lives..  That they’ll want to know the stories that were passed down, so that they can see the strong, solid stock that they came from.  So that they can understand what was sacrificed by the generations that came before  so that we are now able enjoy all that we’ve been blessed with.  I really hope so anyhow.  

What I do realize that we are living in the most remarkable time in history to share, document, and immortalize those that made the many sacrifices to bring us to where we are today.   My hope is that if I can share it virtually, either through sharing the stories and the knowledge here or on my Ancestry page, when the next ones are ready to know, the information will be available to them…whether I am around or not.  Maybe my sharing will keep their stories alive for just one more generation.  As long as our stories live, a part of us does to. ​