Category - Stories

The past holds valuable lessons and wonderful memories. Cultural traditions. Rituals. Ethnic foods. A namesake or piece of long-held property. What we know of our personal family history tells us about who we are and how we got here. That’s all. Our present and future depends on what we do with it, and is our responsibility of what we wish to leave behind.

We seek ancestry records to fill in missing links and often the findings are amazing because they are unexpected. Revelations bring our past up to date with our future. It centers our place on this planet. I am a descendant of these people who traveled here from there.

Discovery isn’t always pleasant. To learn that you are not royalty or heir to some ubiquitous island in Pacific can be a bummer. But to learn that your distant relatives were horse thieves or slave owners or tortured by radicals makes one feel tainted. Or learning that so many died at an early age from influenza or other easily treated disease, by today’s standard, makes one sad.

We dream of being Royal blood, to confirm what we’ve always felt: I am a Queen. Or at least in my bloodline.

By chance I met a woman who I learned was a distant relative of mine. It was exciting at first, until she presented “facts” that my father’s family were “the bad seeds” and she was from the better side of tree.

More recently I attended a bridal shower and was seated at a random table with no one I knew. We made polite conversation throughout the dinner. The woman directly across from me engaged in a random conversation about painting and artwork. I’d painted a gift for the bride. I showed a few of my sign paintings to the woman. One was a six foot reclaimed barn board with the city name Gloucester and the distance 20 miles underneath. She asked if I lived 20 miles from the city.

“It’s a translation of my mother’s name – 20 miles means Ventimiglia in Italian.”

She thought a minute about this and asked if I knew another family that she thought she might be related to. Indeed I did. I told her the connection to my mother. She gave me her maiden name, a common name in the city that branched out across the city. Her maiden name was my grandmother’s maiden name.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s play the game…Who is your father.”

He shared the same name as probably 100 men in the city.

“Who is your grandfather?”

She told me but said he never went by his given name.

I leaned over towards her and smiled: “Did he go by the name Scotty?”

She smiled. “Yes.”

I said: “Uncle Scottie is your grandfather?”

“Who are you?”

“Etta is was my grandmother.”

“AUNT Etta is your grandmother?”

Instantly I had a new relative. A close relative. Discovered by chance?

It turns out she’d done extensive research on our family tree. That night I discovered by Italian roots were quite shallow. That we are more than 80% Celtic. News to me.

Because we are shoots from the same tree doesn’t make our past our future. Respect those before you. Thank them for getting you here.

BE F-G AWESOME TODAY!

Original graphic and quote: Stephanie DelTorchio

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