I’m sitting here, fingers flying across the keyboard, deep into writing about ancestral detective work, when my phone rings.
“What’s up?” chirps the voice on the other end, “You busy?”
“I’m writing a blog post,” I said.
“What’s it about?” He asked.
“Genealogy,” I reply.
“Another one?” comes the response, dripping with enough judgment to fill a family Bible.
I’ll admit, I immediately considered channeling my inner drama queen and belting out a “BYE FELIPE!” (That’s the male version of saying, “Bye Felicia.”) and dramatically slamming down the receiver. But my professionalism, good manners, and fear of breaking my phone prevailed. So I sat listening, rolling my eyes, and tapping one foot until our conversation ended, and I got back to writing this.
My daughter, Nikki (named after the incomparable Nikki Giovanni), has caught the genealogy bug. Trust me, once bitten, it’s harder to cure than the urge to pop bubble wrap.
I remember reading Giovanni’s poem Scrapbooks in the ’70s when bell-bottoms were all the rage and disco was king. One line from that poem remains etched in my memory, “Sometimes it seems my life is a scrapbook.” I find that so relevant.
Delving into genealogy is like playing detective in your family tree; you dig with a symbolic shovel and examine findings with a magnifying glass. If you’re lucky, you will discover a treasure chest of memories, and every time you uncover a new tidbit about your ancestors, it will add another entry to your scrapbook.
Now, Nikki’s interest has been peaked, and I’m thrilled. She’s planning to take the AncestryDNA test to learn more about her deceased father’s family history, potentially connecting with unknown relatives and strengthening existing relationships. Since her father and I separated when she was an infant and eventually divorced, she and her brother had very little interaction with his side of the family. Her curiosity is heightened by the fact that foster parents raised her father, and although he knew his sister who was with another family, neither of them knew their birth parents; she’ll undoubtedly be looking for a needle in a haystack.
Thankfully, her quest to learn about her grandparents and great-grands on the maternal side of her family won’t be as challenging since I’ve played detective with our family history for years and even wrote a book about it.
As luck would have it, my cousin Velda, bless her heart, created a small but remarkable photo album a few years back showcasing our paternal lineage. This treasure trove is brimming with family snapshots – featuring my father, her father, their siblings, some spouses, and our grandparents. A brief description of the subjects thoughtfully accompanies each image. Coincidentally, some cousins on my mother’s side compiled a similar photo collection after our 2018 family reunion. These two volumes form an impressive set destined to be cherished heirlooms for generations.
Because a family tree is a wild world of roots and branches, there’s always another story to uncover, another mystery to solve (and another blog post to write).
Discovering our forebearers’ hardships and challenges can make us more empathetic and appreciative of our culture and life experiences. Look at Alex Haley. His discovery of his ancestries and the subsequent writing and publication of Roots profoundly impacted his life. In addition to bringing him tremendous success and recognition, Roots became a #1 bestseller, a widely-watched TV miniseries, and won Haley a Pulitzer Prize. His success also sparked widespread interest in genealogy and African American family history, inspiring many others, including myself, to explore our roots. Tracing lines of descent through generations using oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other sources serves as a valuable family heirloom and historical record. Alex Haley’s Roots inspired esteemed author Henry Louis Gates Jr. to learn his own ancestry. He later developed a PBS series, “Finding Your Roots.”
Nikki may never write a best seller like Haley, but I will encourage her pursuit. And one more thing about genealogy. I must tell you that my cousin, Tanya, has more enthusiasm for family history than a squirrel has for nuts. In 2014, she went on a wild ride through our family tree, mapping out every twig and leaf like she was trying to win the genealogy lottery. She didn’t just scribble our family tree on the back of a napkin. No, sirree, she went full-on digital diva and left a jaw-dropping Genealogy Report on the MyHeritage website, created by another cousin, Dwayne. Dwayne, bless his tech-savvy heart, had long ago set up the online family hub that facilitated Tanya’s project. Not only is the genealogy bug highly contagious, but in our case, it’s a family affair.
As I see it, life’s just one big scrapbook, and most of us try to make our pages uplifting and worth reading!
As Marcus Garvey said, “A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin, and culture is like a tree without roots.”