Why we Need Memories

Five days before I got the phone call, my older sister most likely had her deceased husband on her mind. As she has done every year since his passing six years ago, she likely told everyone who would listen how much she missed her beloved Frank. And why not? He was her everything.

Not that there weren't any others. My sister had a large family of devoted children who loved her dearly—and several grandchildren and great-grandchildren who returned that radiant love.

But on this day of the phone call, she no longer had to recall how very lonely she was.

Even though some phone calls are not unexpected, they still can be difficult to comprehend. Or accept. It's hard to acknowledge that someone is gone—irrevocably so. Perhaps that's why it is so helpful to remember those many stories of life, rather than to be left staring at a gaping emptiness.

And so, I turn from sharing stories here of relatives long gone to take some time away to reflect on someone who has, so recently, gone to join them.

Sharing Stories to Make a Difference

I'm not sure what I was expecting, launching the Memorial Day weekend by attending a funeral. Though the person whose memorial I attended was not a close relative, he was a member of the community worthy of recognition, and I wanted to be there to pay my last respects.

Events like that can easily serve to turn one's own thoughts to personal mortality, and from there to meditations on the meaning of life...and perhaps ruminations on how well one's own life might have measured up, should it be we who were being eulogized instead of the dearly departed. In such a melancholy turn of mind, my husband and I found ourselves continuing such a conversation over dinner that afternoon, sharing life stories and those hard-won nuggets of wisdom that often are appreciated by others to whom they might accidentally be passed along.

Life isn't always easy for people, and some people have had a rockier start than others. That, however, cannot always be judged by current appearances, a lesson reflected upon by those sitting at our dinner table. The conversation brought to mind the difficult childhood my husband and his siblings experienced while their father grappled with what likely was the aftereffects of emotional trauma from his service during the second World War.

Though Frank Stevens certainly did not offer the ultimate sacrifice during those war years, a part of him never did return home when the war was over. That loss became a lifelong affliction, eventually costing him his life within two decades of his return home.

Following that personal evolution through the letters Frank wrote home during his years in the Navy revealed, at the start, a fun-loving, buoyant spirit, but by the time he returned to his home in Chicago after the war was over, his own father passed away from heart trouble. In many ways, life for Frank took a downward spiral from that point until his death in 1966.

Those for whom that event hit hardest—his own immediate family—each suffered the loss differently. In my husband's case, that loss was seen through a five year old's eyes, leaving a lifelong impact. While a tragedy like that can become a topic one never wishes to talk about—at least in public—in his case, that five year old's pain grew up to become the empathetic mentor's encouragement to others in a new generation suffering agonies of their own. He has learned to become willing to tell that painful story.

Sharing that story once again at the dinner table yesterday gave one more chance to encourage another hurting person to perhaps consider how one's own story, bravely shared, can make a difference for others. It isn't an easy offering, and the words may stumble out at first, but people who are hurting can recognize the sound of someone else who knows what it's like. Sharing one's story is like granting permission to let the pretenses down and get to the words that can bring relief. And, hopefully, healing.

With all the pain that is in the world, hopefully the brave offering of sharing a story will transform those humble tokens into words of encouragement that bring strength to others. At the funeral I attended yesterday, I certainly heard such a story of an overcomer. We can expect eulogies to be like that, of course, but that insignificant detail of funerals makes me wonder how many other such stories of overcomers are represented by all the rest of the headstones in our cemeteries. How much better if we found a way to share those stories before the words can no longer be our own.

Off the Shelf: Man's Search for Meaning

It was not hard at all to decide which of our literally hundreds of books to pull down from the shelf for this month's read. The result came about from a convergence of timely thoughts and experiences, and made it so I couldn't just not read it.

Actually, the book didn't originally come from my bookshelves. It came—as I realized when I opened the cover and a bookmark from November 16, 2006, fell into my lap—from my mother's bookshelves; I had grabbed it then as I ran out her door. The reason for the precise date was that it was stamped on the paper, which in reality was a stand-by boarding pass for my family's return home after attending to my comatose mom in the hospital subsequent to the car wreck that broke her neck.

Such are the types of incidents which prompt people to search for meaning in life.

Apparently, the drive to find meaning in all that upheaval was not as powerful as I had hoped, for once on the plane bound for home, I read only a few pages, then realized my mind was racing far too much to absorb what someone else was saying to me.

So, I set it aside. For, like, ten years.

Fast forward to this spring. A local Italian heritage association had asked me to come speak to their members about starting a family history project. Their director explained: the group had just conducted a survey, seeking to discover what was uppermost in their members' minds for the upcoming year's program content. Highest on the list were two responses. One—of course! These are Italian-Americans we're talking about—was to revive the skills necessary for re-creating those delicious traditional Italian recipes. The other? Learning how to research members' own family history. And not just the names and dates; they wanted to preserve the stories.

Tasked with telling this group everything they need to know about genealogical research in one hour, I began thinking a lot about this notion of preserving our heritage. It's fairly obvious that there is a surging interest in exploring one's roots lately. Not only have online sites like Ancestry.com or FamilySearch.org seen demand for their services, but programming about genealogy seems to be everywhere, from television series to YouTube channels to podcasts to blogs.

Of course, that prompted a question in my mind: why? Why this increased interest in genealogy? Is it simply because these organizations have concocted the magic sauce for irresistibleness? I doubt it. Nor do I think it is all on account of people "always wanting to" research their family tree, just because they watched Roots back in the 1970s.

When I talk to people who want to learn how to start their own research, they usually have one of two reasons to embark on their project. One is inspired by the soon arrival of a grandchild, or other such motivation to pass along to descendants information about their extended family. The other reason—the flip side of this same coin—generally focuses on discovering our "roots."

In thinking about these two typical responses to the question of why people embark on genealogical projects, I realized something. Each of these—and they are really two different ways of looking at the same motivation—can be reduced down to one essence. The pursuit of our family's stories, the quest for our roots, are really a way for us to find meaning in life—in both our ancestors' lives and our own.

Of course, letting those thoughts inspire me to grab a book like Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning turned out to be roughly akin to choosing a conference breakout session based on only the title, not the course description. The book, originally published in 1959 by this Viennese psychotherapist, was birthed through the indescribably painful experience he endured as a prisoner at a Nazi concentration camp. It is a short but heavy read. Yet priceless, as a book to be experienced.

Continued existence—no matter how destitute, according to Frankl and supported by his wartime experience—can only be sustained by meaning.

Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.

It was the eloquence of Frankl's brief narrative that demonstrated his point. Most of the hundred pages which comprise the first part of the book involves a recounting of the author's wartime experience. While no explanation can lead us to grasp the day in, day out agony of life in those concentration camps, Frankl was able to provide illustrations of how his realizations helped him cope with the last vestige of freedom still available to him: the ability to choose his response to the injustices he faced daily.

Those were the examples which supported Frankl's development of the "third Viennese school of psychoanalysis" which he called logotherapy. A discussion of the therapy's tenets is briefly provided in the second part of the book.

Since my original educational background is in rehab therapy, I found it informative to review the concepts, juxtaposed with the author's recounting of his dreadful personal experience, although I imagine the general reader might not share my interest there. Still, reading the first part of the book makes me realize how empty and insipid our concerns of modern-day life have turned, now that we are so far removed from the deprivation and desperation of those war-torn years. The profound insights yielded by the author's intense suffering demonstrate his contention that even the worst negative aspects of life can produce meaning, if that is what a person must endure.

Of course, while our ancestors' stories may have demonstrated survival in the face of such dire straits, it certainly doesn't infer that we must suffer for our "art" of genealogy. And yet, I believe it is that same drive—a quest to bestow meaning upon our life experiences—that motivates people to embark on the exploration of their family history today. Researching our own history gives us a way to connect with our past in the stories of the adversities our ancestors overcame, and provides a promise of a future as we bring those stories forward to pass them along to our children and grandchildren.

     

The Last Party

Does your family history include any life stories that ended abruptly with a last party?

If you've been following A Family Tapestry for the long haul, you know that the answer to that question, for our family, is an unfortunate yes. Make that a triple yes.

Though each instance brought untold pain and lasting change, there is something we've discovered, as a family, about taking that tragedy and transforming it into something that can benefit others.

Every year now—for over a decade, at this point—my husband shares the story of his three family losses during a national program for high school students known as Every 15 Minutes. The goal of his involvement is to make a difference in the lives of these young people—to connect with them in a meaningful way so that his family history doesn't have to become replicated as their family's loss.

I usually mention the Every 15 Minutes program here at the end of each year's season—explaining it in more detail in my posts in 2011 (after we returned from the preliminary research project to obtain photos and documents reconstructing the three collisions for my husband's presentation) and in 2012 (recapping the actual story of the Stevens family's three losses).

Once again, we've begun another season of the Every 15 Minutes program in California. As you read this, my husband is likely pouring his heart out to an audience of young people at a high school near our home, in their final assembly of the two day event. He's not doing what critics of the program assume—just getting kids to cry, which may be effective for the moment but soon forgotten—but convincing them to make strong, lasting commitments to help each other stay alive, to take care of their friends, to make a plan so "having fun" doesn't have to end in tragedy.

The E15 season is a taxing one: this year, there will be at least ten such programs in our county's high schools. The program is complex and takes a dedicated interdisciplinary team to run smoothly. Along with my husband's presentations, our daughter oversees the "moulage" process—the gory makeup for the simulated crash acted out for the student body—and does photography of the event. In addition, there is a videography team, a sound team, a fire and rescue squad, local police, highway patrol and even coroner. Local hospitals volunteer their facilities for filming and mock treatment scenes, as do the jail facility, the county courthouse and even the funeral home. Though demanding—and exhausting—the program is well worth the effort.

In a way, it is painful to relive such a story as the one my husband shares each year for this program. What supersedes that difficulty is the chance to let one family's story spare another family of repeating the same agony.

When people realize there is a painful past in their family's history, the tendency is to tuck such stories away, to gloss over the ugly parts. These, however, sometimes deliver the transformative essence giving others the courage to make necessary changes. Our pain becomes others' preventive antidote.

It takes courage to let go of such difficult memories and free them to do their work. We face embarrassment, sometimes even shame, along with the doubt that our story would make any difference at all. But if the dark side of your family's history has somehow transformed you, redeemed you, or made any difference for you at all, it will only be in the sharing that it can do the same for anyone else.

A Little Introduction

How is it that plans which sound so easy in the imagining stage turn into such brick walls at the moment of execution?

It’s my intention, instead of sitting here moping in the doldrums, to get busy and record the memories, documentation and even the family’s ephemera I’ve recently found after the passing of my aunt last month. For one thing, it’s always more therapeutic to be busy about a project than to just sit in the shadows and sink further into depression. At least for me.

What I didn’t anticipate, today, was body-slamming full force into something that feels suspiciously like a brick wall. This was not something I expected. I’ve sat, staring at the blank “page” on my computer’s word processing program, for far too long.

So my proposal, at least at this delayed point, is to make short work of proper introductions, so I may move beyond this roadblock and get on with the getting on of being productive. (Got that?)

A short introduction would be quite suitable, when it comes to meeting someone like my aunt. After all, she was quite short, herself, standing only four feet ten in her better moments. She took on that big world out there by determination, discipline and constancy tempered by a cheery disposition. She was always smiling. Always engaging. Always ready to find some common ground to gain access to your world, so you could be a friend in her world.

That was probably a wise strategy for someone as diminutive as she was.

She and my mother were children of the Great Depression. As much as they were opposites, they shared a common heritage. The moving from job to job, state to state—anywhere my grandfather could find work, because he refused to stand in those “soup lines”—brought these two children from school district to school district, state to state, with a long-distance move once every year or so. The family lived in Florida, Maryland, Texas, Michigan, Colorado—and then, finally, Columbus, Ohio, where it seemed the economic pressure was, at last, over, and life could settle down to a “normal” these children had never yet known.

In that more stable home environment, my aunt completed high school—attending what is now the “old” North High in Columbus—and then, as unusual as it was in those times for women, went on to college. She graduated from Ohio State University in 1948 with a Bachelor of Science, now prepared to enter the world of education, herself.

I don’t remember where she held her first teaching job—she told me once, and perhaps I’ll discover it in those family papers I now possess—but I do remember hearing how scared she was, beginning that new job. She was teaching in a rural school district—I seem to remember it was some place near Mansfield—and she told me about those “big strapping teenage boys” and how she would “somehow” have to make them behave. She told me, all she could do was pray and ask God to tell her what to do. She was tiny, all right, but more than that, she was tiny in her own eyes.

She found a way to overcome that fear embedded in her frame. Perhaps thanks to the “Southern hospitality” gene she certainly inherited from my grandfather, she found a way to be herself by being friendly—and firm with a smile, when the need demanded it.

Eventually, my aunt found a teaching position closer to home, and returned to the Columbus Unified School District, where she taught that 1950s-style “home economics” class until the subject became extinct in the wake of politically-correct curricula. By then, thankfully, she had returned to school, obtained her Master of Education and focused on work in the school’s library.

Even after “retiring” from full time work, she continued working as a substitute teacher. If I’m not mistaken, she subbed right up until turning eighty. And after that? I don’t think this family knew the meaning of the word, “retirement.” She found another part time job to keep herself involved in community life, in addition to volunteer work. She was too much of a people person to drop out of life just because of reaching a magic number.

It was interesting, during visitation and after my aunt’s funeral, to meet her friends and neighbors—some of whom remembered having her as a teacher, some who were fellow teachers along with her. They’d mention her cheerfulness, perpetual energy, outgoing nature.

Just the way I’ve always known her.


Photograph, above: Sara Jacqueline Davis—who would never own up to that "Sara" if she could help it, and preferred the nickname "Jackie"—in a school portrait dated 1986. Where did that red hair come from? I have no idea; she was always an understated blonde. I only stumbled upon that photograph last month; a new discovery for me.

An Unexpected Thanksgiving Gift

In pursuing a research strategy leading up to a trip to Ireland late in 2014, I’ve been systematically reviewing and documenting what I’ve already discovered on the various branches of my husband’s paternal one-hundred-percent-Irish line.

Of course, best intentions can sometimes encounter resistance. If you’ve been a regular at A Family Tapestry, you are probably aware that November was not the easiest of months for me. The beginning of the month brought our family a sad loss in the passing of my aunt—my mother’s only sister, for whom I was named.

You may also recall that, before leaving my aunt’s home in the Columbus, Ohio, area last month, I found and carefully packed several items of family memorabilia to bring back home. There was a lot of material to follow up on.

You know how time, intentions and obligations mix. Something inevitably comes up and even the best intentions get laid aside for a more convenient time. For the rest of November, I hardly had a moment to spare to explore these documents, letters, newspaper clippings and photos I had garnered from old storage boxes and albums in my aunt’s home.

After realizing I was literally moping over all this sense of loss—not to mention, having boxes sitting out on shelves in my home, now demanding their own rightful place to be stored—I decided this weekend to switch directions and lay aside my Ireland research plans and focus, for a little while at least, on these Davis and McClellan lines of my Southern maternal heritage.

I’m not sure why I hadn’t focused on these lines before. Oh, I did do a little writing about the McClellan line—mostly for the discovery that one branch of that line provided the key to qualify me for Daughters of the American Revolution membership, and also on account of that unexpected revelation that my great grandfather’s Florida home has undergone a rehab project as part of a downtown historic district designation.

As for the rest of my maternal line, well, perhaps the reason I never pursued further research on these surnames was that I already knew others had blazed the trail ahead of me. Somehow, as much of a struggle as it has been to even work my way back to a mere 1850, I enjoy the thrill of the hunt with the many undocumented paths my husband’s lines have taken over gliding down the smooth, broad highway of time travel back to the 1700s and even 1600s in documentation others have provided for some of my own maternal lines.

But now, in the wake of the Thanksgiving holiday, and with thoughts of the soon-approaching Christmas celebration, I’m flooded with the nostalgia of family memories. I can’t help thinking about those, like my aunt, who will no longer be with us to once again pick up the family traditions. Perhaps this will be not only a convenient time, but a therapeutic time—why resist the urge to delve into all those items I’ve found?—to set aside my Ireland focus and turn my attention to the more immediate details of my own family history.

So that’s what I began doing this past weekend: poking around what could be found online for my Davis family and related lines. I wasn’t too surprised that it didn’t take me long to stumble upon details others had documented and posted online. I had already seen that while working my way back to the 1850s in that small village in the hills of eastern Tennessee—the town of Erwin, to be specific—in past research attempts.

It was in the Davis line that, this weekend, I discovered someone else had documented a link to the Tilson line—a family named in the D.A.R. database, already. Here was another way to trace my connection back to a Patriot. I wasn’t surprised. I had heard from family that this line had been in the New World for a long time.

A second detail popped up shortly after that discovery: a connection to the Mayflower. While I will have to prove this assertion for myself, it was a pleasant and timely discovery on this Thanksgiving weekend—though the doubtful side of me is demanding an explanation for how a seagoing vessel (admittedly headed originally for the Virginia plantation) arriving in present-day Massachusetts could yield descendants who were decidedly Southern in heritage.

All this will reveal itself in good time, I am sure. For now, I’m just basking in the timeliness of discovering I may have a closer connection to the Pilgrim story than I had ever imagined.

Above: Mayflower in Plymouth Harbor, William Formby Halsall (1841-1919); courtesy Wikipedia; in the public domain.

Suitcase Packed—With Memories

Do you ever wonder what thoughts go into the decision regarding what to stow in a carry-on bag?

Some people—like my daughter, recently—choose to put everything in their carry-on bag (or "Rollie," as my daughter prefers to call it). Why check any bags at all, when you can crush, mangle and obliterate all your clothes in one single portable device?

Some people—like business travelers—prefer the speed and assurance of keeping their secrets (and their underwear) close at hand.

And then there are people like me. The ones not willing to risk loss of a very different type of irreplaceable.

A couple years ago, it was me, stashing a year's worth of blog posts in the form of letters, photos and memorabilia from Irish Chicago ancestors in my carry-on bag. There was no way I was ever going to risk losing those.

"Have you ever lost a suitcase?" my husband demanded.

Well, no. But I came close. On one trip to Columbus, I arrived without my Sealyham Terrier. He got shipped to Albuquerque.

I always wanted to travel to Albuquerque.

But not then. I had to wait for him until after midnight that night. He arrived at my mother's house via taxi. I had to tip the cab driver for a passenger I bet he hadn't expected to have that night. And why not? You didn't think my dog was going to pay up for that tip, did you?

When it came to the treasure trove of memorabilia I received during that wonderful trip to Chicago a couple years back, you can be sure every last wisp of that ephemera arrived at my home, courtesy of my carry-on bag. No way stuff as irreplaceable as that was going to be checked.

And yesterday, I played re-runs. While not as hefty a haul as was the stash from Chicago, my booty from Columbus also claimed a special berth in that same carry-on bag.

How could it be otherwise? I can hardly wait to get this pile of papers home and organized, scanned and catalogued.

That's the kind of project that keeps one looking forward instead of dragging backward into the mire of things that cannot be changed.

Sometimes, I'm grateful for the therapy of memories.

Not Left Alone

He is survived by his wife, Marilyn.

With all the losses that befell the Bean family in 1955, it seemed the family was dwindling to nothing. Yet even though it seemed, with Earle Raymond Bean’s obituary yesterday, that his wife Marilyn was now left alone, that is not entirely so.

For once, I’m rather thankful that newspapers make editorial mistakes. In this case, it was an error by omission: Earle and Marilyn had two small children.

To think that this would be good news—considering those small children in question were then aged four years and fourteen months—is not quite what I mean. Rather, that Marilyn was not left entirely alone was one form of comfort. Yes, it was a difficult future that faced the small family. But as hard as it seemed, they had each other to pull into that future.

On the other hand, tracing the trajectory of the Woodworth family’s health tendencies owing to Marfan syndrome, that future had its dark side, too. Considering that Earle had lost his mother, Maud, when she was barely thirty five—and even his own brother, who was thirty four at the time of his death—Earle himself had not even made it that far. He was only twenty nine when he passed away.

If Earle’s son Gregory had had the same level of medical care that had been available during Earle’s generation, he would have made it only to his twenty fourth year. Thankfully, by the 1970s, things were different. What at that time was called “open heart” surgery became the new game-changer for victims of Marfan syndrome.

In Greg’s case, the moment of his own health crisis came on the afternoon of October 1, 1974. How well I remember that day—and that miracle. Though it became only the first of several such cardiovascular surgeries, the blessing was that it hadn’t been the last. As Greg often commented, himself, despite the health struggles he faced, he was so appreciative of the opportunity to have a life. And with the heritage he had in his great-grandparents on both the Bean and Woodworth sides, passed down through his grandparents and their family, he had a lot of life to live—and to give. Thankfully, after that heart-stopping moment in 1974, he had the opportunity to extend that full life another fourteen years.

Of course, you would expect, after that point, to see me post yet another obituary in this long tale of life that all of us eventually share. I’d like to say I’m not going to post that obituary in deference to the privacy of those who still remain. But I can’t really say that now. You see, the only one left whose mention would violate that respect of privacy would be the one writing this post.

A while back, a reader—Intense Guy, dubbed online as “Iggy”—asked for a recap on all the relationships. In answer to his comment, “I’ve lost the thread; how are you related to these folks?” I deferred the answer until later. Strangely, I found myself having such a hard time keeping that promise.

It wasn’t because I didn’t know the answer. On the contrary: I know the answer all too well.

Perhaps what caused it to be so difficult to say has something to do with the very same reason why Sam Bean could only comment, “I had a swell wife.” Coming to Sam’s defense at the time, some of you were so perceptive to pick up on that possibility on his behalf. Iggy had mentioned,

I suspect his brevity when speaking of his wife was due to pain of loss—my grandfather would only say "she was a saint" of my grandmother after she passed away.

Agreeing with that sentiment, reader Far Side commented,

I have met people who will not speak of the dearly departed. It is too painful for them.

While I couldn’t see it at the time—until you all had put words to it—I was still going through the same process, myself. Oh, I had alluded to it in places. Like when that “fourteen month old baby” passed away last November, triggering the idea in my mind to work on this series. And again, with the official first post, “Starting This Story at the End,” where I introduced Earle’s son, Greg.

Now that you’ve mentioned it, yes, I can heartily agree with the explanation for the way Sam put it about his own wife. It is too hard to put into words.

Even after all these years.

Being Family, Doing Family

In the far corner of my kitchen counter stands a gallon jug of stage blood. I realize that is not a customary addition to the accoutrements of most household countertops. And it isn’t generally a part of ours, either.

Really.

For the most part—from the last cheer at graduation to the murky middle of the next January—my kitchen counter looks pretty much like anyone else’s.

By the time local high schools are putting in time planning for spring breaks, proms and graduation festivities, though, a new order of “Reel Blood” shows up on the far corner of the counter. Another season of “moulage” makeup arts revs up for the beginning of the Every 15 Minutes program. And my daughter sets herself to the task of making teenagers look like their parents hope they never will.

I endure the sight of something as unappetizing as a plastic jug of dark red liquid, first of all, because there is really nowhere else we can store it. A tile countertop is the easiest to clean when transfers from gallon storage container to more-easily-controlled squeeze-top tubes get messy.

I also put up with it because I can see the level of the stuff decrease visibly each week, event by event, reminding me that the last drop will soon be poured out. I know that once it is gone, the plastic container can be sent to the recycling bin for another year, and my kitchen can go back to being just a kitchen.

The main reason I acquiesce to such an un-culinary corner is that I know what that stuff can accomplish. As phony as it is, when applied to the use for which it was intended, it lends just the right air of somber reality to get teenagers to step out of the realm of invincibleness and into the realization of “This Could Be You.”

My daughter has learned from emergency room nurses how to craft realistic-looking wounds—the horrible kind that only emergency responders would know on an all-too-regular basis. She works, as part of our family’s business, alongside a team of professionals to re-enact scenes of fatal car crashes for the benefit of students whose high schools participate in the national program known as Every 15 Minutes.

Her work helps set the stage for the opening scene of that two day event. Then, alongside first responders from local fire, ambulance, highway patrol, police and sheriff’s coroner personnel, her father adds his efforts as trainer and motivational speaker to help change the hearts of students and redirect them toward choices that may very well keep them and some of their friends alive past prom night or grad parties.

In many ways, that gallon jug on my kitchen counter represents family. Right now, it demonstrates how family can work together in productive ways—community-building ways—through two members of a family-owned business working side by side, each contributing their best from their different but complementary skill sets.

It also represents family from the past, tying together our family history with our family destiny. Those of you who have joined with me on my blogging journey of documenting what happened in this family—from the story of Frank Stevens’ turn from happy-go-lucky high school student to early recruit during World War II to never-the-same-again man, husband and father of four, to the story of his son Kelly who followed in his tragic footsteps—may remember that it is this story that our family shares during the Every 15 Minutes program.

Today, I don’t want to include any photographs with this post. Though our family has so many from participating in more than ten years of this event—after all, anything that would fit with this subject would be quite gory—it doesn’t take much searching during the months of March, April and May to find many online resources that would provide examples. A simple search online will yield photos and videos of such events across the country. Newspapers in the cities whose school districts sponsor the program often run stories with photo montages. It is not hard to get the idea of what a graphic scene is re-enacted every week in high school after high school.

That story is shared with the hope that it will make a difference in the lives of other young people—a difference that brings about a better outcome.

We take a family working together to weave a family’s history into a greater compelling story, with an overall message to both students and their parents to turn their hearts and their loyalties back home to family. Somehow, in telling the tale, in demonstrating the tragedy, it all seems to come back to those ties of family.

There is no accident in the fact that we think of the family we come from in terms like “roots.” Family is what nurtures us, what gives us support and direction.

When I think of it all in those terms, I can endure a jug of stage blood on my kitchen counter. All I have to do is remember the difference it makes in multiplied lives and families over these few short months of Spring.


Disclaimer: national regulations require writers to be "transparent" in revealing any "conflict of interest" regarding financial matters referred to in their writing--so writing this post leaves me in a position in which I must make a declaration that, should you click on the family business link that further explains this family's involvement in speaking at the Every 15 Minutes programs, and should you subsequently be persuaded to choose to do business with the principals of that website, you may simultaneously be affecting me in a positive financial manner. However, you can be pretty sure that the things I said here were not influenced by financial considerations--believe me, living this stuff is not easy!--though they were influenced in a much more intangible way by my personal involvement with the subjects of these stories. There! Said it!

Crossing Over

Sometimes a genealogy researcher finds that the boundaries become blurred between the land of the living and the resting place of the dead.

Oh, we have no trouble traipsing through innumerable cemeteries, gawking at the epitaphs of strangers long gone. Some even celebrate this oddity, adopting the moniker, “Graveyard Rabbits.”

I can hardly blame them. As long as I can remember, the fascination of the micro-histories that may be found by careful attention to headstones draws me, too.

But that fascination eludes me today.

In a move that we often wish for ourselves but would discover to be devastating for others, my sister-in-law took the opportunity, just before dawn the other day, to step over that demarcation line and join the other side. She passed quietly in the night. No one knew—well, no one, that is, until it was quite over and most irreversible.

Not that they didn’t try. A valiant effort by family and first responders ensued upon discovery. That blurry line, though, hardened its resolve to keep the one it had just captured.

And it was all over. The line, once blurred, returned firmly into place. A new boundary has been drawn.

That news has left, first, shock. As time passes, though, my memory eases the jolt in microscopic ways, as scenes from our lives together play out in the movie screen of my mind.

I see my sister-in-law in all sorts of escapades from youth and from the many times we’ve shared together. I recall what seemed to be the invincible twenty-something who—courtesy of several serious car wrecks from which she merely walked away—was the source of periodic heart-attack-worthy spates of anxiety for my mother-in-law. I see also the doting sister-in-law whose good intentions while visiting me in the hospital, post-surgery, lapsed into concern that she, herself, might become the one who needed nursing attention. Thinking of the upcoming holiday, I recall the yearly dance of coordinating schedules so that we could get together sometime between Christmas and New Year’s Eve in a way that would not conflict with our travel obligations or her husband’s gigs with his band.

I remember how she adored her “big brother,” the man I married, who unmercifully never let her forget that, when a pre-schooler, she would introduce herself complete with middle name, though she couldn’t quite pronounce it. Rather than ending with a perfectly-enunciated  “Louise,” it always came out as “Judy ’weez.”

It’s odd to think that the very ailment that claimed her brother’s life so early—Marfan syndrome—was partially what shriveled the size of her extended family. She lost her grandfather, an uncle, and father within a few years’ time. Her mother, now gone, was an only child of parents who had moved from Wisconsin to California—cut off from extended family left behind. A grand-aunt and grand-uncle were all that she and her brother had, growing up—until age claimed that surrogate grandparents’ generation. And then, her brother left, too.

With this passing, there is no one remaining in that family. That thought is not lost on a genealogist: a family gone. A stump of a branch on a hollowed-out family tree. Sometimes, life doesn’t go on.

Perhaps it’s the genealogy in me that wants me to keep on pursuing her family history. Though there is no one to pass this heritage down to, there is quite a story. My sister-in-law’s paternal  grandfather—a local, male version of Helen Keller, was blind and deaf owing to a childhood accident, yet developed skills in many areas, including publishing a book of poetry, and publicly speaking about his experiences. Her great-grandparents provided stories of spunk and vivacity, and heritages as diverse as Frenchmen from Maine traveling around the horn to California during Gold Rush days, to Irish-Americans crossing the continent to the same destination. Perhaps it is that seemingly-indestructible resilience that, passed down to her generation, powered my sister-in-law’s younger days. Perhaps seeing all that she survived throughout her life painted her with that invincible aura.

But it was not meant to be so. We all have to go at some point, we tell ourselves. And after we go, those who are left behind take up the task of looking back to see what is worth keeping—worth remembering. Father, mother, grandparents, aunts and uncles morph from family members to family memories.

And yes, even sisters-in-law.

Well, that is not entirely correct to call her my sister-in-law. She might be more correctly labeled as what my family facetiously dubs “outlaws.” Even then, that is not quite right. Because I lost my first husband at a relatively young age, though I remarried, I’ve always maintained a relationship with my original in-laws. Adding the in-laws from my current marriage, it became quite awkward to introduce this woman as my sister-in-law, yet that is what she was. It always took an inordinately long explanation to complete those introductions. It was easier to just call her Judy, Greg’s sister. Most everyone in my circle of acquaintances would then understand.

It helps to know people who know that.

You May Be Wondering…

Now that you have journeyed with me through the historical review of one solitary family—that of Frank Stevens of Chicago—and have seen all the tragedy that, incredibly, could befall one single family, you may find yourself full of questions.

I do have a reason for telling you this story, though. And that reason has to do with one unifying factor that runs through each of these tragedies. Can you tell what it is?

Kudos to those of you making the astute observation that almost all of these events predate the widespread use of seat belts, but that is not the unifying factor to which I’m referring.

For those of you suspecting some effects of post-war stress dictating the subsequent poor life choices of World War II veteran Frank and Korean veteran Gerry, Frank’s brother, you are close. According to family members, the fun and easygoing Frank was never quite the same after coming home from war; I imagine it would be much the same for his younger brother after service in the Korean conflict. And yes, there certainly was a type of post-stress for John Kelly, too, who lost his father, Frank, at a vulnerable age.

For that observation, you are getting warm. But not entirely accurate. There is more.

The one unifying factor in each of these three traffic collisions—regardless of who was driving, what type of car was involved, or which road it was on—was a substance: alcohol.

On his long drive home in 1966, the last night he called his wife to promise he was finally on his way, Frank had just left a lounge. He had most certainly been drinking, which may have contributed to his choice of such a high speed in attempting to negotiate the curve on the highway that claimed his life.

On his way home from the party that Friday night in 1970 when he bummed a ride from another party-goer whom he didn’t really know, Kelly ended up the passenger of a driver whose post-party skill was most certainly impaired.

Coming home at that tell-tale post-two a.m. time that Saturday night in 1977, Gerry was also most certainly a victim of alcohol—either by the driver of the vehicle in which he was riding, or by the driver of the vehicle that approached his car head-on. Or perhaps by both.

What a price to pay. It was hard enough to write about such losses. It surely was not breezy reading for you, either, if you slogged through all those episodes. But to actually have to live it—that was unbearable.

And yet, as sometimes happens, that which seems utterly unbearable is sometimes turned into something which benefits others. This can only happen when it becomes a life story—something you live through, something which propels you through its sheer unbearableness to seek answers—and relief!—for yourself.

This past week—on the eve of student celebrations such as spring break, proms and graduations—marks the beginning of another season in our county of the program known as Every15 Minutes. The Every 15 Minutes program is actually a nationally-known program, but our state makes it possible for high schools to participate in this program on behalf of their students through a grant process. The event is fairly well structured through both the national program and state mandates so that, if you were to attend any one given high school’s Every 15 Minutes this year, you would find it essentially the same in format as any other.

My husband, working years ago in law enforcement, at one point found himself assigned to a position which required his participation in this program. As he performed his duties at the assigned high school, he found more and more aspects of the Every 15 Minutes program for which he could add suggestions to make the outcome more effective for the students. Over the years, he became more and more involved, and started sharing his personal story in a way that has touched audiences time and time again. Though he now no longer works directly for law enforcement but in his own business as a motivational speaker and trainer, he still is an integral part in getting this message out to thousands of high school juniors and seniors.

No one can tell a story like that and not have first lived it. The price he paid to be that little boy in that story—the forlorn observer of all that tragedy—has somehow been turned around to be the very thing that has prevented others from experiencing such heartbreak.

Disclaimer: national regulations now require writers to be "transparent" in revealing any "conflict of interest" regarding financial matters referred to in their writing--so writing this series, and this post in particular, leaves me in a position in which I must make a declaration that, should you click on the family business link that further explains this family's involvement in speaking at the Every 15 Minutes programs, you will be reading material for which, should you subsequently be persuaded to choose to do business with the principals of that website, you may simultaneously be affecting me in a positive financial manner. However, you can be pretty sure that the things I said here were not influenced by financial considerations--believe me, living this stuff is not easy!--though they were influenced in a much more intangible way by my personal involvement with the subjects of these stories. Whew! That sounds so legal... 

The Solidarity of Family

Once the news was out about the unexpected loss of Frank Stevens—husband, father, brother—family started heading from all points to Albuquerque. Funerals are always painful times, but somehow in the misery of the loss, there is a sweetness in the supportive camaraderie of family and close friends. We often think of funerals as unwanted events, something to avoid—and yet, it is at those specific bittersweet moments that family members minister to each other. The therapy of memories is so powerful a healer to those who are grieving, and yet, those remembrances cannot work their wonder if we don’t allow the memories to be coaxed out into the open. Funerals are times when those needed memories can breathe life back into our sorrowing souls.

Frank’s brothers from the west coast were there at his funeral to lend their support, as was his youngest brother, and his brother Ed, still in Chicago. Only a few days later, already returned home to California, Frank’s oldest brother John Kelly was writing to his mom, sending Agnes news of the week she had missed. The visit with the bereaved family had done its good, but there was so much more needed for the future.

 

                                                                  Feb. 10, 1966

Dear Ma, Pat + Mike—

Bill + I arrived home safely.

Max fixed chop suey for dinner (very good) and I left immediately after dinner 5:35 P. M. and was home at 8 P.M.

Norma + the kids seemed pretty cheerful when Bill + I left but she will have some bad moments at times – especially after she is alone.

How much like many funeral visits in so many families was John’s observation in his letter that certain members of this family “took it very hard.” The report that “Sunday night when the family and close friends were allowed to see Frank’s remains was the hardest time” is so similar an experience to that which so many have had to endure. John told his mother about the children crying “so heart brokenly,” but it wasn’t just the young ones who were struggling with this loss. The “baby” of the previous generation, Frank’s youngest brother Gerald, struggled, too. John mentioned to his mom

Chip came in Monday night to the mortuary (his plane was late) when the Rosary was almost over. He was in a bad, emotional state—didn’t make a scene of course but cried like a little kid.

There is nothing so difficult to absorb as the sudden, irrevocable loss of someone you love.

Will’s Boys

In their nearly thirty-four years of marriage, William Stevens and his bride, the former Agnes Tully, raised six children—five of them boys. I never met three of those sons, so it was interesting to find pictures among their mother’s and sister’s collections to share—pictures introducing me to them in the prime of their lives, and even, for the younger ones, during their childhood.

Take this informal outdoor shot, for instance, probably taken some time in the late 1930s. Lined up at the request of an elder, no doubt, most likely during a family occasion or church event, are four of the five boys. John, the eldest, is to the left, making quite a contrast to his youngest brother, Gerry, next to him. Next-to-youngest brother Frank stands alongside Gerry. The line is completed by second-born child, Bill. The only one missing from this group is their brother, Ed, the fourth-born child, third of the sons, whom you’ve already met.

Will and Agnes were married in 1912, and with the arrival of their firstborn began a stretch of seventeen years between oldest son and youngest. Having such a span of ages within one family makes for a wide spread of experiences and observations about family life (and the current events encircling them), which I’m savoring now as I read through old family letters. Each son following his own path leaves such a variety of details about choices that have turned into the heritage each of their families now hold.

With the exception of the second-born, ironically it was the two youngest of the set that I never met. Sometimes, the legacy left behind for family is bittersweet.

Every one of them, now, no longer is with us. While too close to the present to qualify as “genealogy,” I’d like to take some time to remember—and honor—each of those five sons during this week.

Until Dreams Take the Place of Regrets

Yesterday’s post prompted me to take a “process break” from my usual observations on family heritage. I had mentioned yesterday that I let the visual cues from a picture lend me a mindset that caused me to make misinformed judgments. In this particular case, I let the picture of a child lead me to draw conclusions based on an assumed perpetuation of that childhood stage.

However, as I closed the article, I mentioned that the reverse also happens: when we see pictures of people from their last stages of life, we tend to also draw conclusions. Those conclusions—generally inferring that the current elderly appearance retroactively defines the whole of that person’s being—lead people to interact in a much different manner than if they could have had a relationship with the entire person.

This very thing was demonstrated to me so clearly five years ago, when my own mother was severely injured in a brutal car crash. Air-lifted to a trauma center for treatment, she was kept in a medically-induced coma until stabilized in preparation for surgical repair of her broken neck. During that time, of course, she could not speak for herself in any way that would form a relationship with the staff providing her nursing care.

Naturally, the nurses, looking at this disheveled survivor in her mid-eighties, were left to their own devices in formulating judgments of just who this person was. Everything from assumptions about her health to presumptions about her personality evolved from the cues of appearance. For instance, my mother was normally very slender, but the injuries had caused her to swell incredibly; this was taken to be the usual “fat” of old age. Because the neck surgery couldn’t be attempted based on other underlying health complications, and the neck had to be maintained solely by use of a brace called a halo, nursing and therapy staff based prognosis on what they assumed to be an “average” elderly patient, and thus didn’t urge her to do her best in treatment. Generally, she was left to be an “old woman.”

I don’t know what prompted me to do this, but when our family flew halfway across the country to be with her in those first few comatose days, I felt impressed to print a copy of one of her studio pictures—the one you see above—from the portfolio of her young, hopeful days as a professional dancer and actress. Without saying much, I posted the photograph on the wall next to her bed.

It didn’t take long for the staff to notice.

“Who is that?” they would ask, pointing to the picture. They would always be amazed to hear the answer. Thankfully, it gave me a credible opening to explain that, even up to the day before her crash—she was on the way to a hike in the hills after her customary daily workout when it happened—she was still able to replicate the steps of some of her former dance routines.

It wasn’t a sudden change, but nevertheless, I’d call it a dramatic reversal of perception. I’m grateful to say that, though I’m sure the treatment rendered was always of professional quality, it somehow became more human, more relationship-oriented, after the little insertion of that visual aid. The mental pictures we carry with us generate our every move more than we realize.

I come from a line of long-lived women. These are women who don’t begin to consider old age until dismissing their seventies. Tennis? Jogging? Golfing? No problem: these women engaged in life and hard work with endurance, often until they were in their late eighties or nineties.

But to tell someone that—especially professionals who are already trained to know better—is such a hard task. Seeing is truly believing. We are all captive to that fact. I’ve done the very same thing in my own professional work—see an old client, translate that visual snapshot into an entire lifetime of being. There is no denying that old age has its baggage, but somehow, no matter how old the cover, there is always a young person still resident inside, as historian Page Smith observed in the book on his own journey, Old Age Is Another Country.

John Barrymore is attributed with observing, “A man is never old until regrets take the place of dreams.” Perhaps that is what we see when we observe people whom we automatically label as elderly: we paint them with regrets.

And yet, what is it we seek to do when we delve into family history? We seek to strip these old people—these relatives we once may have known—of that late-stage veneer of regrets and repaint them with the freshness of the hopes they harbored throughout the many stages of their lives.

Now, as family historians, we may only paint by numbers—or worse, only connect the dots. But somehow, we hope to progress until we are accomplished at this portraiture and can deftly replicate the very nuances of their entire being.

We seek to reverse John Barrymore’s weary epitaph and permit those supplanted dreams to regain their rightful place.

That’s how I want to remember the people in my life.

A Country Milestone

A few miles’ drive out in the country beyond my home is a farm stand. Not your usual shack that peddles fresh veggies, this place is a farm stand with attitude. I’ve loved coming out this way for years—decades, in fact. It hasn’t been only because of the selection of fresh produce, but mainly because the store’s proprietors took pride in their offerings. That pride showed not only in the way the food was displayed but also in the friendly more-than-a-customer atmosphere.

The owners were descendants of an Italian immigrant family—not unusual in the surrounding farming communities around here. And, like many Italian families I’ve known from New York to San Francisco, they were not bashful about letting their Italian shine through. In the case of this farm stand, that heritage made itself known in everything from the fresh basil picked-for-you this morning, to the accordion music playing through the sound system. Little fun touches—like the ugly-face art on misshapen peaches, or the collection of vegetable art preserved in Ball jars—added to the ambience.

Above all, the “mama” of the establishment presided in her inimitable way. At least, she maintained her presence for most of the sixty-plus years the store has been in business. Toward the later years, her health kept her from being there for the demanding schedule such ventures require—and then, a while later, she wasn’t there any more. Her health had required her to seek a more restful lifestyle.

But the farm stand continued serving its customers, a community that grew to include travelers on their way from the Bay Area to the many weekend hideaways in the Sierras. This place became their special midway stop, their little treat—especially as the business grew and added a bakery and, ever mindful of an opportunity to hearken back to their Italian roots while meeting a summertime traveler’s needs, a gelateria. Of course, the local customers appreciated the additions, too. I’ve always been a regular, driving out that way at least once a week—for the vegetables, of course.

Since I’ve been out of town, it wasn’t until yesterday that I was able to get back into my shopping routine. This being the peak of summer, that meant a trip to the farm stand.

Pulling into the parking lot, I noticed a sign out in front that hadn’t been there. It read: “Thanks for the memories, Mom.”

It didn’t take much to figure out what must have happened in the weeks that I was away. I confirmed my suspicions with the girl attending the counter in the bakery, then continued my shopping in a daze. Though my mind tells me the end is inevitable for all of us, how sad it is for those remaining when it comes.

My mind lost its way while I browsed counters full of fresh-picked fruit, thinking: yes, she certainly did leave memories. This entire operation was a legacy this woman and her hardworking husband had left. True, it was still in existence, thanks to the willingness of her son and his wife to take up his parents’ vision. But its creation was owing to the mom and dad who first took the initiative to risk their new idea, and put the diligence and personality into building a one-of-a-kind venture.

With all that I had been through in my travels in the last couple weeks—sorting through pictures of nameless relatives long gone—I couldn’t help wonder what memories this family would be sifting through. Would that extended family sit around the kitchen table as we did and pass around the pictures, reminisce, and get some relief from their grief by the soft touch of happier remembrances? What would they remember?

The scenes I was reminded of, from my recent visit with family, became echoes of what I hope for this family as they move through this process of remembrance. What a rich heritage is left to nurture them when they are ready to ease away from the initial pain of loss.