Friday, April 8, 2011

SO MANY FAMILY MEMBERS SO LITTLE TIME TO FIND THEM


Some times I just feel so over whelmed with thinking about my ancestors. There are so many of them that have gone before me, and I want to learn as much as I can about them. There are grandparents  about which  I have a good amount of data including pictures. Then there are others that are just names in my files.

Those are the ones I feel sad about. They meant much to those around them during their life time and now they are just a name in my notebooks. A name and a birth date and maybe a date of death. I may know who they married and if they had children, but what was life like for them? Were they religious? What were their thoughts on what was going on around them? What were their political views?

So much to learn and so little time to do it. Some times my daily life gets in the way of my desire to learn about my family. How can I juggle all the things I have to do or should do with want I love to do.

Right now as I write I am at McDonalds. It is noisy which is difficult, but also comforting as I search for dead folks. I look out the window and I can see Lake Superior, what a view. The weather may be cold half of the year, but it is now Spring and people are taking off their big heavy coats and even starting to wear shorts.  Now that is silly to this 62 year old lady, but if they want to freeze their legs so be it.

Now back to family after that little weather break. Just think about all those that have gone before us. Our parents, grand parents and then our four great grandparents, just keep multipling those family members and by the time to go back four to eight generations their are a lot of family members. I can go back eight generations on a few family lines but no way will I probably know all five hundred and twelve great x 8 grandparents . No wonder I can feel over whelmed at times

So Just For Today I will try to find out something about one of my 512 great x 8 grandparents or maybe something about their siblings.

Have a fun researching day hope that you are not feeling over whelmed now. ..Grace

2 comments:

  1. the nice thing about genealogy is that if i get overwhelmed researching one person or family i can put it aside and work on something else. enjoy your spring day. :)

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  2. I wrote a post a year or so ago echoing the same feelings of "so many ancestors, so little time." When I wrote I was feeling overwhelmed at trying to blog about the information I had as well as continue searching for information about the ancestors I knew about and find new ones. It is a daunting effort to think about finding all 512 of our direct acestors. I think your idea of one at a time (or perhaps a family at a time, when it occasionally happens) is the best way to do it. Like you, I really want to know the family members I find because they are individuals. I hope you're having fun working on your "one" today!

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 I am nowhere  done searching for my roots. For my missing family members.  So many to fine so little time.  This has been a hard few years ...