Sunday, September 29, 2002
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Sunday, September 29, 2002 |
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Learning new things about my ancestors By
MARY JANE HOLT
We had a house full of company and were about to sit down for dinner when the phone rung. Daniel answered and listened at length before asking the caller to repeat her name. Then he handed me the phone and said, "Maybe you better take it. Says she's a long-lost fourth cousin or something." Turned out to be a third cousin calling from California. We only spoke briefly since my guests and dinner were waiting. Then on Sunday afternoon, after the house had been vacated, I called her back. Two hours later, we had agreed that we would both subscribe to AT&T's new $19.95 per month unlimited calls program. I hung up a far more enlightened descendant of my grandparents, specifically of my grandmother on my dad's side. I had learned that macular degeneration had struck a great number of people on Daddy's side of the family. The gene for some kind of Mediterranean anemia was quite prevalent too. But that was nothing to everything else I had heard. I hung up feeling like I had made a connection whose time had come. You see, I had no memory for a long time of parts of my childhood. Then, about 20 years ago, I was in a gift shop with a friend, looking at some antiques when I smelled something that smelled like my grandmother's house and suddenly the memories began to slip back into my mind and heart. They didn't rush in. Not at all. But they did start coming back to me. It's like I still have some kind of guard up, like there are some things I choose to let myself remember and some things I choose not to recall. Selective memory is an interesting phenomenon, to say the least. I wish I knew more about how it works. There have been incidents in my adult life that I would love to forget. I think about wanting to forget them. I have longed to block them out, even wondered if hypnosis would help me erase them. Bet you didn't know I had such a cowardly streak. My brother has a phenomenally vivid memory of his childhood, our childhood I should say. All my siblings have a better memory than I do of our first decades. Of course none of the other six can recall being two years old. I vividly remember having whooping cough at age two. And I recall seeing my first death at about age two and half. Maybe when we are that small we have more control over what we will and will not remember. I'm sure any psychologist who might be reading this would love to enlighten me. Turns out my new found cousin has a younger sister, my age, who is a psychologist. She told me that she and her sister had not been talking lately. She was sure that was about to change. She couldn't wait to tell her about finding me. My cousin had tons of information about our mutual roots. I felt I really had very little to add to what she had already gleaned from her past research. But she said I connected a lot of dots. She sure did more than connect dots for me! She reminded of where I come from and that always makes me realize where I could be if it were not for the grace of God. You see, it's my grandmother on my dad's side that I don't like to remember. She was always after me to pray for forgiveness. Almost every time I was with her she would pull me aside, warn me of the fires of hell, and insist that I pray for forgiveness. It was like she was consumed with fear that I would not be with her in heaven. It was a prayer her dad had made her pray and she insisted I pray it as well. To this day I don't have a clue what I was asking to be forgiven for. I suspect she may have single-handedly been the inspiration behind the hunger in my teen years to study and learn about other religions. In the end, Christianity proved to be where it is for me. Jesus Christ is so real now and I'm thankful for my faith in Him. I'm glad I have grown weary over the years of all the trappings that often accompany Christianity and so many other religions as well. Bottom line? We are who we are. We are our memories. Without them I suspect we must settle to some degree on being less than all we can be, not only for today, but for all eternity. I will look forward to future conversations with my newfound cousin.
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