FOR SOMETHING A LITTLE DIFFERENT...
Thu., December 17, 12:41 PM
Well, I have to admit that was different. Over the past couple of weeks, both U.D. and I have connected to distant relatives from different parts of our family tree. One is the granddaughter of my (paternal) grandmother’s brother — my second cousin. The other is the great-grandson of my (paternal) grandfather’s sister. That is, he is my second cousin once removed. So on Tuesday, U.D. and I met a man the same age as her father who is her third cousin. As I have pointed out again and again, these long generations make for strange relationships. It’s the reason I first started sketching out family trees for my kids years ago.
This gentleman began by sending me a long list of his own ancestors, and we share one side of that. I knew a few others very slightly, but I can add details to our side. I always feel sorry when someone asks, “Did you know my mother?” and at best I can only answer that I remember her name but can’t put a face to it. His mother, who was a second cousin to me, was older than my dad!
An interesting part of all this, outside of meeting someone who has similar interests and who has traveled to widen his research, is that we are finding out about more websites than we knew existed. My biggest problem with websites is that you really have to go out and look personally, whether it is to the Bureaus of Vital Statistics or to a cemetery. For example, I found a cemetery description that included the name of my father’s oldest brother. Good; I have been to that cemetery and I saw the grave. But a few rows over are the graves of his parents — I saw those too — and they are not on the list. Whoever maintains this site would be happy to add photos and additional names, but one would have to go to the cemetery and take the photos. As I have mentioned occasionally, I am not a photo kind of gal.
The other nice thing about all this is that the lady who contacted me — the second cousin I mentioned at this top of this post — is also interested in genealogy and can provide details for the larger tree that the gentleman has been workin on for many years. Considering that so many of us are the children of parents who would rather not talk about the past, this is not an easy project. Nevertheless, I think our kids will appreciate it. For example, in the years since my son married a woman of Portuguese ancestry, we have found a couple of other Portuguese connections. No wonder Ms. Lila is so beautiful!
