Busting Through The Rock

                         

As I continue to write this blog on family history, I realize that I'm probably making a terrible mess of it all. I have so much information: documents, pictures, reflections, census, birth-death-marriage records. The list goes on and on. It's daunting thinking about sharing it all. It's hard to keep track of it all. Anyone reading would need to go back to some of my first posts. I shared the lineage of each line before I began. The problem now is ... that I have so much information, I get bogged down and then wonder which direction to go; what do I share at this juncture; what do I cull out; how do I move forward; how do I not get stuck in one area.

With that said I went back to my original few posts. I was excited to share my Quillin history and my trip to Ireland where I made connection with my "way back" roots. But as any good genealogist will tell you, you have to get from point A to point B to point C....and it goes on and on. 

I decided to not start with my parents and all the recollections of them and their documentation, etc. It was just too raw and there is far too much information. I may have NEVER moved forward. I loved them both so much. So, my initial goal was to look at my pedigree and start at the top of the tree with my grandparents. I knew them all, except for one, and loved them all. My dad's dad passed the year before I was born. I realize now that I have so much information on each level that it would be hard to move forward unless I skip some of it. It also brought up the problem of organizing all of this information. I purchased an external hard drive, found a model of "how to" document and save. That's overwhelming in itself. Yet, it is the MOST important thing in order to "prove yourself". 

So today I went back to reflect on my journey. I don't know how well I'm doing, but I have decided to move on to the next tier of branches on the tree. That would be my great-grandparents. This is the level where I had to begin the REALLY hard digging. The place where you begin to hit ROCK....truly the bedrock of my foundation. 

I was lucky in that I knew 3 of my great-grandparents personally, but I was a child and didn't know them well. So....I began interviewing anyone alive who knew these people; I began to contact courthouses, pound the pavement, visit cemeteries and try to connect with as much history as I could before it was gone. My mother was my sidekick. She adored traversing this journey with me. (Daddy did his share as well, as is documented in my "Memory Lane" posts.) I adored the time that I spent with each of them, listening to their stories. But I digress...The problem is that I LOVE the research and am intrigued when I find a new opening. (Mother loved writing the stories and collecting the photographs.) And as you know, each set of parents opens the door to another line and more information that would connect it all. AND I found that as I put flesh on the bones (meaning learning more about the intricate details of each family and their children), I began to sweep off the dirt, crack the rock and discover a whole new world that I never knew existed. 

So....as much as I would like to leap forward to the NEXT good stuff, I will present a little of each level and keep moving forward, leaving out some of the information. It looks far different laying here in my lap, than what it does trying to present it to you here on this blog. Far too overwhelming. As I slog through this blog, I realize that I can't focus on ALL the details that I actually possess. For a perfectionist, this is going to be tough. LOL.

New philosophy, skip some, move onto the next...and hopefully when I return back to point A, point Z will still be connected. No wonder why the Indians viewed life in a circle and not a straight line.