Lately the craze is to trace one's background. Where did your ancestors live? Why did they leave? Who stayed and where are they? Where are family members in the USA? We are learning about church registries, city records of Europe, engaging translators to read and explain these records when found. But why? Why has it become so important that it has become an American phenomenon, engaging the interest of thousands and giving employment to so many.
Well, cynically, the pandemic has provided the time for it. Sitting at home, staring at the TV for programming or streaming, books - but no libraries, no movies to go see, the kids bringing uh oh thoughts to your head after a week of particularly restless and bored whining. So enough, one says. Got to find something to do.
First we do home projects. Shelves get cleared, dusted, rearranged. Trash piles line the street. Fix it becomes a priority. And then, and then.... Well, and then comes the genetic side of keeping busy. Most of us have sent off our saliva in little tubes to one or another of the companies. We have all our lists. We have even heard from some or contacted others. My grandsons called me all excited at their results and shouted over the phone, "We're your grandsons!" Well, no kidding! But that is the excitement it generates. The question still remains, why? Why do we peruse the lists, seeking a familiar name, a name that might pop out.
My take? We seek roots. We seek a community. We seek something sure, reassuring, yet exciting. When those lists of names prove to be difficult to work with, we seek other possibilities of finding these roots, and hence the ancestor search. In these days of anomie, these days of burgeoning hatred, when one's assured essence of being American is challenged, well, we take up that challenge and find out where did we belong and how did we get here. Who are we is the question we seek to answer and off we go. And here comes the perfect way to fill those hours, reading old records, finding someone, the excitement, the phone calls to others about our discoveries, the growing feelings of roots, of belonging, of knowing we count, we belong, we are here.
For the Jewish person seeking roots, the Black person seeking roots, the displaced seeking roots, there is a deeper reason. Who are we really? Where did we belong, if anywhere? Where is that place where my ancestors found refuge - or did they never find that refuge till they came here? In fact, why did my parents come here and make me a first generation American - and am I accepted as such. People who suffered greatly from violent hatred and animosity, who were forced to undergo myriad expulsions, well, it becomes an almost frantic need to make some information permanent, especially as the older generation dies out.
For me, it became a search for my namesake. Who was she? Why did she die? Where was she killed, slaughtered, an elderly woman facing jackbooted violence. What about the rest of the family? Why did my Bubby feel so alone, no survivors found, a sadness that permeated any discussion of family, a tendency to turn that discussion elsewhere. For all Jews it became a necessity to understand how we got here and strangely enough, there is a large contingent of non Jews seeking their previously unknown Jewish connections, also trying to understand their places in society, where their roots were originally grown - and were they weak or challenged and hence had to uproot?
As with many projects, it either grows or stagnates. This search goes through phases. One hits a roadblock and stops. Then returns after some break and lo and behold, finds a way around it, through it, and finds a treasure trove of information. Success! Eureka! There is no other feeling like that, no better fuel to keep on digging. And as one digs, the information is overwhelming. For me, there were several highlights which I am sure others similarly had, but for the individual, it is beyond all description. One is not alone. One has roots and these roots have grown in some strange places, survived the harsh weather they faced, and maintained and developed. In this crazy, harsh, and uncertain world, we find a different kind of certainty and relish it - so on we dig. Time and time again.
For me, one highlight was being sent a picture of my great grandmother, my namesake, and wow! I saw my mother there in that face. I saw me in that face. I saw a real person, flesh and blood, who had children, who raised these kids for many years by herself with the death of her husband, my mother's namesake, and the sorrow, the anger, the anguish, as I truly understood that not only had my father's side been wiped out other than for basically one remaining family, so, too had my mother's and there were no survivors.
But was that true? First we found one couple, a brother to them, three children, also seeking family, and we connected. And we found hints of possibilities so on we searched. Our eyes teared at the print barely readable; we tried to make sense of contradictory records. We found the roadblock from the Holocaust when entire families were slaughtered, no one left to tell the stories of their histories to survivors here in America. We found the blockades of lack of information as records were found in churches, but synagogues and cemeteries of Jews were destroyed, so where do we go for that information. How do we move forward, onward, in this search for roots, now so much more than a time relief sitting in the house. It becomes almost a search for a Holy Grail of another type.
And thanks to the Lord Almighty we hit a treasure trove that brought great joy - and a kind of sadness - to us. We found three branches, grown into life and success, into connections, three branches from survivors who had hidden for so long till the Nazis were defeated. Three survivors who thought they, too, were alone, no one other than their immediate nuclear families. The same feelings of my Bubby. So we rejoiced, sent emails, texts, long ones, made phone calls, shared the joy and excitement, and found that the two branches in Israel did not even know of the other!
And now? Now we search on together, sharing discoveries, ideas, suggestions as to where to search next. We find a new branch here in America, here from the 1890's, and we are one. And we are so sad that my Bubby thought there was no one left, no family, no cousins, no nieces or nephews, the knowledge that those she loved, had grown up with, were killed brutally, savagely, out of a dastardly hatred that has haunted us through the millennia. And we shout up to the Heavens, screaming, with tears in our eyes, that, "Bubby, we found them! They are with you now."
So we continue on, with time to spare, with time to take up, with a driving and growing need to know more, to dig further, to make these new family ties even stronger. Yes, this craze began, for many, out of a need, and a whimsical thought that it might be interesting, but we have found so much more. We have found stronger roots, trees that will shade us, nourish us. Flowers that have bloomed. And we are happy, now onto the next phase after a bit of a rest.
Now we need to worry about more people to stay well and safe. Good exchange- finding them, joining them, sharing concerns and family. No better bargain, no better discovery than that. The same reasons for most Americans, whatever their backgrounds that impels them to start and then continue their own searches. Go to it! Enjoy!
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