As I’m working on who I am becoming, I’ve also been examining the people who I have been. My family has always felt like a singular unit; one that showed up in a neat package one day, with a full set of in-tact grandparents. Tidy, I’d call it, for better or for worse. Not tangled up in all that past nonsense.
I woke up a few weeks ago, blanketed in my husband’s last name, and kicked it off of me only to find my father’s last name, and his father’s, and his. The grief of all those lost maiden names came like a caffeine rush; why are all my mothers so blatantly ignored?
I’ve been digging through what’s freely available on the internet on just one side of my family, and found a hefty dose of late 19th century Germans. I found that two complete strangers born nearly 200 years ago, Marie and Peter, grew up three hours away from one another in Germany (by modern transportation). They’d marry their spouses, emigrate with their children to the US (to Indiana!), and those children would have children, who would meet each other at long last and have children—one of which was my grandfather. I got three greats into the past without even logging in.
Somehow, the internet graced me with a photo of Peter’s son Michael and his wife Johanna—my great great grandparents. “It’s probably not who you’re looking for,” you’re thinking. I thought so, too. But OH one look at Michael’s thousand-yard stare and I knew he was one of mine. I mean come on.
I know that the past is painted with thick, clumsy brushstrokes, and it can’t heal the present. But I look at the names I’ve gathered, and I’m reminded of how small I am, and simultaneously how big my life can be.
I’m raking through these leaves to find out who my family was before they were me—and to find out who they were before they were them. Mostly, I wonder what stories they told before they were given a Bible to believe in. What came before that? And what came before THAT?
There is comfort in it all, and there is a challenge: to put my history into the context of the present. To acknowledge that others have lost much more than just maiden names.
And to be a seed for better things ahead.
Next Steps: Drink a glass of water, send this photo to your family, and ask them to fill in some missing maiden names.