Mediums

THANKSGIVING DAY…

Posted on by dvn ms kmz time travel

It has been a very long time since the dead have talked to me… Or maybe it has been a really long time since I have taken the time to listen to them when they start speaking. Either way, a long time it has been. Two days ago, Thanksgiving to be exact, the chatter started up loud and clear.

Oddly enough though, I couldn’t really pay attention to the dead and their stories because the living story begged to be told.

SO. Here it is. The living story that the dead are begging me to tell so I can get back to them and THEIR stories…

I searched all over for a picture of a Thanksgiving food fight that I could insert here in order to convey the level of disaster Thanksgiving was for me, but I couldn’t find one (at least not one that clearly defined who I needed to give credit to and thus, I chose none for fear of being searched out by the copyright police).

To be fair, there was no literal food fight and the ‘fight’ was probably only felt by me, but still…

I guess the best place to start is dinner… I got drafted to the adult table. After living 37 years, I made it. Except, that totally isn’t where I wanted to be. I would have much rather have squeezed into a place at the kiddie table with my sister, kids and nephew, but that just wasn’t in the cards for me this year.

Dinner was completely awkward and uncomfortable- FOR ME. My brain (you’ll remember, I have been recovering from a brain injury) decided to play random tricks of reality on me and I found myself making comments on people that were relevant 15 years ago, as opposed to the 1 year ago my brain told me it  had been. I tried to join the conversations going on around me, but no one was having any of that. My brief forays into the conversations were met with barely concealed eye rolls or one word replies, that left little room for me to continue. I tried to interject accomplishments about my kids and myself- all to no avail.

Dinner sucked and I found myself wishing I had stayed home.

After everyone had finished eating and most everyone had left the table, the conversation somehow turned to the ancestors… I perked up. I was ecstatic. This was a conversation I could participate in. After retrieving ‘the books’, I sat down with my phone in hand ready to take notes and share.

But, as I sat listening to the information being passed on, I began to have questions and things weren’t adding up right… So, in a small lull in the conversation, I asked the only question I would be allowed, “how do you know that these people are in our family?” (Some names had been retrieved from the courthouse that have the same sir name as that side of the family and now they were being presented as our ancestors because of their general proximity to where documented ancestors came from. I had theories on these people being in our family, but no proof or documentation, so I genuinely wanted to know how to document these people.) The answer I got was not satisfying. It was vague. It was, “because I knew people who knew first hand.” (This may have been true for people further down on the list of names, but I was speaking of the first few names on the list- of whom no one would personally know, as they were born or lived in the late 1700s and early 1800s. I tried rephrasing my question and another relative was quick to answer, “I get what you are saying and I get what [person] is saying, too. A lot of our history is going to be word of mouth and not written down.” Hmmm. I don’t believe that. And as I am the one who has spent countless hours in courthouses and cemeteries gathering information, I know that there is always something to document a person’s life, existence and connections- sometimes, those things are just very well hidden.

After that, I was shunned from the conversation and accused of disturbing the order of documents (that I had never seen). Documents were pulled out and shown- but not to me. Alas, no one was interested in the things I had gathered or wanted to share…

And that’s how my Thanksgiving went. It was not the time of my life.I probably won’t go back for any more holidays and that’s okay.

There is good coming from my Thanksgiving disaster and that is the dead people started shouting at me again or I started hearing them again or whatever. Last night and into the wee hours of the morning, I was chasing down cousins long dead and they were showing themselves to me. Those names that were thrown about during the aforementioned Thanksgiving dinner are rattling around in my brain, begging to have their fair share of talk time. I can’t wait to dig in and hear the stories they are obviously begging to tell and who knows? Maybe I will eventually find them sitting on a branch in my tree…

Haunted by the Junk Drawer

Posted on by dvn ms kmz time travel

https://i0.wp.com/www.amyvolk.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/junk-drawer-pattywest-blogspot.jpg

There is absolutely no denying it. We all have one. And more times than we will ever admit, we have wondered where something was only to remember that it (whatever it is) is in the junk drawer and in the junk drawer is where it will stay, because who really has the time or inclination to go searching through the junk drawer? If you’re anything like me (and I’m pretty sure you are), you have duplicates of things simply because you’d rather not waste valuable time ‘cleaning’ the junk drawer… Am I right or am I right? Junk drawers come in all shapes and sizes, but for me and my dead people, it is Ancestry’s shoe box and the yellow spiral notebook. If I am out ‘in the field’ any questionable tidbits or I want to look into this further things get jotted down in the yellow spiral notebook and if I am browsing through Ancestry’s bazillion records and I come across a this might be so and so document it gets tossed into the shoe box. There’s no shame in my game and I will readily admit that once something goes in, it almost NEVER comes back out- no matter how good my good intentions may be.

Clearly, my junk drawers could use some love, affection and attention. I keep telling myself that one of these days I need to make it my weekend project- especially now that winter is upon us and I won’t be doing a whole lot of outdoor exploring any time soon. Except, I always find something else to do…

That’s when my dead people came to the rescue. Or rather they became extremely bothersome, like they don’t know what it’s like to have things to do or something. Anywho… My dead people have been extremely quiet as of late- I think they were offended by something I said- and I had nearly given up hope that I would ever hear from them again, until about two or three weeks ago.

Are you familiar with the Freedman’s Bureau? (I really, really hope so, otherwise I am not entirely sure I want us to continue in this friendship…) I was checking my email (read deleting all the junk mail) when I came across an email from what I thought was The Freedman’s Bureau. I started shaking from excitement. (I know this particular bureau is no longer in existence and has been disbanded for quite sometime. I get it. However, remember brain injury. And that sometimes makes me read things that words don’t actually say.) I didn’t even open it. I was very diligent in continuing with the task at hand and getting rid of all those pesky emails. Then I sat down to see what kind of interesting documents or clues or what have you there would be. I opened the email. I didn’t understand what was happening. Why was the Freedman’s Bureau sending me information on debt? Was one of my ancestors in debt and they (I can’t even begin to tell you who I thought they were) had found these debtor records? I clicked out of the email. Reread the sender information. Freedman’s Bureau. I clicked back into  the email. Now my brain decided to slowly start working again… Freedom Debt Relief. Umm, what? I really thought this was my sister’s idea of a sick joke or something, so I clicked out of the email again. Ohhhh. Can you just imagine the look of disappointment on my face as realization dawned that I had misread things? Yeah, I wish I could have seen it too. Once my dismay ebbed. I determined that it was the dead people back from where ever and they had been talking to me again. Okay I need to search the Freedman’s Bureau of records. But for who? It would have been to much like right for them to give me a name along with their hint, you know? But, I was in the middle of things and so I just scribbled a quick note in- you guessed it- the yellow spiral notebook.

Days later, my dead people upped the ante. I was asleep and I dreamed that a Union Civil War Soldier was staring at me through the sliding glass door. This dream was so intense, I woke up and was terrified that someone was looking through the blind covered glass doors. It was so real, I could almost make out the name or whatever those scratch marks on the side of his Union cap said. Almost. Alright this was confirmation that my dead people weren’t mad at me anymore. Again, I made a quick note in the infamous yellow spiral notebook. After all, I had a pleasant little nap to get back to…

Later that same night, I had another dream. This time a baby was playing on my back while I slept in the dream. Again, it felt real, extremely real. So real that I woke up calling my daughter’s name to ask her why she had put the baby on my back while I was asleep. Her name became stuck on the tip of my tongue, as I realized that the baby was actually in his crib and sound asleep. Again in it went into the yellow spiral notebook, to keep the others before it company.

If you’re keeping track, this is the run down of things thus far- I need to go to the Freeman’s Bureau and see what that will turn up, I needed to look more closely at any male relatives that served in the Civil War and someone had a baby that didn’t live, I assume.

Then last night came the incessant tapping at my widow. It was nerve wracking. It was terrible, really. Because unless someone was playing a truly fantastic game of ‘Knock, Knock Ginger’ (I didn’t grow up calling it Ginger, but I am grown up now and Ginger sounds so much nicer), then there was no one there. And then my toilet flushed- all by itself. That’s when I called the girl-child’s daddy.

I get it. My dead people missed me and they are wanting me to find them. In the junk drawer… oh boy.

Anyway, I am rambling all over the place, when really all I needed to have said was “check your junk drawer people”- but that would have been boring and there is already enough of that in the world, don’t you think? Well, that’s what I will be doing ALL DAY on Saturday and Sunday too- if I can sneak away. You should join me! I know you have a junk drawer- but have you gone through it recently? What kind of things did you turn up? I am eager to hear your success stories (and your failures- if you must). Leave me your comments and don’t forget to like and share!