So, Why Do I Blog?

A collage of my three blogs

A good conversation emerged today in one of the Facebook groups that I have joined. The question arose around the topic of writing and sharing. One participant admitted that she was not yet ready to blog and a bit nervous about it. I jumped into the dialogue and hope that I was able to encourage her to do so.  

I fully understood her point, she was hesitant and did not yet feel that she could blog. Then I thought about it-and I truly wanted to know why I have become so engaged in the blogs that I have. Now, I don't post in them all the time, and they each very different types of blogs. And though I don't post daily or weekly, they are still very important to me, and I decided to explain why. I realized why I have found blogging to be so special--it gives me the platform to share my stories.

As genealogists we all know that everyone does not share our passion.

Everyone we meet does not know the feeling of euphoria we get when we make "the big find".

Not everyone wants to hear how hard it is to find Mariah.  BUT---a fellow genealogist does!

We know the "rush" we get when we are on the trail, but we also know the emotion we feel when we find someone long sought. 

We all know how we felt when we first got started and we found the gr. grandparents in the early 20th century and we did the math when we saw their ages. We know the emotion when we realized that we were looking at someone who had been born enslaved. And when we follow that ancestor back in time to 1870---and we see the family a mere five years into freedom, we know how we felt that first time we saw that--and we want to tell everyone.

But---we also know that everyone does not share the passion.

But---there is comfort, because there is a family that wants to read about what you have found. 

There is a community that wants to read HOW I found Uncle Sephus, or WHY I was so captivated by Madam Martha Hockenhull. There are others who are excited to hear about my journey documenting a man called Spottswood Rice, and his journey to freedom and life as a dynamic AME leader. I even have a new friend whom I have never met, trying to locate the ruins of an all African American academy called Tushka Lusa Academy that thrived in the Choctaw Nation. And another friend---whom I have never met has also developed curiosity in a mysterious Black settlement that existed for several decades  in the late 1800s and early 1900s and then it disappeared. The new friend has himself become interested, and is visiting old courthouses to examine land records to see if he can also learn more.

I have tons of stories to tell and blogging allows me to share them.  

My hope is that in some way the people who were affiliated with these places will be known. 

I hope that in a small way that the names of these people who are ancestors to someone, will have their names called once again.  

My hope is that I can provide the platform so that  yes, we can call their names.

I guess that is why I blog.

"An ancestor never dies till there is no one left to call their name."

~African proverb~