You know how sometimes a topic will find it’s way into your life via various methods, all around the same time? Well, that has kinda happened to me in the past few weeks or so. First, one of the bloggers I read posted about her new found hobby of researching her genealogy.Then, one of my best friends from high school posted a Facebook status about ancestry.com. And finally, another blogger that I read posted this awesome family tree that she designed. Coincidence? I think not.
Isn’t this beautiful? And it goes back six generations. I think I can do four (including me) after some deep thinking.{via Legacy Digital Design}
I’ve always been really interested in genealogy. Incidentally, last week I took the Jung personality test for the first time and it told me that I valued family history, which was cool. It also told me I put a high value on social status and birth right, which I do not, so I chose to ignore that tidbit. I love history and I like finding my family’s place in it. Plus, it often involves some detective work, which is appealing. (what I don’t find appealing is dead-end questions you never find the answer to. But that is a different story).
I think family trees themselves are fascinating. When I was little, I used to practically study the family tree that my mom had filled out by hand on the first page of my baby book. I just really liked reading the names and looking at the relationships. As a teenager, I became addicted to The Sims 2 and I basically bred my Sims in a giant web of family connections spanning at least four generations (no, I didn’t have much of a life in high school. Thank you for asking.) When you think about it, a family tree is just another way of displaying information. Since I started blogging, I have come across some really beautiful ways of displaying family trees*.
The only downfall of the family tree is that it often only shows linear ancestry. I want a tree that shows the whole thing. Siblings, cousins, you name it. I want one that starts at a certain generation and then goes down. I guess that would be a family… shrub? Web? Tapestry? I get that it would be ginormous, but I wish that some apparatus would try to master it. Even ancestry.com doesn’t allow you to see ALL of the people you have entered in one window. You have to click on the different members to show all of the relationships. They can do it in Harry Potter; why can’t modern technology can figure it out? (The Black Family tree, anyone?)
I guess that for now I’ll just have to pick some brains and come up with my own family tree. Maybe someday I’ll visit some of my relatives who have looked into this. Someday I would really like to visit Cincinnati, where my Mom’s whole family is from and meet those folks (I’m talking to you, Grandma Jane!)
*I tried to find examples, but of course I failed. I’ll add them if I find them.
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