The Tree of Me (parts of it)

I was watching some CBC show that follows pseudo celebrities on their path to look into their Canadian ancestry. And then I was like ‘meh, but I cannot do that.’ Well for one, I do not have much history in this country aside from my parents, anything and anyone further back is an immigrant, and tended to be a farmer, schoolteacher or something other. Yet although none of them were the Supreme Court justice, or a public figure I can hear recordings of (or enjoy the wealth of!) I do have a lot of quite extreme and interesting stories from Europe and these long past relatives. To name a few I can say how my great grandfather lived and worked in the U.S.A and Argentina for years before returning to his home country (Old Country as they say), a great uncle served multiple military agencies as a spy, another was a professor who knew many political leaders and spoke 7 languages, a great grandmother raised all 8 brothers and sisters essentially on her own, someone else was a merchant, another few restaurateurs, another few doctors, another a principle, and many saw unspeakable horrors in various wars and occupations.

I typically do not mention the specifics of my closer family, I.e. grandparents, it feels too close to home, they came here lived/and live good, and some saw some horrible things during the war(s).

So I cannot document a lot of this and look through an English historical library, but it is very fascinating. I do not know what their IQ’s were, some were obviously high and some not. Like every family. Some had it simple, most did not. Looking back through their pasts though I can say as a writer thank you: to the nice ones, the not so nice ones, the ones who had success, and the ones who lost it all. They all lived incredibly in some way and selfishly I can also say, gave me a lot of material for the future.

The weird part, as self obsessed as it sounds, is thinking that all these very different people are all part of me somehow. Kind of freaky methinks.