Ancestry

Mike and I are fresh off a mini-vacation. We traveled last week to the East Coast, to attend a friend’s wedding and to do some sightseeing. It was glorious!

We are tremendously lucky that Mike’s mom came out and stayed with Michaela (who was thrilled to have one-on-one time with her nana). They had adventures of their own while Mike and I galavanted, first in Gettysburg, PA, then in New Jersey for the wedding, followed by a few days in Philadelphia.

Gettysburg was amazing. It was tremendously powerful. The site is huge, which I hadn’t necessarily been expecting. One of the highlights was the cyclorama, which is an enormous painting that depicts, very realistically, one of the skirmishes of the battle. The cyclorama has been restored and is in a new(ish) building that includes lights and sound effects that makes the fight very realistic. We talked for miles, seeing various sites and touring the museum. One of the things that I found so amazing was that the museum didn’t just have a lot of Civil War artifacts. It had artifacts that were matched very specifically to particular individuals. Not just famous generals, but rank-and-file soldiers. Everything from belt buckles to sabres to guns to backpacks and Bibles. It was fascinating. The fact that the community of Gettysburg came together after the battle to establish a memorial and to designate it as a sacred spot… What forethought!

I was struck, while at Gettysburg, but a very real connection to history. There are many explanations about why the Civil War was fought. It was about slavery. It was about economics. It was about states’ rights. The thing is, it impacted me in a very personal way. My ancestors were slaves. When I went to Mississippi several years ago, I saw the place they toiled. In bondage. And the Civil War made them free. There, at Gettysburg, the Union won a victory that made a major impact on millions of lives, including my ancestors’, and mine, and Michaela’s, and those of whatever children she may have. It was a very profound feeling.

It seems fitting, then, that I came home from the trip to my mother’s day present from Mike, a DNA test from National Geographic that will help shine a light on the details of my ancestry. I guess that’s the next phase of this journey.