legend and legacy

  I just rejoined Ancestry to continue some searching. I have decided to return to the past because the future isn't looking too great. Maybe some of this liberal progressionism is rubbing off on me, I can rewrite the past. All I have to do is find alternative facts. In fact I spent several hours doing just that yesterday. I have to say I was reminded how easily it is to go off on a tangent and get yourself confused. I did manage to add some actual facts to my tree and my story. They do say you have to know were you have been in order to know where you are going. So I started once again with my third great grandfather, Johann Ludwig Reichart in Germany. Born in 1773, while our revolution was raging, married in 1823, he would die in 1850. It was his son Christian that would emigrate to America in 1856 and serve in the civil war. But already I'm jumping ahead, as I said, easy to get distracted and just wander off. Johann Ludwig Reichart is where my legacy begins, at the moment. I'm hoping to learn much more about him. 

 I do find all of that interesting and a great diversion from today. All the things that were. But I believe our legacy is only one generation away. A legacy is what we leave behind. In one definition it is just money or property, in another it is computer software. As for me, I think of my legacy as what I will leave behind of me, of who I am, and what I believe. A great deal of me came from my Dad. My attitudes, thoughts, and observations are somewhat based on what he taught me either directly, or by his actions. I was one of those boys that spent years trying to be his father, only to discover that person is more myth than fact. I'm still trying to find me, and I have to say I'm a little nervous about meeting him!   I have come to understand our lives are a mixture of fact and fiction. And fact; fact is what we choose to tell ourselves. It is the only logical conclusion I can reach when thinking about others choices. Surely they believe that to be the truth, otherwise they would have to be crazy to believe what they do. I also keep that in mind as I write down my thoughts for future generations to read. It is my hope, that some future generation will read what I have written with an impartial approach, as a means of gaining insight into what will be their past. I also believe that must be done by someone that never knew you while you were alive. Those that knew you cannot be impartial or unbiased. 

 I have little in the way of actual documents to read from the past as far as my family goes. I have no journals, diaries or manuscripts. I was given a sort of biography written by a great grand Uncle of mine. Fascinating to read about his life and what he thought about certain topics. There are no great revelations in that document however, nothing surprising. Nothing I would wish to cling onto, claim for my own. I see a lot of folks doing that these days and I question it. Can we really ride on the laurels of the past? Are we somehow entitled to claim their accomplishment as our own? Can we claim whatever hardship and injustice they endured as our own? Should we be compensated for the past? No, I don't believe we should, that enters into the realm of fiction, it was fact for them. It is fiction today. 

 It isn't death that I fear, it is being forgotten. That is what makes me the saddest. I say sad because that is the emotion. I suppose you say in death I still wish to impose my thoughts into the conversation. When I was small I was told to leave the room when adults were talking. Children were to be seen and not heard. As an adult I have discovered most of the conversations the "adults" are having are nothing very serious. The talk is usually about the things we shouldn't be doing but enjoy doing anyway. Or the adults are talking about what others are doing wrong, what we call gossip. In a way I do think the older way, not allowing the children to engage in the adult conversations, was a better method. It certainly kept children from becoming disillusioned early on in life. Much of what I heard about my parents was fiction until I became old enough, then facts were interjected and the story made more sense. Of course there is a down side to that, much of the truth is lost in that fashion, fiction becomes a habit. Doctors may call that denial, but the fact is, they believe the story they have told so many times, it has become their fact. 

 I do try to write as honestly as possible. I have already met with some criticism about that. Once I was met with rage and indignation! I won't say who that was but only that is was a family member. The story I had written didn't reflect their version of the story. I only told my truth and my opinion of what those facts meant. Yes, it was speculative in nature. I hadn't heard those conclusions from the person I was writing about. Still, in the truth there lies a certain risk. And no more so than when expressing your own opinions. The tempering of the truth requires a very skillful hand. I fear I am not adequate to the task but struggle on anyway. Torn between the desire to leave a complete and accurate record, and having others reading that record today, the balance is a delicate one indeed. There are secrets, secrets best left alone and secrets best left between yourself and your God. Life doesn't have to be a tell all. But it is what we don't know that interests us the most. That is the truth, even when the truth is fiction. Some become a legend in their own time, others become a legend in their own mind, and others legend over time. Is the legend true? 

 Ah, legend and legacy. Two subjects worthy of study if you wish to understand yourself. Once you fully understand the differences between them you will have started down the path. Some people will try to live a legend while others concentrate on legacy. Is our legacy really the things we leave behind? Is that what drives some to acquire wealth and property? Is it a desire to leave tangible evidence of their existence? That may be the case even when they are not aware of that. It is my feeling what I leave behind will disappear in short order. By that I am talking about the material things, as for wealth, no one is inheriting a fortune. Perhaps that is why I feel compelled to leave my thoughts behind the only way I can, by writing them down. Man started doing that by drawing pictures on the wall of a cave and that desire remains in each of us. It is primordial. The experts do not know what the real meanings of cave art is. It is speculated that they had a religious connection, some shamanic purpose perhaps. I think it was an appeal to whatever their concept of God was and a cry for help. It could just as easily been a means to boast of their accomplishments. A desire to leave a legacy, a desire to let others know, I was here. To not be forgotten.