Jonathon

I am looking for ghosts again this weekend. Can we say obsessed? A little. If you understood my financial situation you would understand why I am digging in. Other than that I will give you several reasons. I can be Indiana Jones or any other number of adventuring archaeologist type. I am setting out on a project believing it will go one way and it always, always goes in a different direction. LOL.... what in my life does not...LOL Like a moment ago. I went downstairs to make a cocoa and ended up trying to rearrange my dining room. I had been putting birth certificate copies and death certificate copies and copies of this and that in files and I decided toorganize the files and post them on line to my tree to share with others. Which brings me to wondering why some people go to all the trouble of research and then do not wish to share with others what they have found. Is it a top government secret? Is it a threat to National security? Have they found the Area 51 papers? Like something their Great Grand Uncle 7x removed did will jeopardize them? People!! It is myth and legend and stories and tales. None of us were there so we can not say what is truth and what is not. One tale completely leaves out a side of the family that went in their minds "rogue". So to you "experts" you claim the writer is wrong. No, it is his story and he was incredibly patriotic and left out those people. He was ashamed of them and maybe just maybe, his wife who was related to the "rogues" by the way, maybe her family agreed to it. Maybe even asked that he do it. Get out of the so called facts of a paper trail and use a little common sense. Put yourself in their shoes. How would they feel? OK, ....LOL.... I am discovering a rich tradition of military service of my family. We were senators and congressional representatives and we stood (like in private conversation) with George Washington at Valley Forge and nursed the injured and wounded on the battlefield, on and on the history, legends, tales and myths go. Maybe I will discover that little gem of a tale that leads to another tale that leads to a clue to an obscure book in my book case that tells and points to something of great value. Like in the movie Fools Gold. Treasure is not always tangible. I reading about our, Americas, history from the people who were there. Not the people who wrote books for high school. Tales and letters and stories about relatives told at Thanksgiving dinners. I get to take day long vacations to places I have been to and to places I have not. I am searching through pages and pages of fashion from eras gone by trying to date the clothing in photos. Learning about whale bone corsets and how it was imperative as a man to be able to tie the correct knot in your tie depending on the time of day or where you were going. I am getting to know these people. Who they may have been. What they did. I discovered that the reason I can not find members of my immediate family is because they all up and went to California and were there in Sacramento helping to build the new state. They were there when the shooting incident occur ed in the court. They were friends of one of the men. I know this does not interest every one. That is a good thing. My children may not care. Or they may in another 40 years want to know. But right now I can look at a 120 year old book on my book shelf and I know the girl to whom it belonged 120 years ago.These ghosts I play with take on their own little personalities. Some tell me everything. Some tell me nothing. Some have nice stories and some have tragedy. Some were nefarious and some heroic. I do not like the ones that tell me nothing. No hint, no clue. Others have left behind lots of clues. Others leave clues, just not easy clues. Take for instance Johnathon. Legend says he was real but fact says prove it. since legend and myth are born of fact I must dig deeper. To really solve this to my satisfaction I must move. There is only so much information available on the web. Surprise! Now which ghost should I track down today?