Just thinking

Today I passed by the old cemetary where my great granddaddy, Allen Taft Smith, is buried. My infant son, Luke, was cooing at me from the back seat. My thought was, "Who will tell him where his people are buried if I'm not here to do it?" Who would tell him the stories and the important places that have meaning to our family? It's possible that they'd never get around to remembering to him this old burying ground. They could never tell him the stories that my grandparents told only to me. I know things that noone else would be able to tell.

I've thought this same thing many times in the years since I began being a father. Sarah is now 24 and married. Stella is 14 and in high school and Daniel is 13 and in the 7th grade. I've known for a long time that the responsibility is mine. I'm glad that I can start now. I'm glad that the world's technology has advanced so that I can start a blog to save some of these memories. What I write may never be important to anyone but me, and that's OK. But I believe that there are people living now who will care to know these things. And descendants that I will never know will have a way to know a little more about who they are.

It feels so good to have started.