Centennial

I’ve been thinking a great deal of my aunt these past few days, having attended the viewing and funeral service last week. Since that part of our family lives in Michigan, we so rarely see them. My parents see them about once a year, on the way home from their annual trek to my brother’s house in the Midwest. But as for me, as I said in an earlier post, it had been about seven years since I last saw my aunt – until last week.

I thought a lot about the life my aunt had led. 100 years of living and breathing on this earth, going through childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, and so on. 100 long years! Born in 1907 ... think of it – 1907!!! It kind of blows me away, I guess hitting some major “history geek” chord in my being. This was the year that Oklahoma became a state; Hersey Park opened in Hersey, PA; the first Hoover vacuum came on the scene; W.H. Auden was born.

I also thought about my family on my paternal grandmother and great-aunt’s side, three (living) girls with four brothers. One sister died of croup at the age of five (scary to think that Grace suffered through croup this past fall and, thankfully, lived to tell of it), and an 11-year-old brother died of appendicitis. A while ago, in my seven-year quest to uncover our family history, I came across some copies of documents pertaining to their arrival to the U.S. from Holland. Amidst the papers were a couple of letters written by my great-great-grandmother – their grandmother – while on board the ship taking them to their new home. Her husband had gone ahead as so many men did, finding a place to live and possibly establishing a source of income, and when ready he sent or the rest of the family.

My great-great-grandmother wrote of tremendous hardship on that ship, having to take care of several small children, one of whom was my very young great-grandmother Antje, who would become the mother of my beloved grandmother and Aunt Effie. It’s been some time since I’ve read those letters, but I don’t recall hearing any telltale sign of a bad attitude, or griping about her situation, although it was truly difficult. She wrote of people stealing her soap, or her food. She worried for her children. She wrote of sickness and horrible smells. She missed her family. Yet she knew what was waiting for her; she knew it would be worth it. I’m not sure what kind of life they were leaving behind, but as with so many immigrants they believed what they were leaving was worse than what awaited them in a new country.

I thought about my great-grandmother Antje (the oldest woman in the above photo, seated in the center, surrounded by her children and grandchildren at the celebration of their 50th wedding anniversary), after whom we considered naming Grace, making that long, treacherous, and scary voyage as such a very young child. What went through her mind? What did she feel? Was she afraid or did she have that childlike freedom of any sense of fear, only excitement and adventure?

One word strikes me as I recall these stories of ancestors long gone: brave. These people were indeed brave. We have no idea what it would be like to do something like this. Sure, I’ve picked up and moved many, many times … but it’s a different world by far. My great-great-grandmother traveling alone with her children. My great-grandmother growing up and living here in this new country, so foreign and unfamiliar. My grandmother and Aunt Effie, born in the infant years of the 20th century, growing up in the decadent 1920s and smiling in countless photographs together.

I said good-bye to my grandmother when I was 8 years old, a child just beginning life and experiencing the first great rift of a loss through death. I said good-bye a few days ago to her sister, my Aunt Effie, now at age 35 and with a family of my own. It’s all pretty amazing to me.

I am so blessed to be a part of such a heritage, such a family. God knows it could have been very, very different. I was given a gift. I am truly blessed.