January 2000 January 1999 January 1998 Rachel's Daily Diary _________________ Thursday 20 January 2000   7 43 pm pst   [ want to know ] Today I rekindled my passion for genealogical research. My gradfather let me know that we are related to a well know politial comentator and that there is some bad blood between his branch of the family and mine. Oh, and my grandfather can't remember how we are related. So, I tracked down an e-mail address on this guy. I wrote and said that I believe that we are related and I hope he can provide me with some info. I hope that the message isn't discarded if it is opened by an assistant! I crawled back through my Family Tree folder and took a look of how much information I have on each branch. I found half-written letters that need

I have the most information about the family of my paternal grandmother's father. Of the six branches you can see on the left side, I still need to make contact with two.

I just recently located my first decendent on the tree of my paternal grandmother's mother. He is an older gentleman, and said he has many grandchildren in the New York area. I am excited at the prospect of getting to know all these new relatives. I've got to mail him a list of questions... I have so much more information on my father's mother's family than on any other branches (my father's father or my mother's family). I have loved getting to know so many relatives, and I am especially delighted when I come across another researcher.

The family of my father's father's father is the one from which I get my last name. There are many branches I have yet to track down. This has been a particularly difficult tree. In the tree, two first cousins got married and had children. The female cousin came to live the male to escape the Holocaust. They grew up together and eventually married, with their rabbi's consent. I have lots of family members who died in the Holocaust, and I would like to put names and faces to them. I would like to be able to remember them and I would like to be able to teach my children about them, so they can be remembered forever. I want to know.

The tree of my father's father's mother was my skimpiest, until I went to meet my 82-year-old cousin last year. She filled me in with dozens and dozens of names and now the tree is bulging. Where it says my branch I made a not to see another tree, so my branch isn't even shown there. All of those people are decendents of other branches. You will see that the third branch, the one of my 82-year-old, is lush with names, but I have not located any of the other branches, so the tree has many blossoms waiting to bloom.

This tree depicts the lineage of my mother's father. My grandfather was on of eleven children, only two of who are still living (a third of which died during my cross-country trip before I had a chance to meet her or even talk with her). There is nowhere to go with this tree except back to the homeland: Germany. There is little hope of information there, as the family most likely emigrated because they were peasants.

The tree of my mother's mother is the most bare. I was able to contact one person, who gave me the addresses of two others, but neither of them responded to my letters, which means I will have to contact them again. Persistence is the only way to get anywhere with genealogical research. There is more than one case of mental illness on this branch (my grandmother was schizophenic) and thus my mother and her brothers didn't bother to stay in touch. They think I am rather absurd for wanting to track down these people, but I find my lineage endlessly fascinating... I will keep searching.

I find it slightly disconcerting to read of my years ago, and find myself engrossed in the world of school. No doubt I will later be amused by my current streak on finding a job. What a gift to finally have graduated. * * * two years ago today: "My spark is back. I walk down the street with my big dopey grin and I let trickles of laughter bubble over at various moments." * * * one year ago today: "I am in the middle of a bit of a crisis. I am trying to enroll in classes, make sure I can graduate, and try to work out my dance minor." * * * one month ago today: "It was colder today; it was snowing. The sun never came out. And I was the goddess of the mountain." * * * <   yesterday   |   month   |   tomorrow   > ~   back to Rachel's Daily Diary   ~