A Transplant but with Roots!

 This truly is an amazing World, if we choose to see it that way.  I like to approach Life with my eyes wide open.  I don't want to miss any of its wonders.  Eyes wide open.  Mind wide open.  Don't miss a thing (hopefully). 

I was born and raised in Chicago.  (I'm getting to my "small world" point in a minute.)  In 1975, at the age of 26, I moved to Sacramento California.  When I was about 30 years old, I started college, primarily for classes to further my career, but it transformed into a love of learning.  I took classes for the better part of 30+ years.  Although I'm on hiatus now, I still grab a webinar, online class or in person class whenever I can.

In the early 1980s, my Humanities professor, Dr David Warren at Sacramento City College, assigned a family tree for the class.  That was the start of my family tree and I've been working on it, on and off, ever since.  I've had more time to work on it since I retired April 2006.

When I started my family tree, my family was small, or so I thought.  I assumed that my family came to Chicago from the Old World.  Most did.  Then I learned about my paternal great grandparents - the parents of my dad's mother, Gertrude Sophia Minor.  Henry B Minor was born in Uniontown PA and his wife, Sophia Booi, was born in Chicago but her mother and father came from Holland and England (respectively).  

Huh.  Pennsylvania.  Who knew?  No one in the family had ever mentioned it.  My family, and my world, was suddenly larger that I knew previously.  Then, shortly after moving to Winchester VA in December of 2015, I learned that my great-grandfather, Henry B Minor was in the PA Cavalry, and he is on the PA State Memorial at Gettysburg.  Wow.  Henry was born 3 hours from where I am now and he fought at Gettysburg, 3 hours from where I am now. 

Wait.  My ever-enlarging family and world is, in some way, getting smaller (if that makes sense).  In just the past year or so, I've learned that my Minor ancestors originated in Connecticut when Thomas Minor came from England in the 1620s (conflicting years on that).  There were a lot of Minor children, and some moved down the east coast and others across the country in the following years.  

I recently learned that my 5th great-grandparents, Stephen and Athalia Minor lived in Winchester in the mid-1700s, at the time Winchester was being founded!  (It was originally called Frederick City I think.)  So, here is my SMALL WORLD.  Here I am in Winchester VA.  Additionally, Henry B Minor was apparently in Winchester and Opequon (about 15 minutes from me) during his time in the cavalry during the Civil War.  I'm gobsmacked!  Yes, I am a transplant but I have ROOTS here in the Shenandoah Valley!

One important thing to note.  As a former tax auditor, I like documentation, and I feel the need to analyze and verify.  Although I have a lot of information to show that I have the correct ancestral line back to Thomas Minor, I feel that I can use some additional documentation to be 100% sure.  I have over 60 DNA matches to folks who also have a MINOR in their family tree.  DNA doesn't lie but family trees online often contain errors.  I need to be honest and say that I could be wrong, but I'm working on verifying.  If I'm wrong, then that would mean that Ulysses S Grant is not my 6th cousin 3x removed.  Oh well. The other folks in my family, in my Life, are more important anyway.

Fifteen years ago today we brought Woody home and into our family.  Yesterday we put Woody to sleep.  He lived a good life.  Today we brought him hom for the last time.  Frank, my husband, took him to All Pets Cremation Center in Winchester yesterday. I went with him today to bring Woody home.  The staff were wonderful.  Great compassion.  I felt that they genuinely cared about Woody.  Woody will be missed.  RIP sweet boy.

PS - Trouble publishing.  May not post today.

Huh.  Just saw this draft.  Will it still publish? (from 2016!)

My Life's Story - Just a start (hopefully not a false start)

My, how time passes!  I haven't posted for quite a while but that does NOT mean that I haven't been doing anything.  Perhaps that's my problem - too busy with other stuff. 

My posts are primarily for me.  I need a place to record my thoughts.  My past.  My life history.  My daughter spent a lot of years without me in her Life.  I'll go into the details about that as I write down my history.  There are no bells and whistles here.  Most folks will find this boring and not bother to return.  That's okay.  As long as I can record what I need to say to my daughter, I'll be happy.

I've started to write, several times, on my laptop in a Word document.  I struggle with HOW to start.  How to organize.  Do I write events and memories chronologically?  Or by category?  Or a combination of both?  I think it will be a combination.  For instance, my early years.  My fractured school life.  Giving birth to my daughter, and other major events in my Life. 

I can see that I haven't had any comments on "recent" posts, and that's all right.  Again, this is for me, and my daughter.  If I continue to have "false starts" in a Word doc, I'm afraid they will never see the light of day.  Also, I cannot continue to agonize over what I should, and shouldn't write.  I just need to unleash and let go of my thoughts.  No walls. I've held back too long.  It's time to break down those walls, or at least open the windows and let the light shine in, or OUT.  

Hmmm.  This is rather cathartic.  It feels good.  I'm on my way.  Let's hope it's not another 2 years before I write again.  However, from past experience, I know I'll get distracted and forget to write.  No matter.  I've taken the first step.  

My "working title" for My Story is Memoirs of an Amateur.  I read Oscar Levant's autobiography, Memoirs of an Amnesiac, decades ago.  That title has stuck with me all these years.  

Again, NO bells.  NO whistles.  Additionally, NO ADS!  (No one would pay me for this!)

Later!

In Search of my Father

I have fond memories with my father in my early years. After his nervous breakdown in the mid-1950s (PTSD no doubt) things weren't the same, but I always knew he was a good soul. My dad was lost to the family a while back and I've been doing what I can to find him. In 2016 I flew to Chicago to file a police report, and after that I submitted my DNA locally so I could be entered into a nationwide database (NamUs). A cousin also submitted her DNA. I doubt that my father is still alive, but I'm hoping a DNA match will bring him "home" so I know that he is, finally, at peace. He deserves that. I guess I'm saying all this because it's Father's Day weekend. When we're young we may not always appreciate the parents we have. Remember that they won't always be there so enjoy them while you can. I think of my father just about every day, and I hope & pray that I find him some day.

I copied this (the above paragraph) from my Facebook page.  I don't post to FB a lot, and I post to my blog even less often.  I've never been in the habit of writing in a journal every day.  I'm more of a "bad weather" journal writer.  I tend to write, or have bouts of inner discovery, when I'm a bit sad, contemplative, or just in a "mood" that I can't explain.  I've been that way since I was a teenager.  

I really want to write more but the "Real World" keeps getting in the way.  How does one find time to write about Life when busy living Life????  I don't know and that's why I take long breaks between posting to my Blog and to Facebook.  I also posted a couple of photos to my FB when I posted the above paragraph.  I'll post those to my Blog later.

City Girl Gone Wild: Birds of a Feather, or not.

I was born & raised in Chicago.  Within the city limits of Chicago.  Many people say they're from Chicago, but when I ask "where" specifically, it turns out to be a suburb.  Yeah, I was a City Girl.  Thankfully, when I grew up in the 1950s, we took trips out of town, and I got to know the countryside, farms, lakes, and fishing.  So, I guess you could say I was a City Girl with a bit of a "country heart."   I used to say I wanted to live on a farm, or in a castle.

In 1975 I moved to Sacramento California, and in the early 1990s I moved to the small town of Loomis.  That was my first experience living in the country.  We had sheep, chickens, Guinea fowl, turtles, migrant ducks, geese, herons, egrets, night visits from bear, raccoons, possum, skunks,  bob cats and the usual snakes, lizards and various song birds and birds of prey.  We had an abundance of wild life.

I now live in the Shenandoah Valley of the State of Virginia.  It is SPECTACULAR!  The wildlife is different from that in CA, but much of it's the same,and I think we have even more here than we did in CA.  I had a lot of material for short stories while living in CA, and I'm adding to that here in VA.  I take a lot of photos and some videos.  I just tried to up load a video of just some of what I see here, but it's too large.  I'll work on getting that here in a different way or by shrinking the file.  More later. 

Aha!  I was able to edit the video and upload it a few days later.  The video shows different critters on the ground under the bird feeder.

I'm Melting, I'm Melting!

I'm melting!  My heart, that is.  What?!?   My heart is melting - quite often when I observe one of my grand children, one of my pets, and even some of the wild critters around our house.  How can my heart not melt when a grand child calls me Nana?  How can my heart not melt when one of my cats tilts his head inquiringly while observing me perform an ordinary task?  How can my heart not melt when I watch a parent bird feed a gaping-mouthed baby bird?  Thank goodness I'm melting.  I can't imagine living my life with a cold, hard heart.  It isn't just words.  It's definitely a warm fuzzy feeling I get.  Yeah, I guess it's the melting of my heart.

I Must Be Crazy Because . . .

Wow!  It's been a long time since I last posted.  I guess I'm not a "blogger" because I seldom blog.  Why?  I guess I'm too busy living my life.  I'm too busy, or I just don't think about, blogging.  As a "part-time" blogger I'm assuming I don't have any followers so I look at this blog as my own, personal journal.  I may be the only one who reads it and that's okay.  So, with that in mind, I've had something on my mind.

Years ago, more than half my life ago, I was in an unhealthy relationship.  I was young and naive at the time.  I had a rough child hood, but I've managed, over the years, to make a good life for myself.  Although I was young and naive I wasn't so young and naive that I didn't have enough sense to get out of the unhealthy relationship.  Looking back on it, that was one of the best things I ever did for myself.  (That and I quit smoking about the same time.)  There were, however, some repercussions that were unforeseen at the time that I left the relationship.  That's a long story for another day though.

Throughout that unhealthy relationship I was made to feel unworthy, small, and whatever other negative feelings I had heaped upon me.  (I have since learned that I have control of my feelings, and no one can make me feel bad about myself if I don't allow it.)  My partner in that relationship led me to believe  that I was crazy.  He made others believe that too.  Why?  Good question.  I've been giving it some thought lately.  (I think because I recently heard about a lie that he is still telling others about me and our relationship.)  As a result, I've come up with a list of reasons why I must have been crazy in my younger years.  They aren't in any particular order.   Read below.

I Must Be Crazy Because: 

• I couldn’t pee in front of him when he declared that I should be able to.
• I followed the command of a “Don’t Walk” sign by stopping at the curb rather than walking into the street as he did.  His comment was “You follow that?” or something similar. 
•  I chose to take classes so that I could get my GED certificate. (Why would I need that?)
•  I took the test to get my driver’s license.  (Again, why would I need that?  I wasn’t expected to do anything on my own, probably because I wasn’t deemed  “capable.”) 
• I used too much toilet paper – more than the 3 squares that he thought were adequate. 
• I didn’t talk enough.  I was often told that I needed to talk more. 
•  I said something stupid when I did talk.  After leaving a small party one night, I was told "What'd you say that for? That was stupid.”  (His exact words.  They are burned in my memory.)  No doubt stupid by his standards, but no, it wasn’t stupid in reality.  (Hmmm.  Damned if I do, and damned if I don’t.) 
•  I sat like a lump on a log when his friends visited.  (One of his friends came by when he was out one evening.  We talked for a while and after a bit the friend cocked his head to one side and said “You aren’t so crazy after all.”   Where did he get the idea that I was crazy?  Hmmm.  I wonder.) 
•  I couldn’t make his sandwiches the right way.  I shouldn’t have spread the filling all the way to the edge of the bread because it would ooze out.  (Hmmm.  Didn’t he realize that after a bite along the edge of the sandwich, there would be a new edge and the filling could, just possibly, ooze out anyway????) 
• I made his food too greasy. 
•  I made his food too hot. 
•  I made his food not hot enough. 
•  I wasn’t always immediately willing to drop what I was doing to perform some sort of sex act when he “suggested” it. 
•  I expected him to do the dishes when I could not due to a splint on my broken finger.  
•  I put the dirty dishes on his dresser.  (No, he didn’t do them even then.  Instead, he had a couple of girls over when I was out at class one evening.  One of those girls did the dishes.) 
• I struck out at him once when he backed me up against a wall while berating me about one thing or another.  (Yeah, I think I actually scratched his arm when I struck out.  I felt threatened as he loomed over me with his greater height and his over bearing presence.  I was, figuratively, pinned against the wall and reflexively struck out.) 
• I didn’t like it when I came home after class one night and found our daughter was being watched by a friend who just happened to be a heroin addict.  (Silly me for being critical about that.) 
• I got a bit upset when he left for the “store” about 10 pm and didn’t get home until sometime after sunrise the next day.  (Later on I got to be good friends with the young woman he was visiting on those outings.  Since we hung around with the same people, she saw me over time and realized that I wasn’t the big-biker-chick-type who was going to beat her up if I found out about her. ) 
• I was extremely introverted until I gave birth to my daughter.  (Having a baby changes a lot!)
• I couldn't shop lift and I got upset when I found out (afterwards) that he had shoplifted while we were in a store.  (I have to admit, though, that he also shoplifted in my presence, and I was too timid to challenge him at the time.  After all, he was doing it because "they charge too much" for the goods.  Didn't he realize that his shoplifting habit was part of the cost of goods sold???)
• I couldn't lie in order to get more welfare than that to which I was entitled.  (Grammar????)   I received all of $16 a month in order to cover incidentals that I needed for myself and my daughter.  I couldn't lie and say that I had to pay room & board when I was given it for free from a family member.  He, on the other hand, took another person's female child to the welfare office in an attempt to receive welfare.  (At least that's what he told me.  Since he was known to tell tales, I was never sure what was  true and what wasn't.)
• I was just a wee bit happy when his motorcycle was stolen from the parking lot just outside our kitchen window.  Was I being mean?  No, I just thought it was kharma biting him in the butt because he bought the motorcycle with ill gotten gains.

So, was I crazy?  I guess you could say yes - if you think that all of my actions were out of line with what HE expected of me.  Personally, I think I'm quite sane because I got out of that relationship before there was too much long term damage.  Yeah, like I already said, one of the best things I ever did for myself.

I'm sure I could come up with more reasons why I must have been "crazy."  This is just what I started to list while in the shower this morning.  (I do my best thinking in the shower.)   Maybe I'll add to the list over time, but I think this is a good start.