August 22nd, 2015 | Friends, Genealogy, General, Health, Matters of the Spirit, Memory, Time Passes, Travel, United States
A Facebook friend inquires, “Is death always sad?” The comment followed former president Jimmy Carter’s announcement that he has terminal cancer. A number of people from NPR’s Diane Rehm to ordinary friends have found the news “sad.” My FBF continued: “Although I...
June 28th, 2014 | Gardens and Gardening, Genealogy, General, Memory, Time Passes, Travel, visual arts
This was the branch that most frightened me, the one most perfectly positioned to do irreparable harm to the monument. Lower and smaller branches had already been removed, opening space around the slender column surmounted by its neoclassical urn. Four of us—two on...
August 29th, 2012 | Genealogy, Memory, Time Passes, Travel, United States
In genealogy, I have found, it is always easier to see a connection than prove one, to imagine a family than establish one, to design a tree rather than allow it to grow. When we attempted to track down my Dear One’s Lithuanian progenitors, for instance, an...
August 28th, 2012 | Genealogy, General, Memory, Time Passes, Travel, United States
“Dontchaknow”punctuated her every third or fourth sentence. Granny was fabulous. She was easily moved to laughter, her eyes sparkling and her face a constellation of wrinkles. She made brownies and applesauce. She took us out to lunch at some restaurant between...
November 8th, 2011 | Genealogy, General, Travel
So much of this trip has been about discovering a grandfather who was never a part of my memory. David Sanford Cutler died suddenly from what may have been a staph infection in 1926. His sons Calvin (my father) and David were only two and four years old...