I made the decision to stop writing the book I have been working on for two years. The threads of storyline that I started out with have been twisted and severed. The Pearson Women took on a life of its own and took me down roads I never anticipated.
I have uncovered many surprises and several shocks along the way. I have learned alot about my family history. My research has been the subject of family discussions.
I hit a really rough spot several weeks ago. I spent hours trying to find little details I needed which turned up nothing. I have been hitting dead ends and finding dead sources.
The research about the train wreck that killed my great grandfather in 1959 was the clincher. I won’t visit that dark rabbit hole again.
The Pearsons
I have uncovered details about relatives that were not shared for a reason. I believe that sometimes the folks of the past protect the future generations from their sadness by not passing along harmful, painful information.
Maybe someday I will pull out my files and do profiles of each of the characters for my children and realtives to enjoy.
But for now, I am going to be grateful for the good things these people passed down to my generation. I choose to trust their judgement in leaving some things buried in the past.
Before I start this post, I would like to announce that I have been blogging via my phone for the past year or more. This is my first time back on a computer on the mountain. Boy, did I see past mistakes! Between the tiny screen and the tiny keys, it was hard to see what I was sharing. I have finally moved back to a computer because the book I am writing got so big it needs Scrivener for me to control it. My printer has decided to work as well, so this has been an exciting morning. There have been other technical difficulties, but that is nothing new.
Back to the three signs. Dismiss these if you wish. When events go way beyond coincidental, I call them signs from the Universe. That is what I say happened last week. I have posted about the copy of the letter that was sent from my mother to my aunt and back again. I also shared that the envelope from Canada did not have a date stamp. That catches you up for the rest of the story.
The next day two more related events occurred. The Universe knows that I am slow. First, I found the envelope that my mother mailed the copied letter to my aunt in. It had a date stamp of Dec 16, 2005. That was twenty years ago yesterday. My Gran died in 1995. Thirty years before that. I guess my Mama had been too busy to go through the box and read all the letters until then.
Both envelopes for mailing the copies back and forth.
So the third time I saw the letter I realized I needed to look closer than just to write a summary on a post-it note. That’s when the surprises started. The first paragraph blew my paternalism theory for the book out of existence.
The first sentence was, ” Well ’tis done____ for better or for worse! The letter goes on to describe their efficiency apartment and includes a hand-drawn map of it. This map is the only thing I remembered from seeing the original letter in the box disguised as a book. My goal then was just to get them in order.
The next several paragraphs glowingly described things in the apartment. Then comes the sentence, “I wish you could see my ring! … It’s platinum with five diamonds. The engraving is exquisite. It has EMD – DIP 5.10.’29 on the inside.”
Here comes number two bonus of the more than coincidental events. My sister called to tell me to look for some things I had found earlier and bring them to her over the holidays. I really wanted to do it later, but was afraid I would forget. I stopped what I was doing to go find that box and stick it in my suitcase.
The box in the box.
I opened it to be sure it was the right box and there inside that box another little box. Written on the top was “Wedding Ring (Broken).” I opened the box to find two pieces of a platinum ring with only one diamond left embedded in it. I got out my jeweler’s loop and looked inside it.
There it was! EMD – DIP on one piece and 10. 29 on the other.
My Gran’s wedding ring mentioned in the letter.
Believe what you wish. I am just sharing the facts.
floweralley 