Oh Happy Day

I had planned to spend the day deeply involved in house cleaning.  The first hour, after the youngest child left for school, was spent scrubbing soot from the large stones that surround our fireplace, and cleaning cobwebs from the nearly unreachable corner behind the entertainment area.  I already had one load of laundry folded on the couch, one in the dryer, and one being washed.  My plan had been well put into action, and I chalked up Happy Moment #1. 

Then, I stopped for a quick little Facebook check.  There I found a message from my husband's second cousin, with whom I have traded nineteenth century photos, and have the occasional chat concerning research of the McKernan ancestry.  I had recently sent him an invitation to view my online family tree, in hopes that my work on his family might benefit him, and that his critique might benefit me.  His Facebook message was to report that while perusing my tree, he discovered that his wife and I share a common ancestor in one Mr. William Carpenter (born c.1605, England).  What an interesting find!  I was once gain amazed at the smallness of our world, and of the genetic relations so many of us unknowingly share.  Count that as Happy Moment #2.

Grave of William Carpenter

I left the computer to wrap up the basics of my housework, and then jumped right back on to investigate further into William Carpenter's wife, (as Cousin Bob and I had discussed some discrepancy concerning her maiden name).  I had some trouble locating the man in my paternal grandmother's branch of the tree, and so I decided to just enter his name in the search bar, and up he popped.  Tracing his descendants forward, I discover he is not in my paternal tree at all, but my mother's branch!  This was Happy Moment #3.  I always assume that everything occurs in my paternal tree, simply because it was Nellie Owings (my pat. GrMother) who spent her life tracing our lines, and had connected us with some of the most important names in history.  My maternal line is just as important, but aside from stories of relations passed down through many generations, much of the research is left to me to document and validate.  So to discover that not only was Carpenter a maternal link, but he stemmed from the Barrows branch, which (if you've read my previous post "My Greatest Discovery"), you'd know was lost to me for years, and was a miraculous find.

I then returned my attention to the here and now, and completed three more loads of laundry.  I took a little time to work on a project that I recently began:  an ancestral portrait wall.  With all of the photographs, and other such stuff, that I have accumulated this past year, I really wanted to show it all off.  I finally completed a seventeen slot photo collage frame, filling it with some of the best 19th century McKernan related photos (the ones I mentioned earlier).  I labeled the photos in the paint program, so we'll always remember their names.  It is also embellished with small pictures of the Irish flag, a field of shamrocks, a Celtic cross, and a Celtic knot, and the McKernan Heraldry.  Happy Moment #4!

At the end of the day, after the laundry had been hung in closets, and tucked into drawers... after dinner had been cooked and eaten... while waiting for the little one to get herself ready for bed, and while Hubby was chatting with his father on the phone, I decided to poke around in my grandmother's research boxes.  This led me to Happy Moment #5 : Discovering a chart that led from herself back through direct descendants to Marc Antony, (lover of Cleopatra).  I didn't think anything could surprise me anymore, when it comes to our genealogical connections.  Grandmom introduced us first to Civil war soldiers, then Revolutionary Heroes and Founding Fathers, then to multiple royal houses of Europe, to the Emperor Charlemagne.  I already knew that from "Uncle Charlie" we trace back to the earliest Caesars, but to see Marc Antony and Octavia threw me for a loop.  You know, that makes the children that he had with Cleo, my half-cousins.  Blood relations between Cleopatra and me ... just.wow.

Happy Moment #6 : Finding a photo of my grandmother posing with her husband (who happens to be wearing a very small bathing suit), looking very much NOT like my grandmother, but like any other young lady of the fifties.

Happy Moment #7 was finding a photo of myself, as a youngster, posing in front of a historical signpost.  "You see!", I declared to my kids, "I told you my grandmother used to drag me along on her excursions up and down the eastern seaboard!" And then I had to pause a moment to accept that I really was there.  She did take me to all those wonderful places.  I've walked on, what has become to me, Hallowed Ground ... and I didn't even realize the importance of it until I grew up.  It's like your parents telling you that they have indeed taken you to Disney World, but you were three, and you have no memory of it.  Does it really count?  No.  I want to back!


The evening was punctuated with Happy Moment #8, which was simply my Hubby and I lounging on the couch discussing our genealogies, and how proud we both are of our wonderful ancestors.  Both foreign and domestic.

Happy Moment #9 actually came this morning, but it was well within the twelve hour margin since moment one, so it counts.  As I sipped my coffee, while the kids got themselves ready for school, I perused through the records bin again ... happily coming across an original photo of my great grandmother Mary Eleanor Owings, Grandmom's mom.  I already have this photo ... sort of.  I have a copy of a copy.  It's sort of darkened and faded at the same time.  But, very happily, I now have the original, semi-colorized portrait of the lady, in all her Victorian glory.

This blogpost, I must say is Happy Moment #10.  Being able to share my happiness with everyone!


This post is participating in OhAmanda.com's Top Ten Tuesday!