Storied By Josh

Some time ago, my partner and I spent much time back in the country of her ancestors: Italy. As we combed through records and bounced around government offices and communal cemeteries, I had an epiphany of sorts. I sat down and wrote them out.

I do wonder if Anna’s ancestors would ever have imagined that they’d have an offspring coming back. All the evidence in the genealogy papers we’ve done seems to point that they never had any plans of returning. And with the moderate difficulties we have, how much harder must have it been for them?

We are, after all, living in an insane era. The web has made things infinitely easier. This is a golden moment in time in which we’re able to utilize it. NdGT has postulated that AI will probably destroy the web as we know it. So we are very much lucky to have access to, at the moment, reliable information on its super-highway.

Her ancestors had nothing in that regard. They had word of mouth, letters, radio, and books. What a step of faith, bravery, and desperation it must have been.

The second thing is this: we’ve found a municipal cemetery of sorts. We’ve been doing some digging (figuratively of course) to find Anna’s great, great grandparents’ graves. It is extremely difficult to find a pauper’s final resting place once it’s been forgotten.

How quickly we forget our generations passed. It hasn’t been long, really in the grand scheme of things. Yet for most of everyone, memory is only of the ones we knew when we ourselves were alive.

We come to this old country, one of the oldest in western civilisation, and visit old villas, palaces and mansions of ancient families. I see paintings of their ancestors on the walls, portraits and photographs. I stare into their oiled likeness. What did they feel, what were their dreams? These powerful men. They left proud and lasting legacies for their children’s children. But in the end they were dust and painted canvass.

We are merely existing in a moment of time. And we grow so worried about it. At least I do. It is strange to consider that all of my behemoth emotions will end with me. They matter little at the finish.

Even the words I write now will be forgotten in days soon. Lost in a universe of binary amoung the wasteland of others.  Sometimes it scares me. But mostly it’s comforting.