Most of my family history is lost. My parents did not share the stories of their childhoods and my siblings and I did not know any of our relatives, so we know hardly anything about our roots. I see how that lack of connection with our roots has deeply affected my family. We are pretty disconnected. I think this is something that is shared by a large majority of people living in the US today and I have to wonder how much it contributes to the loneliness, isolation, and depression so many people seem to experience. I have noticed that as I have been crafting personal stories, I am feeling more grounded and connected to my parents and to myself. I feel not quite so lost. So I have been wondering how to get back our lost family stories.
Recently my grandson, Lukas, handed me the key to this puzzle when he asked me for a story about a search for a golden baseball. His dad loves baseball; I've always turned my back on his interest, dismissing sports as frivolous and a waste of time and energy. Lukas' request presented me with a dilemma – how to give him the story he wants and stay true to my own storytelling interest. You see I want to talk about topics I deem to be important, such as environmental caretaking or social justice. Not interested in something as “trivial” as sports.
I knew I would have to put this story together in a way that would have value for me; otherwise, I would never be able to craft an interesting, lively story for him. As I thought about the story, the idea of the Grail quest popped into my awareness. Then it occurred to me to ask the resident family expert on baseball, my son and Lukas' dad, D, to share with me everything he knows and loves about the sport. If nothing else, I reasoned, it would give us something to talk about besides the law.
Through those discussions, our relationship is taking on new dimensions and lots of memories are being evoked – my Dad's love of baseball, how I enjoyed going to spring training games with him, the time D and I tried to sell his baseball cards in Manhattan, our trip to the Baseball Hall of Fame, my Dad taking D to games, how pleased Dad was the day D took him to a game.
And then came the key to the lost stories: one night I was researching the Red Sox, my Dad's favorite team, and came upon a piece written by a man who grew up during the Depression. He wrote about his experience of listening to baseball on the radio, playing ball in a vacant lot, using makeshift equipment, wearing knickers – all things I now remember Dad talking about. And I realized that I can take what little I know of my parents' lives and conjure up what they must have been like based on stories of other people who shared cultural history with them. It may not be exactly what my parents experienced, but I noticed when I read that article how close I felt to my Dad. It was as if someone had just shared a piece of his life with me.
I am seeing through this study that baseball is so much a part of American culture that I can use it to look at some issues I am interested in exploring – racism, greed, feeling compelled to live up to contrived images of ourselves, political corruption, addiction. And it occurs to me that I could take any topic and turn it into a fascinating study of whatever I want to bring forth in my storytelling. I could probably study fashion, or architecture, or the Civil War – maybe even cockroaches, and relate them to whatever storytelling topic I want to develop.
And so the quest continues – how to combine baseball, family stories, mythology, and my love of the Earth into one story – a search for a golden baseball. I know for sure that this quest has brought me back to life. I have not wanted to live since D's incarceration. Suddenly I have a compelling interest that makes life worth living again.
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