We are the chosen. Our feeling is that in each family there is one who seems called to find the ancestors. To put flesh on their bones and make them live again. To tell the family story and to feel that somehow those who went before know and approve. To us, doing genealogy is not a cold gathering of fact but, instead, breathing life into all who have gone before. We are the story tellers of the tribe. All tribes have one. We have been called as if it were in our genes. Those who have gone before cry out to us: "Tell our story", so we do. In finding them, we somehow find ourselves. How many graves have we stood before now and cried. How many times have we told our ancestors "You have a wonderful family, you would be proud of us." It goes beyond just documenting the facts. It goes to who we are, and why we do the things we do. It goes to seeing a cemetery about to be lost forever to weed and indifference, and saying, "We can't let this happen." The bones here are the bone of our bones and the flesh of our flesh. It goes to doing something about it. It goes to pride in what our ancestors were able to accomplish. How they contributed to what we are today. It goes to respecting their hardships and their losses, their never giving in or giving up, their resoluteness to go on and build a life for their family. It goes to deep pride that they fought to make and keep us a nation. It goes to a deep and immense understanding that they were doing it for us, that we might be born who we are, that we might remember them, so we do. With love and caring and scribing each fact of their existence, because we are they and they are us. We tell the story of our family. It is up to the one called the next generation to answer the call to take their place in the long line of family storytellers. That is why we do our family genealogy, and is what calls those, young and old, to step up and put flesh on the bones." Author Unknown