I'm a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormons. When possible on Sundays, I discuss some things related to my faith and what I believe. With respect to your own beliefs, I hope this gives you a chance to get to know me and my religion a little better. For previous installments, click here.
I am pleased to say that on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, after our (mis)adventure in Kamakura, I spent some time learning about indexing through familysearch.org, per my goal to find a way to keep my sights on the temple even when I can't attend. I did the tutorial and then indexed my first batch - a page from the US, New York, New York - Death Index, 1880-1956. I've done a lot of data entry in my career as a librarian and this program is set up to be really user friendly, so it was all pretty easy to figure out.
Even though it wasn't my own family history I was working on, I imagined that I was being helpful to someone out there. This index had death dates and cities, as well as the death certificate number, which if they could use that to find the actual death certificate they would probably find even more information. OCR (optical character recognition) has come a long way, so it's possible just having a photo of this index would be useful, but an indexed page even more so. The batch I worked on didn't take long, and I definitely anticipate doing more!
On Saturday, with this project on my mind, Blake and I went to see the latest Pixar film - Coco - a story about a Mexican boy who learns a lot about his family on the Day of the Dead, even traveling to the Land of the Dead. So many elements of the story - multi-generational family, music, deteriorating mental health in old age, healing, honoring family who have passed, second chances (even after death) - were woven in such a beautiful way that I was crying by the end, even with parts that were relatively predictable. I think it's right there with Up for my favorite Pixar film, and even already one of my favorite movies ever. It's so well done!
And then, this morning, while it was Saturday evening back at home, I was able to FaceTime with my grandmother at the start of the party they were having for her 80th birthday. After I talked to her, my dad took me around the party to say hi to a few people and see some of the amazing quilts that my grandmother had made (not an exhaustive collection, if only because I have a few here in Japan) as well as the top of one that my mother had made for her out of squares she had commissioned from the family. They had it set up at the party so everyone could work on the actual quilting of it. My dad promised to sew a stitch for me.
Even being 7000 miles away from my family of origin, I've had a lot of opportunity to think about them and connect with them these last few days. I'm so glad to know where I come from and find ways to relate to the experiences of those who have come before me. Hopefully, I can get back into the habit of family history research and keep finding out even more!
I am pleased to say that on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, after our (mis)adventure in Kamakura, I spent some time learning about indexing through familysearch.org, per my goal to find a way to keep my sights on the temple even when I can't attend. I did the tutorial and then indexed my first batch - a page from the US, New York, New York - Death Index, 1880-1956. I've done a lot of data entry in my career as a librarian and this program is set up to be really user friendly, so it was all pretty easy to figure out.
Even though it wasn't my own family history I was working on, I imagined that I was being helpful to someone out there. This index had death dates and cities, as well as the death certificate number, which if they could use that to find the actual death certificate they would probably find even more information. OCR (optical character recognition) has come a long way, so it's possible just having a photo of this index would be useful, but an indexed page even more so. The batch I worked on didn't take long, and I definitely anticipate doing more!
On Saturday, with this project on my mind, Blake and I went to see the latest Pixar film - Coco - a story about a Mexican boy who learns a lot about his family on the Day of the Dead, even traveling to the Land of the Dead. So many elements of the story - multi-generational family, music, deteriorating mental health in old age, healing, honoring family who have passed, second chances (even after death) - were woven in such a beautiful way that I was crying by the end, even with parts that were relatively predictable. I think it's right there with Up for my favorite Pixar film, and even already one of my favorite movies ever. It's so well done!
And then, this morning, while it was Saturday evening back at home, I was able to FaceTime with my grandmother at the start of the party they were having for her 80th birthday. After I talked to her, my dad took me around the party to say hi to a few people and see some of the amazing quilts that my grandmother had made (not an exhaustive collection, if only because I have a few here in Japan) as well as the top of one that my mother had made for her out of squares she had commissioned from the family. They had it set up at the party so everyone could work on the actual quilting of it. My dad promised to sew a stitch for me.
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| Many people made their own quilt squares, but due to distance/time/skill, I just designed one, ordered the fabric, and commissioned it from my mother. It's the pink and green crossword puzzle one shown here. The green fabric has thimbles on it - Grandma collects them and I've helped a lot on all my travels - and she and Grandpa (while he was alive) loved doing crossword puzzles. It was helping them on one that earned me one of their nicknames for me. |
Even being 7000 miles away from my family of origin, I've had a lot of opportunity to think about them and connect with them these last few days. I'm so glad to know where I come from and find ways to relate to the experiences of those who have come before me. Hopefully, I can get back into the habit of family history research and keep finding out even more!
5 comments:
Top 3 Pixar for sure. Probably top 2. I think they didn't do the best job with their marketing, because I wasn't sure I wanted to see it. But when Ancestry did an early screening (for free even) I went and BOY was I glad I did. I'm going back with my son next week.
I barely even knew the movie existed before last week (thanks to absolutely no marketing here), and the trailer didn't do it justice, so I know what you mean about marketing. So, so good.
We even saw an extended trailer at Disney World at the beginning of the month. It was better than other trailers, but it still didn't make me want to see it in first run--maybe Redbox it. I hope word gets around. I'm telling everyone I know to go see it.
Gratefully, our movies are $3 here, so even if with popcorn and drinks for two people, it's cheaper than full price back in DC and not too much of a gamble. Even if the movie is terrible (*cough* The Mummy *cough*), we're not out too much.
Hooray for technology bringing families together in all kinds of ways!
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