On Ancestors

Family is more than those with us today

Unknown Family photo from 1875

When we talk of ‘family’ it is customary in our culture to be talking exclusively about people who are alive. However, in this we may be the exception rather than the rule. Many cultures practice ancestor worship, and still more give a great deal of time honouring the departed members of their kin. But we burn them, bury them and forget them pretty quickly in comparison.

My mind took this turn after I visited the grave of my father who died more than a decade ago. My father would have been indifferent to this visit such an English pragmatist was he (‘when you’re dead you’re dead’ was his philosophy of mortality), but I found contemplating the rugged rectangle of slate that marked the hole into which I had helped lower him oddly satisfying. I could not say wherein that satisfaction lay. I knew that six foot under that spot was just a sprinkling of bones that had nothing to do with the living spirit I had known. And yet visit, I did, and pay tribute, I did, with a handful of wild flowers.