The Gift of Family Stories
Twenty-two years ago, my husband David interviewed my grandfather.
David is a professional journalist. He set up a video camera, sat my 92-year-old Grandpa down, and asked him about his life. We videotaped the hour-plus conversation, and later, when YouTube became a thing, put it on YouTube.
Grandpa Joe has been gone for a long time now, but his voice and his stories live on.
I watched a few minutes of it recently. One of the first things he said was that he wished he had asked his own parents about their lives.
I loved my Grandpa, but he could be a cranky guy, and not particularly introspective. I was pleasantly surprised that he agreed to the project at all, yet he eagerly answered every question, even David’s nosier ones. He seemed to be having a great time.
I thought about that video again years later when my mother-in-law was in a nursing home. Many of the people there seemed lonely, their lives reduced to meals and medications. I hoped they had opportunities to tell their stories before it was too late.
Those experiences prompted me to create Get Storied, a business that helps people tell their life stories. We sit down and interview our clients, write their stories, and create books that can be saved and shared forever.
There are lots of reasons to preserve family stories. Here are two:
1. You are giving the gift of telling somebody that they matter. Their words are worth hearing and their stories are worth saving.
2. You are giving future generations a better understanding of their own identity.
Every time I interview a client, there’s at least one moment when they pause, look me in the eye and say, “Make sure you get this down.”
And every time I start a project, a family member or friend says, to me, “Make sure you ask about this.” There are things they want to know about their loved ones, things maybe they’re embarrassed to ask.
Yet the obstacles and disappointments are part of who we are, along with our successes, our sense of humor, our relationships and our hard-earned wisdom.
One other thing: Joe died in 2005. He wasn’t famous, but he was a successful businessman and generous philanthropist who was well-known in his community.
His obituary in a local newspaper was one paragraph long. It didn’t say anything about his childhood, his business savvy, his sense of humor, his golf game, or how he met my grandmother.
For that, we have a 22-year-old video.