Family Tree

So, if you haven’t noticed, I have been pivoting my blog a bit. More towards my art. And with it more towards my “Living Daringly” business I am building and want to build out.

With that, this post is more … personal. With some of the business trainings I’ve attended this year, folks say that everything you put out there should align with your business brand. I guess that’s a good and broad thing for me, because my brand is “Living Daringly.” Brands aren’t just logos and business colors. It’s the values you run your business from. And my values stem from authenticity. From empowering myself and empowering others through art and education. So this post still fits in a few ways. Let me know if you disagree.

Looking Back Through the Family Tree

Recently, some things from my family’s past have been churned up. Ghosts I thought were at rest … Well, not so much.

I’m not going to go knee-deep into this, but I will provide some articles. The first set related to a cold-case murder that happened in my hometown back in 1960. The latter is a connection to my childhood. (If you want to skip to my piece of things, read the last linked article first. I’ll explain a little more below.)

Growing up, I’d never heard about the Nancy Eagleson murder. Not as rumor nor even local folklore. In talking with family, I know that members of my family were familiar with the tragedy. But the story didn’t make it two generations down. At least not in my circles.

I’ll admit that I’m not going to divulge all here. But I am going to say that the man named in the last article abused my aunt. She was born in 1975, and I was born in 1978. Growing up we were more like sisters. And we both visited the man mentioned in that last article’s camp property, right next door to my grandma’s and great-grandma’s houses. My aunt is the one mentioned in regard to the grand jury hearing. I was a witness at that hearing. (FYI – a grand jury hearing is one established to determine if there is enough evidence present to go to a full trial) In that hearing, it was determined there was enough evidence present to go to trial, and the man mentioned in the article (my great-granduncle-in-law) was indicted. Before my great-granduncle(-in-law) was even formally indicted, he shot himself in the chest and died.

Knowing Too Much About the Family Tree

Dig into the articles a bit. If you do, you might be able to get into my heart and head a bit. With my great-grand uncle’s suicide, there was some closure. Turns out there has been a darker, festering wound underneath that all along. A wound filled with missing evidence. A wound filled with others being abused.

Coupled with this story is the fact that my family tree links back to the original colonizers who have erased and stolen so much culture for the last 500 years. Give or take.

Healing and Shining a Light on the Family Tree

So what am I doing to process this reopening of a wound? What am I doing to process the impact my colonizing ancestors have had on my life?

Make art, of course!!

So this is an entry in my mixed-media art journal. A piece for me to help me build peace (ha!) around this … shit.

I started this one just by writing, in tree form. Working some shit out through written word. Fairly steam-of-conscious.

During that process, I did remember that not all of my ancestors were shitheads. Somewhere back there were abolitionists, folks who valued women, folks who didn’t like what was happening against Indigenous people. There were people who fought back against injustice. Who tried to shine a light on the darkness, and sometimes those lights were extinguished along the way. But they were there. And they are as much a part of me as the deep darkness.

Layer upon layer of this journal piece. Just like layer upon layer of my family tree…

Why Am I Sharing This?

To any white folks out there: we have a lot to atone for. Perhaps we didn’t directly create this racist, capitalist, patriarchal world. But our ancestors did. I have a hypothesis: For every piece of privilege our ancestors bought in land, oppression, genocide, and slavery, they sold a piece of their souls. Under this hypothesis, America is sort of like a bigass Horcrux for white folks.

With that idea, I remind all white folks that our ancestral heroes exist too. Those in the Resistance. Those who supported the Underground Railroad. Those who stood against the witch burners and the land grabbers. The whistleblowers. The John Brown‘s, and the like, of our family trees. Many of these people have been hidden in our family trees. But they are there. I feel the shame of the former paragraph and what my ancestors have done. Also, we must reclaim our souls and honor those who have helped us to hold onto the souls we have along the way. We must do the work that allows us to reclaim our souls fully.

I also share this for sexual assault survivors. By coming out about her abuse, my aunt saved me the same fate. (I hope to the gods) She was the last generation to be abused by that particular abuser. But there are more and more coming out all of the time from the articles I posted above (which have just been reported on this year!!) of people abused by him. You are not alone. And it is not your fucking fault there are sick fucks who are sexual predators. It’s not your fault. And I love you. And if you happened to living in Paulding, OH, and were ever sexually abused by anyone, call the Paulding Sheriff’s office (419-399-3791). Don’t want to talk to the cops, consider calling the investigative reporter instead: Brian Dugger with Toledo 11 News (419-248-1153).

Finally, I share this because it is suicide prevention month. You see, my aunt … the one born three years before me … she died by suicide back in 1998. She never fully healed from the trauma that fucker caused her. For a while we thought she had. She married a nice guy and had two kickass kids. Call it a relapse, but she fell back into a bad head space and ended her life. It’s Ok to ask for help.

While it’s still a hypothesis, conveniently without evidence, that my great-granduncle killed Nancy Eagleson, I hold him (and another) 100% accountable for my aunt ending her life. Especially now that all this shit is resurfacing, I miss her a damn lot. And yet, I’m also really glad she’s not around to deal with all this shit resurfacing…

One more “finally”… Once upon a time, I don’t even know how I’d handle all of this shit resurfacing. Probably by yelling a lot at those in my general vicinity about non-related things. While I’m pretty sure I’m not 100% my happy-go-luck self, creating art, writing privately in my journal, and sharing my story through a few avenues has been healing.

Closing Out

Thank you for reading if you made it this far. There’s … a lot in this post. No matter where you are in your journey, I’m wishing you health and healing. During this decade, we’re probably all suffering from generational trauma in one form or another. And each of us deserves healing, even among the hard work it takes to heal.

With that, I send my normal blessing to you.

May we share:
kind thoughts,
kind words, and
kind actions, intentions,
and love.