Author: clfuu

“No one can be free who has a thousand ancestors.”
―L.M. Montgomery

How are you constrained by your ancestry?

Families, communities, even nations, have “skeletons in the closet,” uncomfortable truths about their history that they work hard to avoid addressing for fear of the pain and shame that will be revealed. The harder we try to forget these skeletons, the more they haunt us.

When have you told the truth about a skeleton in the closet?

“The songs of our ancestors are also the songs of our children”
―Philip Carr-Gomm

What song or family tradition have you passed on to another generation?

Some friendships or groups of friends endure across generations, providing a kind of family that sustains and enlivens us across the years.

What friendships have sustained you across generations?

The Mexican holiday of El Día de los Muertos, the pagan celebration of Samhain/Halloween, the Catholic All Souls Day—all understand this time of the year as a moment when the dead and the living connect across the divide between the worlds.

What do you do to connect with beloveds who are no longer living?