I Dream of Geneology

I have been here in Texas this week. It snowed this morning. I call home to Seattle and hear it's 75 degrees and sunny. No warm skies down here.
My paternal grandparents lived in Denver CO. My grandmother passed away a couple of years ago and just this spring my dad and his brother had to put my grandfather in an assisted living facility for dementia. They packed up his house and put it on the market to sell. This house was bought after my grandfather got out of WWII. My dad and uncle were raised in this house their wholes lives. That was the house where my memories of my grandparents live. I knew all the hiding places. I knew where to find my grandma's hats to play dress up. We all loved that house.
When packing up, my dad brought hundreds of pictures of our family, home to his house in Texas. Aunts, uncles, cousins, great grandparents, great great grandparents, outlaws, inlaws, blacksheep, you name it!
I look at these pictures trying to find recognition. Looking for someone whom I look like. An eye shape, nose shape, anything that connects me. I have 3 great aunts who have had breast cancer. Two are still living and one died of Alzheimer's. If it ain't one thing it's another.
I see pictures taken in Italy and Ireland, before they immigrated to the United States. My great grandmother Dominica Fanganello was a W.O.P. when she arrived with her family to New York. With out Papers. The term WOP held on the Italian immigrants and so the slang word stuck.
They heard you could find work in Colorado and made their way to Denver to work in fields. My Great Great Grandmother Fanganello was on the cover of life magazine. She was pictured in a field, stooped over picking vegetables. She was living the American dream at that time. Making money doing what no one else would do.
I am going to bring all these photos home with me so that someday I can pass them to my children. I am proud of my fore fathers and mothers. I hope they will be too.

Peace Out