This past Friday and Saturday I was at my grandparent's house. Everything about Grandparents just amazed me. It just seems like they're always looking to give their stuff away.
My Grandpa gave me a big bag of stuff. It had books and random little gadgets and more stuff in it. He had it all ready when I got there, like a Christmas present or something. He kept asking me things like, "Would you have any use for this little flash light?" or "Would you like some shades? They're on the table if you want to take a look." My Grandma is always offering me food, asking me if I'd like a snack or desert. I think I probably gain weight every time I visit my grandparents.
Something else that simply amazes me is all of the genealogy and ancestry that my Grandpa has researched. He's managed to trace our family back to 1816! I sit here in 2007, one hundred and ninety years later, looking back and seeing, sort of, how I got here.
It turns out that my Great-Great-Great-Grandpa, John Newton Dickson, fought in the confederate army in the Civil War, my Great-Great-Grandpa, Brince Dickson, had a peg leg, and my Great-Grandpa, Edgar Dixon, fell asleep while driving a horse & buggy one night when he was just 10 years old! When he woke up the horses had stopped right outside of the livery stable! If you fall asleep at the wheel, you end up in the ditch; if you fall asleep on the horse and buggy, they just bring you right on home.
It's all so wild to learn all these things about my family's past. I guess it's just more testimony to how small I am. Life is like a book and I'm merely a page. But it makes me wonder where I fit into the whole scheme of things. I wonder what sort of impact my generation will have on the Dixon family. Back in 1816 we were in Georgia. Then, after the war, John Newton moved to Texas. We've been in Texas ever since. My Dad lived in Nederland and then moved to the Houston area. And that's where we are now. I seem to have something inside of me screaming, "Let's get out of here and go somewhere else!" My brother wants to move to Portland. I want to get out of Houston, and possibly entirely out of the Bible-Belt, but mostly I want my family to stay together, to be near one another, like we are now. I wonder, though, where the Dixon family will be centered when we're done with it?
I wonder after all of this, after my life is done and my descendants are in charge, will I be remembered? I wonder. Will they remember me or will I just be a name on a page? A limb on a tree? I don't know. I just hope I can touch the world while I'm here. I hope I'll be remembered in the lives of the people I know.
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You will definitely be remembered in the lives of people you know. You've reached out to too many people, encouraged too many people, made too many people laugh, resolved the problems of too many people, shared your faith with too many people, to not be remembered. Keep reaching out. The more people you touch, the brighter your light will be and the more people will remember you forever...Your mom
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