by Peggy Strickland

Created on: October 25, 2009

Long years and many deaths and a clan flung far and wide

This family needs its history

And I'm the matriarch?

This mantle thrust upon me in my waning middle years

Be mentor, sage, historian, fount of wisdom

Keeper of the keys to an ancient treasure trove

Makes no concessions for aging brain and capricious memory

The stories of fathers and mothers

How will our children know?

Of how they struggled and suffered and sacrificed

And loved and laughed and lived?

Of oral history made rich with lively anecdotes

Of colorful personalities and their stories

Of valuable hard-learned lessons they impart

Now it falls on me

Will I be worthy of memory?

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