Visiting some whom I've never met

I'm on a pilgrimage of sorts.

I'm traveling to see friends in Iowa this week, and while planning my trip, I happened to notice that Wichita, Kansas is about halfway up. I've always heard my maternal grandmother talk about Wichita, without giving it much thought. I began digging through some of our family history, though, and realized how steeped my own family is in this area of Kansas.

One relative I never met but with whom I've always felt a connection is my great-grandmother, Sarah. She died in the 1950's and is buried next to her husband in Hutchinson, Kansas. I've heard so much about her throughout my life, both from my mom and my grandmother. I now have a couple of her books - treasures made all the more precious by her handwritten notes found inside.

Imagine my excitement, then, to discover that I could easily stop in Wichita on my way to Iowa, and fit in some time to go see the graves of my great-grandparents - make a pilgrimage to honor them and their memories.

After I arrived at my hotel today, exhausted from driving, I hunkered down with pages of family history compiled by other relatives. I discovered two other cemeteries to visit in the area, each of which has a set of my great-great-grandparents (Sarah's parents and her husband's parents).

Finding this information was unexpected - and exciting - and it threw a kink into the works, because now I feel an obligation to see all of these folks. Kind of like when you drive through someplace and feel obligated to meet your long-lost whomever for lunch? Yeah...that's how I feel.

Except these aren't long-lost whomevers - they are my forebears. These are the ones who - quite literally - gave me life. Down through the centuries, from the British Isles and Germany, came these pioneers who settled in Kansas to make lives for themselves. In doing so, they passed on the blessing of life to my grandmother, to my mother, to me.

Tomorrow, I'm stopping to see the graves of one set of great-great-grandparents - more people I never knew, but who are a part of me somehow. I'm excited, but if I'm honest, I'm also a bit nervous. These are some of the ones who made me who I am, through vast generational influences. And while I won't be meeting them face-to-face, I'll be as close to meeting them as I ever have been. (What would my Lutheran-turned-Baptist great-great-grandfather say about his great-great-granddaughter, the Lutheran pastor, I wonder?)

Tomorrow, I'll visit the graves of some whom I never met. And like Jacob, I'll leave a stone there, to honor them and their lives. I'll leave a stone to remember the hopes which led them here - the hopes they have passed on to me, too, somehow.