Sentimental Sunday: Taking Risks

Photo collection of Midge Frazel, photo taken in 1962

Sentimental Sunday: Taking Risks

Are we predestined to be risk takers or are we cautious? It matters in genealogy research more than you can imagine. 

See the concrete steps to the right of the photo near my parent's back door? That's where my mother found out I was not going to be a risk taker. I thought of this this past week when I put on new glasses and remembered that I must be careful going up and downstairs. It might be a couple more weeks before I feel comfortable with that. 

When I was a little girl, my mother tried to get me to jump down to her off the area next to the stairs. I thought she was crazy! Why do that when there are stairs to use? What was she thinking? I was an obedient child but I thought this was dumb. So, I did it and never did it again. Today, I would have purposely fallen, cut my leg and made her day miserable (like a normal kid).

Instead I have set a path for myself filled with careful investigation on a purposeful path. It pretty much describes all of my careers. I dislike unfamiliar places and suspicious people. It seems that everyone wants me, like my mother did, to do something that I don't want to do and could be done just as easily by another person. But, people are lazy and still aren't hiring the right people for the right task. They just want to get it over with.

Unfortunately, people are still asking me to work genealogy in the OLD way. Think about it. I read this past week that someone found out more about their family in the last four years than in the past 40 years. That describes me. If I had gone out seeking records 20 years ago and wasted my vacation time and money, I'd be upset to see all of that put up at Ancestry.com. Is it prudent to wait? Did any of us expect to see so many gravestones taken by strangers for Find a Grave? Did I need to waste my time going to Scotland to get the SAME records that I can get from home at Scotlands People?

I'd rather spend the rest of my time with quality work and stop taking risks. I'm not going to jump off the back steps and break my hip. No, not even for you.