Life and Genealogy

I love researching my family tree. It connects me to my past and allows me some mental stimulation. However, I also have a part time job, three kids, a hubby, a dog, two cats, three birds, well you get the picture.

Week before last I was hot on the trail of Burnett Victory, who I believe was enumerated as Burnett Curtis in 1880. I have no idea why, but his wife and 8 kid’s names and dates fit. It could be a coincidence that there were two men, born the same time, with wives named Mary, who had 8 kids all born at the same time, with the same surname. Problem is, I can’t find my Burnett in 1880, or Burnett Curtis prior to or after 1880.

Then the weekend came and with it the flu! I fell out Friday night at 6:30 pm and woke up Monday morning at 9:30. I did do some eating and trying to be nice to my family in between, but for the most part I ran a fever, and slept.

So that meant my Saturday and Sunday household chores had to be done after work each day along with that day’s chores. And that meant that genealogy had to take a backseat for a week.

But in the meantime, I ordered a death certificate for Mary Victory and it came in. The archives wants $1 for the copies and I will need to send them the postage, so I going to be out a big $2 for this document. Less than I spend on breakfast in the mornings.

People often ask how I get everything done. Well, first off, I am extremely organized. No, I am not an organized person. I work at it like most people work at a job. It does not come natural for me, despite having worked at it for most of my life.

Each day at our house has a chore list for that day. My reward for getting done, is that I can “work” at my computer on my genealogy. I use Outlook for my emails and I have tasks set up for each day. Once I click off a Saturday job, it automatically moves to the next Saturday. When all the tasks are done, I get to PLAY!! If I do each day’s chores, then my house stays clean, food gets prepared, my kids get baths, and homework done on time, the cats and dog don’t starve, and most importantly everyone has a clean place to lay their heads at night.

Just like genealogist who need to have a list of things they are working on to get them from point A to point B, as a mom I have to have a list to get me from disaster area to Oasis. And if the flu stays at bay, I tend to stay pretty much even with the game. At least we can have a friend spend the night, or an impromptu teenager party without me feeling like I needed to clean house for several hours first.

I am just as organized with my genealogy. My desk is usually a mess of papers I am working with at the moment, but those that aren’t being used are filed away. I file papers as soon as I get home from research. I then work from those file folders to enter my data into my genealogy program (The Master Genealogist ) I am working on a project to scan the last 19 years of research into my computer. It’s slow going, but will be so worth it when I am done. But I continue to do new research as well, to keep it fun.

I still don’t know if Burnett Victory and Burnett Curtis are the same man or not. May never know for sure. But I do know that Burnett Curtis was a real man that served in the Civil War and did not have a pension. Did my ancestor use both names, was it a census taker typo, or was it two different men. This is the kind of stuff we genealogist live for!