On Father`s Day my son asked me "What`s with the White Rose?" as I read the diaries and many other writings about the historical day my son celebrated as he handed me a card, and a warm hug.
Like any older Dad, I smiled at my son`s question about the white rose I chose to wear on this day. I smiled because I understand that this gesture of the white rose has been lost by today`s standards of celebrating Father`s Day. Even as I write this I have to assume that the "not so young, but not so old" Kossacks have no idea or just plainly forgot that a "White Rose" worn by a person means that the father is dead. Some might not even know of this world wide tradition about our parents symbol of life and death.
Our more lucky people who still have their parents, Mother or Father, wear a Red Rose to announce that their parent, whether on Mother`s or Father`s Day still lives.
Take it from Ole Texan, if you did not wear a rose on Father`s Day Sunday, wear one next year and see how different and more meaningful it will feel when someone utters those words as they look at your flower`s symbol and tribute to Dad, or Mom.
Now having dished unsolicited advise, I pass on to explain why I request help from
the Genealogy and Family History community. With your permission.
Recently, and with painful regrets I wrote here in a diary that I did not care to know what happened to my siblings after I was taken and torn apart from them when my Mother handed me to my grandmother around 1940 in San Antonio while the rest of my siblings remained behind where I was born in Austin, Texas.
By word of mouth I learned that most, if not all perished following my escape from the jaws of starvation in harsh and deplorable times that effectively erased any and all memory or trace of my siblings.
Looking at my own children as they have become adults and with families of their own, I feel so guilty denying them of my past history or family roots. sometimes I look in the mirror and see a Nazi burning anything or history that may educate my children of where I came from or who came with me. So I have reversed course on what I said in a diary about caring for my past and my lost siblings. I do care.
I started with my meager techie savvy on data search and always end up against a blank wall as I Google for "free" family tree searches. I have signed up and taken out an account with "FamilySearch", a free online that purports to help me find family roots and history. Yeah, right. Woe is me as I cannot even find myself online.
I enter the correct names and information that I am instructed to type and I get
the same "no recorded information on person" that I am looking for.
I ask for help here not only for my own curiosity to find these siblings and perhaps even know who my own father was, but to someday tell my kids the story and the complete story of where I came from.
I am sorry for this short burden I place on some of you. Even if I fail, I will rest in peace knowing I tried. But most important, it means to me that I do care after all. Even after three quarters of a century I do care.