Roderick the Ill-Advised

by michaelcahill

Background
Autobiographical. Poetry, essays, musings and commentaries on world and personal events. Anything that doesn't fit anywhere else is likely to be found here.

One's ancestry is always a topic of interest. Could I be of royal lineage? Perhaps the Rockefellers are my long lost next of kin. Maybe Rosie Perez is my dear Aunt Rosie who can't wait to give her long lost nephew a big hug. Okay, well that doesn't belong in the discussion.

In any case, most of us at one time or another wonder about our roots and where we come from. Most of us are able to go back two or three generations. A good number of us can name our great grandparents or even great-great grandparents.

Usually anything beyond that is a mystery or a family rumor. Unless you are the Queen of England there is not much likelihood that you have any immediate access to records of your lineage. In the age of instant information. That has changed considerably.

It is no longer necessary to go on long pilgrimages to distant locales and rummage through dried parchments with fading ink searching for clues. All of that information is available at your fingertips. In fact, it has been organized and made easily accessible to you.

I use a service called Ancestry.com as my main research and organizing tool.

The starting point when establishing a family tree is one's self. The first two branches would be your mother and father. From there you would add their mothers and fathers. From there the tree would branch out into the past growing larger and larger as it expanded into the past.

If you consider the simple math involved it isn't difficult to see that after several generations the tree becomes enormous in scope. Yourself, mom and dad, four grandparents, eight grandparents, sixteen great grandparents, thirty two great-great grandparents…..sixty four, one hundred twenty eight, two hundred fifty six……the number gets out of hand quite quickly.

It reaches a point where virtually everyone alive at a point in history is part of your direct lineage. I have carefully traced my lineage to Mary Magdalene. It is well documented and accurate. It is likely that most people reading this can reach this same point in their lineage as well.

At some thirty generations distant almost everyone on earth is a direct descendant of everyone alive two thousand years ago. It is not quite that simple, but it almost is. Mary the mother of Jesus of Nazareth was Mary Magdalene's cousin. She is also a thirty third great grandmother of mine and probably yours.

You that are reading this and I that have written it are of the same blood. It isn't what this piece is about. It is just something that occurs to me as I write it. One of the tangents that I so adore going on.

Irish is considered my heritage and is what my family hangs its hat on. But, my research show that Irish is only part of the story. French, German and English are also represented in my family tree. If one looked a bit further back into my tree one would find quite a mix of ethnicities blend together that would end up as my make-up.

There are some interesting characters on my family tree. As with most people there are kings and people of fame. Emily Dickinson is a distant cousin which means quite a bit to me. Paul Simon is a cousin as well and not distant for what it is worth.

My grandfather was a spiritual advisor to Joseph and Rose Kennedy back in the day. Further back on my tree you will find Charlemagne and still further "Old Kind Cole". Yes, that merry old soul was a real person and once a king that someone wrote a nice catchy tune about.

My favorite ancestor has to be Roderick the Ill-Advised. That name just tickles me to death. The actual deeds that earned him that moniker are not documented. He was an Irish king several hundred years ago. His deeds must have been spectacular in their ignominy.

I consider doing something so wrong minded as to go down in history titled as "Ill-Advised" a spectacular achievement. It is written that his castle was burned to the ground and he lived out his life banished on an island. He is my sixteenth great grandfather. That is heritage baby!

I can only hope that one day my ancestors will find my name listed somewhere as "Mikey the Blatherer" or "Mikey the Great Tangentor". We all have our dreams.

Pride

Hey, there is a pride parade today
people proud shouting, "Hey, hey
Look at me!" walking hand in hand
this portion of man's fellow man

and we found some shoulders broad to stand upon
nothing we did, but still we swell with pride
we raise our voice to sing, there is little of our own song
we look outside for symbols nothing shines inside

there's a rally round the flag for only we
just this color for today, that's you and me!
make sure you bring the kids so they can clearly see
they need to stand apart and claim their right to be

together we stand alone it's us against the world
we are separated loud we shout
we have our flag unfurled
teach the children well and make them realize
that everyone is different
and who they should despise
make sure you teach the children well
open up their eyes

One thing I have learned in studying my ancestry, is the staggering math involved. Some of the facts of the human race are astonishing. At one point we were close to extinction. It is estimated that only twelve thousand humans existed on earth at one point.

We all came from that small a sampling. We are so closely related it is ridiculous. To attempt to distinguish one human from another is to try and sort snowflakes. We are virtually identical.

Our differences are merely surface and cosmetic. The discussion about race is, in and of itself, embarrassing in its absurdity.

A question concerning whether there is a man in the moon or a woman is under consideration.

I suggest we devote our time to that much more worthy topic.

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See what happens when you don't make suggestions? So, if you have any I am certainly open to them. There is no format. So, any topic or subject of interest will be considered. I have written about events from the fifties, sixties, seventies and beyond. I have singled out world events and personal areas of my life as well. Anything goes.

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A Consideration of Ancestry and Ethnicity

A chapter in the book The Never Starting Story

Roderick the Ill-Advised

by michaelcahill

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