From Generation to Generation

Part of my (most) daily ritual includes running on the treadmill at the local gym.

Lately the images that have flashed up on the overhead television screens have been of people trying to escape. Pictures of men, women and children fleeing war torn or water logged homes have flooded my vision. They are not limited to a particular age or gender or even nationality but their common denominator is what they are carrying. Forget about the emotional baggage, in this instance I refer literally to what they are holding with them as they leave. We witness shoppers, wheelie cases and back packs, basically modern updates of the hessian sacks and the wooden cart that Tevye pushed himself as he left his beloved Anatevka in Fiddler on the Roof.

In all the scary stories of people told to leave, we read, hear or see what they pack in their luggage of love.

Some of the most heart wrenching, gut churning photographs from Holocaust literature are of the piles of belongings that people valued, the carelessly strewn case contents which people ascribed meaning to.

It got me thinking about what I would take with me if I had to leave and about what I value most.

Aside from those I love, the only material items I could think of saving at first thought, was the necklace my father used to wear and the silver candlesticks that my parents had given me when I got married. Neither have any significant monetary value but both are steeped in sentimentality and therefore extremely precious.

Years ago when I packed up my life in another country and watched it crated into a huge container to make its journey across the sea, I ordered two blue metal trunks for which I kept the keys, to house my most valuable belongings. I am not sure what other people in my position used theirs for but my trunks were filled with home videos and photo albums.

While I still yearn to preserve the pictures of my past, both to remember what I might forget and to remember who I was, at times when I have forgotten, I’ve come to realise that making an escape with heavy albums will not be a practical option.

As I tried to get closer to my own answer of what to pack in an emergency (those who know me well know that I like to be organised for most eventualities), it took a visit to a spiritual sanctuary to guide me to my solution.

There is a prayer that is said apparently daily but also traditionally when a child celebrates their entry into adulthood. As I heard the haunting melody and harmonies I’d forgotten I knew, I closed my eyes to savour it fully without distraction.

L’dor Vador is a phrase that literally translates to from generation to generation.

Many years ago now, when I was starting off in the corporate world, I was drawn to a then emerging field called “Knowledge Management”. My superficial understanding was that it involved creating a system (company intranet was an example) to preserve the knowledge of an organisation. Even as staff changed, there was a record of their questions and answers or problems and solutions, to help facilitate transition and information sharing.  Organisational knowledge is thus preserved in a similar way a religion is sustained, by passing down spiritual knowledge and cultural traditions from generation to generation.

When we think about what we want to hand down, yes, the physical objects that have been passed down from parent to child to grandchild hold value and holding them and holding on to them can provide much comfort.

 “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust…”

Ultimately though it is the connection to our forefathers and mothers and the passing down of generational wisdom, that I would like to hold onto, take with me and preserve. While we may yearn for the physical baton to pass down to our children, often the life lessons that come with maturity, the values we impart and the stories behind the objects are even more invaluable.

We all travel along our own paths, bypassing obstacles and our own unique hurdles, but it can help to know that someone has been somewhere similar before you and that they may even provide some clues to reaching your destination more smoothly and swiftly.

What would you take on your journey?