The Meaning of “The Kindred Way”

The name of this website is “The Kindred Way”.  What does that really mean?

If you look up Kindred in the dictionary it states; One’s family and relations, family, relatives, relations, kin, family members, connections, kith and kin, one’s own flesh and blood, clan, tribe, house, lineage; informal folks.

It started with my ancestors.

I was on ancestry.com which is so interesting that it can cause you not to want to do anything else.  If you know someone researching their family tree, they will tell you the same thing.  Originally I was on there to learn about my great grandfather on my mother’s side.  My grandmother has no idea who her father was.  She has never even seen a picture of him.  As a child, she would ask her mother about him but she told her that there was no need to talk about him.  My grandmother is halfway through her 90’s and I wanted to find something out but I couldn’t.  It was as if he just vanished.

While I was on this trail, my father’s side of the family kept popping up.  Kindred is not a widely given surname.  Once I moved over to my dad’s side, everything started lining up.  It took me all the way back to my 6 times Great Grandfather, Bartholomew Kindred.  Bartholomew was the first to come from England to America.  He ended up being the Master Weaver for Thomas Jefferson at Monticello from 1776 to 1778.  He came during the Revolutionary War.  His son’s who were from England ended up fighting in the Revolutionary War on the American side.

I could go on in great detail but I won’t.  The point of this story is to tell you of their strength.  They came by ship via France to America.  Can you imagine the ship ride?  This was not a carnival cruise, this was real life.  No running water.  Probably hardly any food.

According to “Passage To America”, the ship ride was described as such; “…during the voyage there is on board these ships terrible misery, stench, fumes, horror, vomiting, many kinds of seasickness, fever, dysentery, headache, heat, constipation, boils, scurvy, cancer, mouth rot, and the like, all of which come from old and sharply-salted food and meat, also from very bad and foul water, so that many die miserably.

I can’t even imagine.  Now, this is strength and being tough.  This is trying to escape to live a dream.  You leave your home country via France because you could be murdered for treason.  Your wife and your children must board a ship for what must have been a horrendous trip to make it to America.

That is bravery.  That is strength.  That is being strong when you don’t think you can but you have to be.  That is The Kindred Way.

Doing it The Kindred Way

Here today, we are “Just living The Dream” or at least trying to live that way.  What is the dream?  It is what you want it to be for you.  It is trying new things.  Branching out doing things you have always wanted to do but didn’t think you could.  It is being brave and taking a leap of faith.  Here you will find us doing easy, fun stuff along with serious, important stuff.  It’s being who you always wanted to be but couldn’t.  It is trying to be healthy when you haven’t been for a while.  It is being creative when you don’t have a creative bone in your body.  It is learning to be self-sufficient when you don’t know where to begin.  No matter what we do, we are doing it The Kindred Way.

Until next time,

Kari

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