Family History
Photos and Letters in the Narrative of Mattie Williams Bell’s Life and Death
The narrative on death in family history is important to understanding one’s life and their place in family history.
My first encounter with death came when my grandmother transitioned May 21, 1972. Though her death was not a surprise, it did leave me unsettled and feeling life would never be the same. Shock embraced me, leaving a gaping hole in my understanding of what this thing called LIFE really is.
Memories of my grandmother 52 years after her death are quite different than during the first 25 years. I thought I knew her during her lifetime and that I’d learned much about who she was during the first 25 years such that I believed I was an expert on her. Her death and developing an understanding of what Death means enlightened me in ways that I now claim to be the “expert on Mattie Louise Williams Bell.”
Writing 60+ newsletters on family history, especially ones that speak of Grandmother Mattie, convinced me I am the expert among those who knew grandmother. She was the matriarch of our family long before reaching matriarchal status. As the poem below states,
What is this death but a negligible accident? Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight? (https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/292389-death-is-nothing-at-all-it-does-not-count-i)