Capturing those special family moments
Picture this: It’s Sunday afternoon at Grandma’s house. When you walk in the door, you immediately are consumed by the smell of homemade macaroni and cheese, a spiral ham baking in the oven. As you passed around a basket of crescent rolls, you weren’t just sharing a meal, you were making memories.
Growing up, Sunday dinners were a staple in your family. It was a chance to reconnect and catch up on what’s happening in everyone’s life. As you got older, life got busier. The weekly dinners turned into just once a month events. Eventually, they stopped happening altogether.
You assumed you knew everything there was to know about your grandparents: their upbringing, how they met, what they did in their careers.
You aren’t the only one who has missed out on the tradition of family meals. In fact, 60 years ago, the average dinnertime was 90 minutes. Today? Less than 12 minutes.
It’s no surprise that with the decline of family meals, there is a disconnect in knowing our own family stories. Just because the meals have stopped, doesn’t mean the stories have to as well.
In NPR’s Ask Me Another interview with actor Justin Long, he discusses his experience interviewing his 103-year-old grandmother on his own podcast “Life Is Short.” Check out this excerpt:
OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST: Did you learn something from her, though, that you didn’t know before?
LONG: A lot. You know, a lot, which is embarrassing to say because I – we are quite close, and I see her a lot. And I learned a lot about my family. I learned that she had a brother who died at an early age, and she had never talked about that – yeah, like, really…
EISENBERG: Wow.
LONG: …Heavy stuff, yeah.
Long isn’t alone in realizing how many family stories, important events, heartbreaks, are not discussed amongst relatives. But the important takeaway we all can learn from? All he had to do was ask.
Our family stories, our legacies, all boil down to one thing: our loved ones. When we miss out on those important opportunities for communication, we miss out on more than the social experience. We miss out on new memories. Preserving history. Saving life stories.
Our loved ones are our legacy. Preserve yours today with LifeBook Memoirs.
Want to learn how it all works? Read about the LifeBook journeyhere here or contact our team today.
