Last night I attended my cousin's daughter's wedding.
I'm the youngest cousin on both sides of my family. When I was around 10 years old I attended my cousin's wedding. And now ~23 years later I'm at his daughter's wedding.
I'm sitting at the reception watching as my aunt takes the role of my grandmother, watching as my cousin is now father of the bride, how his daughter is now in the exact place he was when I was 10.
I sit and notice my grandma and grandpa aren't there, they never will be. But in their absence I see my aunt aging, I'm watching in real time the process my own grandparents, her parents must have went through before my story began. I see my cousin dancing with his daughter a striking resemblance of old photographs of my grandfather. I look at the head table and see his son, a groomsmen, a near copy of him in his military uniform.
This kid looks just like my cousin who looks just like my grandfather who was around his age when he fought in World War II against Nazis. I'm looking at my grandfather home from the war before he raised my father.
It's moments like these, nights like this I think about how absolutely fast time goes. I think about how I attended my cousin's wedding with my parents when they were younger. Now I'm at this wedding with my brother who has a baby, the next branch in the ever growing family tree of life.
It felt strange not seeing my grandparents at this wedding the patriarch and matriarch of this family. But I realized that torch has been passed to my aunt, their daughter. She is "grandma" now. And that's the way it has always been. It marches on slowly and constant.
There was once an evening like this where my grandparents held their wedding and their grandparents were there. Yesterday's yesterdays.
This is all so obvious to the head. Of course I know where babies come from and how it works but to see it play out. To see how my aunt looks so very much like a transition stage to how I remember my grandmother. To see flashes of my grandfather in my cousin. The heart lesson.
And when this bride attends her child's wedding, will they even know my grandmother? Will they even be able to see roots that deep into the soil. I know they are there. I've seen them. I was held by them as a baby. And one day I will take my place as grandparent (insha'Allah) and even further one day my grandchildren's grandchildren will not know I existed but every time they look in the mirror there I am, there my grandparents are, There we all are the next link in the chain.
What forgotten lives live on in my reflection? What stories of ancestors never to be told, lost to history and progress. Who were the people who first traveled to America? Who were they in Germany? How did they arrive in Germany? Which Germanic tribe carried my genetic torch? The chain continues back deeper and deeper into the soil showing only this present family tree. And where will my children's children carry this flame?