This weekend, I went to our annual family reunion. We held it in a set of beach houses on the Texas coast. It was the first time in many years that practically the entire family made it, including my 89 year old grandmother with the rest of the contingency from Earthhaven in North Carolina.

My aunt and grandmother revived an old family tradition — one that died out long before I was born.  We sang a folk song about going to a corn shucking (which, I suspect, is a variation of this very similar song).  We replaced the main verses with lyrics about our family members and we all sang together.  Then, we were tasked to make up our own verses about the yonger generations, so that the song could continue and grow and tell the story of our family.

I was choked up.  I had just been thinking that it would be wonderful to have some kind of Celtic-like singing and storytelling tradition in our family to keep alive the memories of our elders and ancestors.  And there it was.  I pledged that night in front of the whole family to keep the tradition alive for our children.

I am happy to say that the oral tradition can be kept alive, or revived, even in this modern media-addicted day.  It just takes a little effort, is all.