It's a mid-Saturday afternoon with just about perfect weather (right around 80 degrees). Where am I? The library. I have assignments due and tasks to keep up. I'm doing my best to stay on top of these things1, and because I will be gone all day Sunday, today is Library Day.
Not that I'm happy about it. These chairs are really uncomfortable. My back aches. Chinese students nearby don't understand the concept of “library voice.2” While I am here because I focus is much better than at home, I can't help but lift my eyes from the screen and look around. A blue book two stacks away catches my eye: The Political Writings of William Penn3. Most people wouldn't think anything of this, but I have a connection of sorts to Penn. You see, the Fitzwaters came over to America in 1682 with Penn on the ship Welcome. Check it out. These are my direct ancestors. That makes us one of America's oldest European families, which is pretty cool. I think about how remarkable it is that my family knew a man4 who is important enough even today that books about him or collections of his writings sit on library shelves. The dude has a state named after him. There's no John Idaho, y'know? And the people that bear my name knew him, traveled to the New World with him. The Fitzwaters had a servant they brought with them. That's some serious money talking there. The Fitzwaters were people of some distinction.
Go back further in my genealogy and you'll find Sir Robert Fitzwalter (not a misspelling), a man important enough to sign the freaking Magna Carta and was a leader of a baronial opposition against King John5. We don't mess around. In England, the Fitzwaters were nobility, a family with a coat of arms back when it meant something to have them.
328 years later, I'm sitting in Alden Library. What happened?
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1 I got sick twice in the first three weeks of the quarter, and that really set me back when combined with an unexpected lethargy. I worked hard to get back on pace. I didn't enjoy it.
2 Mandarin is perhaps the most irritating language to listen to that humans speak. I hate it. What's a guy gotta do for a little Cantonese?
3 Nearby: Firm Heart and Capacious Mind: The Life and Friends of Etienne Dumont. If nothing else, a catchy title.
4 Even if they didn't know Penn before the trip, which seems unlikely, they certainly made acquaintances at some point during the two-month trip.
5 I was voted “Most Likely to Start a Revolution” in high school. It's in my blood!
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