So I couldn't think of a good story to tell about myself, so I decided to tell a story about my heritage as my personal narrative.......I hope it counts.
Speechless
My insides prick with a sense of belonging and amazement. Words fly through my head, yet I cannot formulate the emotions that are trying to escape within me. What I try to say drips form my lips then flutters into silence. Left quite, the picture in my hand takes me to another time, another world. Sure it’s said that a picture is worth a thousand words nut this picture leaves me without words. It leaves me speechless.
Whenever guests are brave enough to venture into the Eyre home for dinner they always leave with the same sense amazement.
It will only take a small lull in the conversation for my dad to slip away from the conversation to get the picture sitting on our coffee table.
“Hey come look at this,” he calls from the other room. “Pretty cool huh?”
The guests crowd around the small picture trying to sneak a look. Grabbing the rusted silver picture frame from my dad’s hand, they look at the black and white picture…their faces are masked with confusion as they look down at the picture.
Looking into the picture they are transformed to another world. The picture, taken in Isfahan, Iran around 1905, has both my mom’s great-grandfathers in it, as well as her grandma and grandpa.
The picture has three grown me, all brothers, sitting in the middle. Long beards garnish their faces and dark turbans cover their head. A small grin is noticeable on their faces as they look at the camera, as if there is something humorous going on behind the man taking the picture. Two of these men are my great-great grandfathers. Sitting at their feet are two little girls. One of these girls is my great grandmother, and her first cousin (who would later become her husband, not to many years after the picture was taken) stand behind the three grown men. Surrounded by servants and blossoming flowers, these men, my family, seal their place in history with one snap of the camera.
In one second of time, two or my great-great grandparents were together with my great grandparents. To be able to look through this portal of my heritage is unbelievable.
Leaving behind an arranged marriage, a family’s extreme weal, and his native country, y grandfather, Mohammad Baghar Rahimzadeh, left Iran in 1955 for America to pursue an American college education. He was mission something in his life. And he couldn’t quite figure out what that was.
After venturing through the university of Michigan, he left for someplace warmer. He couldn’t take the cold any longer. So where do you under up when you are looking for warmer weather? —Southern Utah of course.
While finishing college in St. George, Utah, he fell in love with a redheaded Mormon girl. He irony does note escape us that a redheaded Mormon girl and an Iranian Muslim ended up falling hopelessly in love. Needless to say, neither on of their families were originally thrilled with the idea of them marrying the other.
Bodly to leave behind his family? To leave his native country? To marry someone who was a different religion and culture? All of these acts have made my grand pa who is today. A man who wanted nothing, now the hardest working person I know. A man who was raised by servants, now spending his life helping others. A man raised in a strict religion, no believing that an adoring God loves all people equally. His legacy has shaped who I am today.
Far to often, life flies by to fast for us to take a moment and appreciate the world around us, and to be grateful for the legacy that you have.
Each time I look at who my ancestors, and in particular my grandpa, I have a million words that flood my mind, and yet, I am often left
Speechless.
