March Third, Two-Thousand and Ten. It's a beautiful afternoon in a crowded family history center, allowing for my own concentration to kick in. The youth group that just came in is getting settled and the fellow adventurers are being introuced to what could be the most addicting and tremendous work that could ever exist: family history.
Now you may be thinking, "Okay, it can't be THAT tough, can it?" Well here I am to answer your question! It's not easy, it takes a long time, and sometimes you just can't continue researching a person for a day, month, or even years before something becomes available!! Now, what was your question again? ;)
Anyway, there's one main purpose of my blog that I just created on this warm, soft night. I want to inform myself - and the world - about my personal family history progress and how much of an adventure it can really be!!! :D I have been doing family history work for myself and others since day one of my mission, which is now exactly eight months ago, August 3rd, 2009. Isn't that crazy?! I've been out for 8 months now, holy cow!!!! Anyway, that's a topic for another day.
So why am I starting a blog now? Well, here's the short version. A couple weeks ago, I was helping a patron (someone who comes to the Mesa Regional Family History Center, or FHC for short) and I had to reformat my flash drive. Well, I'm ALWAYS making backups of my flash drive, so I knew that wiping the thing clean would cause me no harm, right? Right!! :D But when I went home I had to wipe my computer's hard drive for Windows 7, my laptop, and pretty much redo EVERYTHING technical-wise for my life. Well, there was one problem... I don't have an ONLINE BACKUP of my family history work, AHHHHHHH!!!!!!! *poof!!* All gone, just like that. So now I'm starting from the beginning, again!! :D
That just adds to the adventure and excitement of my work! I have nothing, so I'm starting from a clean slate. If Heavenly Father didn't want this to happen, He would find a way for me to have recovered my countless pictures and Personal Ancestral Files (PAF) and other documents that I had acquired over the months. Was it a lot of work to get all that? YOU BET!!!! But will I have learned something new as I start fresh, and will I hopefully get others interested in finding their ancestors? If that's the case, then I will gladly redo what I once had, and maybe this time, with even more accuracy.
Moral of today's story: BACKUP YOUR FILES ONLINE!!! Email yourself copies of your PAF 5 files often, log your research ON PAPER, and keep a physical file of what you have on top of your digital one!!!
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