Anne Slanders

Days after the funeral, with the horde of compassionate calls and visitors slowing to a gradual crawl, Mollie now had time to show me some of David’s personal passions.

Fetching an old skeleton key out of her purse, Mollie led me down a corridor leading to a room that I had not yet seen. “This is David’s study.”, said Mollie.

There wasn’t much to it. It was a small, cramped room with one hexagon shaped window that allowed a smidge of light to pass through. The built-in bookshelves were a nice touch: filled with volumes of old English literature, books on woodworking and genealogy in no particular order. Mollie tried her best to tidy up the mess left on top of the oak desk but once she disturbed them, the scores of pamphlets, personal notes and three-by-five cards, that were once indexed within some book pages, now found themselves scattered along the floor. She was clearly flustered at the chaos. I stepped in and told her not to worry.

“There is so much of it!”, remarked Molly, “But David was adamant. He knew you would appreciate it. Especially his journal in the top drawer.”

“He wrote a journal?”, I thought. As I sat down in David’s chair, surely this would be my starting point. I could begin unraveling this mysterious treasure trove that David felt was important. I slid open the drawer and there, exactly as Mollie had described, was a leather-bound journal with David’s initials.

Covered in a soft, velvet-suede tanned jacket, I plucked it from the drawer. How strange: unlike most bound journals, the front and back cover were flimsy and devoid of panels. Although the entire text block seemed tightly bound, it looked as though additional signatures had been added to the text block. I later found out this had been the case.

The journal was not a diary. Although entries were dated and went back nearly 15 years, the journal was more an investigative study of an old family story told long ago. Scribbled within were cross-referenced historical notations and cryptic notes all leading to provide some level of authenticity.

I gave Mollie a quizzical stare. “Was he trying to find out if Grandma Candy’s stories were actually – true?”

Mollie smiled and nodded, “He sure was and he found some rather fascinating stuff.”

For heaven’s sake. I hadn’t given those old stories a thought for over 40 years! And now here in my hands was a tidal wave of information and personal investigations. Had he found something? It reminded me of something out of “The DaVinci Code”.

“You’re just going to have to read it.”, said Mollie.

Tune in soon as I share how this all began and the family fable that David found himself immersed into.

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