I have a new obsession (by Ben)

Hello. My name is Ben Davis, and I am addicted to obsessions. How, you might be asking, can you addicted to the rough equivalent of addictions? Oh it is easy. You just get a hobby, like any normal person would, and then take it way to far, way to fast; and then quickly move on to the next shiny new obsession that winks at you just right. I take pride in following after the classic English tradition of being good at everything, and great at nothing. (or as my mother would argue, great at everything, and perfect at nothing.)

Ever since I was young, I had a voracious appetite for knowledge. I like to learn about anything, and everything. I would read trivia books, and made my way through our World Book Encyclopedia (until I got to Sn-, and delved out of the encyclopedia into the wild world of herpetology). I remember having enormous cravings to digest large volumes of information about particularly strange topics. At the age of 9, I relished going to the library, where I would run to the second floor, third-to-last stack on the left, to the 623.x section to read about weapons. Sure, most kids read about weapons or learn to draw a catapult... But I would read the same books over and over, memorizing the distinct shapes and unique names. Then as quickly as I'd been hooked, I found another fascination. Then there was the origami period. We got book after book of origami and passed many a sacrament meeting making boxes, cranes, and jumping frogs. From time to time I was side-tracked with a good series of books, like Encyclopedia Brown. But for the most part I routinely cycled from one focus to another. I wasn't just dabbling like the other kids; I was diving into each obsession head-first, and only surfacing for normalcy when it was painful. Everyone I knew thought I was weird for requesting an encyclopedia of snakes as my only present when I was 13, which I read over and over.

Through middle school, I can't recall many of the things I was obsessed with. Nintendo overwhelmed me back then. But in high school, I got deep into the following: Ceramics, mountain biking, running, computer programming, coin collecting, Lacrosse, woodcarving, fencing, and huge jigsaw puzzles to name a few.

On my mission, we weren't allowed to read, and so I toiled at the Work, but also became overly obsessed learning to read braille, solving the Rubik's cube, and playing chess, spending my p-days thinking while the rest of the elders played basketball.

In college my tastes matured, and I was consumed with the likes of golf, fly-fishing, fly-tying, automotive repair, backpacking, wilderness survival, exercise physiology, skiing, home repair, cycling and bicycle repair, real estate investment, bowling, lockpicking, and the study of meteorites.

Since getting married I've dabbled in furniture building, TV repair, gold panning, Porsche maintenance, orienteering, MMORPG, geocaching, triathlon, self-reliance/subsistence living, beekeeping, sandcastle building, koi raising, automotive painting, astronomy, crossword puzzles, scout shoulder-patch collecting, and morse code.

I don't say this all to brag. I just have a problem staying focused on one 'hobby' if that's what you want to call it. My wife calls it "cute", while she rolls her eyes, and lets out a sigh, realizing now what she's gotten herself into.

Anyway, I mention this all because I just found a new obsession, and this one is a good one: genealogy! (er, I mean, family history!)

My father, James Benjamin Freeman Davis, was an avid genealogist. He spent most of his adult life from age 20 to age 51 doing genealogy. He went to libraries, visited cemeteries, and dug up family info. But he passed away mid-stride of a surprise heart attack in 1993. I was only 15. No one in the family knew how to pick up the pieces of his research (or even that that much had been done). Much of it was lost, except for a few boxes of files, photographs, and a computer disk of pedigree charts.

Now that I have a family of my own, I'm restarting that research. After all, the Davis name (though common in our modern world) is nearly gone in my line. Not that an extinct family name is much cause for any fuss. So far, I have only one son (James) to pass on my Davis name:

I am the only son (me: Benjamin James) of my father (James Benjamin Freeman). He was one of two sons, but the second was still born, of James Hutt Davis (my grandpa), who was also one of two sons. James Hutt's brother, Benjamin Freeman Davis Jr. died at age 20, and had no children to his name. So effectively, James Hutt was the only Davis to pass on his name from his father Benjamin Freeman Davis, Sr. (my great-grandpa), who was one of 7 boys of Ephraim Lemuel Davis (my great-great gpa).

So my son is the only Davis in the world who will be able to pass on the Davis name, that came through Benjamin Freeman Davis, Sr born in 1876. Both of my sisters have picked up new last-names, and certainly aren't genealogists.

So far, working during my lunch-break, the occasional evening during TV, and on Sunday afternoons; I've already read 6 books on genealogical research; started to rework the research my father did; and started some original research of my own finding dozens of new ancestors that my dad didn't know about. (Including an ancestor that came over from Ireland! Hooray, someone kiss me: I'm 1/64th Irish!)

I just hope this obsession turns into a full-blown life-long hobby as I continue to cycle through interests. Oh, look at that pretty bird outside. I think I'll take up birdwatching!