I have rules for movies. I know that sounds silly, but I'm tired of watching movies that leave me feeling sad. If I'm going to invest two hours of my time staring at a screen that doesn't have my ancestors on it, I want to come out of it feeling inspired and in a good mood. I hate following some wonderful main character through a movie only to find he or she gets killed off. I want to laugh through the movie and leave it feeling that there is hope for humanity.

Movies that fit my "rules" aren't always that easy to find these days, so I often turn to older movies and like to spend time watching old classics. A few weeks ago, I was surfing for something to watch and ran across My Best Girl, a silent movie starring Mary Pickford. I haven't seen a lot of silent pictures and was tempted to pass it by, but since my remote control travels had only turned up the usual "shoot 'em up," "beat 'em up," or "blow 'em up" movies that I don't go for on other channels, I settled in to see what it was about.

The story was your typical poor girl meets and falls in love with rich boy, but doesn't know he's rich boy about to be married, but rich boy falls in love too and everyone lives happily ever after. I really didn't expect to be drawn into the film and was contemplating calling it a night. But as the story unfolded, I found myself really enjoying it and didn't even miss the sound of the actors' voices. (Actually, I can think of some newer movies might benefit from the lack of sound too!)

What initially struck me most was the ability of the actors and actresses to communicate the story so eloquently without words. The more I thought about it though, the less surprising it became. As we put together our family's history, we are also without dialogue, but there are still many ways our ancestors can communicate their story to us--ways that don't involve inviting Madame Zelda over for a seance. This week, let's take a look at some ways our silent pictures (and records) can help to tell our family story...

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