For someone as concerned with documenting her life as I am, it’s surprising that I’m not more of a history buff. It’s not that I don’t enjoy history, but with the exception of the ’20s flappers and the Salem Witch Trials, studying the past rarely piqued my interest. I guess my history teachers never managed to affect me in a personal way, whereas my English teachers always seemed to crack the world open for me.

As an adult I find myself trying to make up for the fact that I have little connection to the years that stretched on before me. I’ve studied my family’s genealogy in hopes of finding out more than just the names of the last two or three generations of ancestors, and had some success, but without the letters, photos, and heirlooms passed down in some families, they become little more than a list of “begats.”

This weekend a close friend of mine invited me to join her in attending an exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls in Raleigh, N.C. Having been raised in the church, I knew that these were some of the oldest manuscripts containing sacred texts, but I had little idea of the circumstances under which they were found or the theories about who may have written them. Sure, I could’ve read the Wikipedia entry and learned some facts, but there’s something so intriguing about experiencing the real thing—and museums are adept at trying to capture a subject from different angles and for different learning styles. It’s hard to conceptualize how long ago the 2nd century BC actually is, but to stare at fragments of handwriting, clay pots, and shoe leather from an era so distant is nothing if not humbling.

What will remain of our culture years from now? Will garbage-collecting robots be intrigued with the detritus we leave behind? And even more personally, if someone generations from now studied the items in my house, what would they learn about me?

Try creating a time capsule with your family to commemorate the present. What items will you choose to summarize where you are now? Write your hopes for the future and place them inside with intention. You can agree on a time in the future to open it up or leave it for someone else to find. The important thing is to get a sense of your place in this long river known as time.

What other ways have you found a connection to the past for yourself or your family? Suggestions are welcome!

Taryn Chase won’t be creating another branch on the family tree, but she’s going to have fun swinging from it.