I don’t know what to say, and I beg you to be patient. I don’t know what to say because history is just that incredible to me. I have typed and erased an erroneous amount of times. To be honest, it is quite annoying.
How do you write about something so important? How do you encapsulate your feelings, thoughts, knowledge and experiences, all within the strict confines of words and letters and pages? It is quite daunting making a case on why something is important, persuading you to agree with my opinion or vouch for my opinion. It is a lot. I don’t just want to give you a list of things about why history is important, I want you to feel what I feel and see what I see, and I don’t want to mess up. I mean, I really only have one shot.
The only thing I can think about doing is just opening up my heart to you, and allowing you to sit with me in the reactions I have towards history.
I remember picking history as my major and how I felt. I knew I was making the right decision. This beautiful subject called to me with a soft, warm whisper and I couldn’t say no. I had to explore it, I had to learn it. From there, I fell in love with it.
See, whenever I read history I feel all warm and bubbly inside. It is almost romantic. I really am in love with this discipline. I am able to receive so much information, understanding, and knowledge from researching and reading. It is magnificent. History makes my mind bend and shape and change constantly because of everything new that I learn. I get to see things from different perspectives, and in return I am able to interact with people better.
I can’t help getting a little dizzy in the head. The words I am typing don’t feel right. They feel so arbitrary and clumsy. I want you to understand the way I feel about history, and I feel like I am falling short. Honestly, the reason I feel this way is because I am. History has done so much for me and for you. I don’t know if you realize it. History has showed us how to think, talk, read, interact with one another and so much more. It has already shown us glimpses of our future, and it has shown us the explanations of today. It has done so much more than I could ever explain. Because of this, I can’t find the words to thank it. I can’t find the words to explain my feelings for history because I am in awe.
I am in awe of the majesty that is our past—the nuances, the perspectives, the loud voices, the soft voices, the people of yesteryear, the triumphs, the failures and the interconnectedness of it all. History has shown me how to live today. How everything is connected, how every life matters and how everything happens for a reason.
History has given me hope. When I can look back at a time that seemed absolutely dreadful come to an end I can look at today and see a light at the end of the tunnel.
I know I did a bad job at explaining why history is important, and maybe it was misleading to title this article as such. But, if you have even the smallest amount of imagination then imagine this: a petite, strawberry blonde girl with freckles, wearing cat eye glasses that has the biggest, brightest smile on her face, unable to speak, flustered beyond belief, and bursting at the seams from excitement, respect, regard, and love–all at the mention of the word “history.”
