I've been thinking alot about the good feelings that existed at our Family Reunion. I've also thought about a conversation I had with a former neighbor about the fractured relationships with his own siblings. It has made me realize that one of the great things about our family is that we really love each other. It is love that unites us and supports us having really good times together.
Maybe this isn't all so surprising. Maybe most families have this strong bond of love. I don't know. This is my only family so it is the one that frames my perceptions.
Why is our family so loving? I've thought about how Dad always adored Mother and treated her with such respect. And I've always felt that in his later years Dad's love for his children and grandchildren was as close as mortals can get to unconditional love.
I also think of mother's joy for living. She loved to laugh. She loved babies. She loved to be with and around her family. I think her pleasure was infectious and profoundly influenced how we approach life and how we view our relationships with our family.
What do you think makes our family so special?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I love the closeness, Micah does too. It wasn't until I married Micah that I realized that not all families were as close as ours. I thought everyone did cousin's gift exchanges and held Family Reunions on a regular basis. Not sure what makes us so close or who is responsible for it. But I love how close we are.
ReplyDeleteMicah doesn't really know his Aunts and Uncles very well. They'd never drive 5 hours for a baby blessing like the Lincoln's have done for us. They never put they're money together to get their nieces' husband a Graduation Gift. Micah has a cousin that lives 20mins away from us and we've seen her once since we moved here. It'd be so different if it was my family.
The following is from Bruce (who doesn't know how to post a comment so he emailed it):
ReplyDeleteSpecial? I don't believe that we are different or really special. I believe that we have respect for one another and that are parents raised us to respect one another and always remember that family is first.
I remember one of the California Luke kids having issues with their car in Utah, and how the Lincolns helped them. Aunt Marge, if my memory serves me correctly, was amazed and very thankful - and spoke to the importance of family.
Not sure why we are so special, but Carol's memory of dad's appreciation of what he had, Mom's love of family, is very obvious in all us.
Must just be a good mix of those qualities that makes our family so special....
I have wondered about this too. I think it is just our immediate family. When we get together with some of the Lukes, Rogers, & Smith's the feelings are not there. The love and respect just isn't there. The families as adults fight and there are hard feeling that never get resolved. I guess we just got all our fighting out when we were young and now we realize how important each of our family is to us. I can't imagine any one of my family not being an every day part of my life. Maybe I don't talk to them every day or even every month, but when we do make contact it's just like it always was. I know if ever I have a problem, I can go to any one of my sibs and they will be sympathic and understanding, of course that would be after laughing about how silly I'm being and helping me to see my problems are nothing. But that's something else we have and that's humor....if you can't laugh about things you are way to serious. In a nutshell I think our parents just loved us so much (and we were always around love) that it is only natural that we truely love one another. It was the example.....
ReplyDelete