30 Days of Thanks:: Day 17

November 17, 2011 30 Days of Thanks:: Day 17

Today I’m thankful for my siblings. All 6 of them.

There are too many of them for me to take a day sharing about each of them, because I have so many more things to be thankful for and the month is gone.

Let’s just say, that growing up was always very interesting. 4 boys and 3 girls (plus the parental units to guide them) made for a good life. I remember people always teasing us about being Catholic (which we’re not). As if we didn’t realize that we had a big family.

We grew up in an age of innocence. (of course every child should feel that way.) There were no set belt laws (so my little sister and I rode in the back of a station wagon); we could drink water out of the hose; McNuggets were new; you could trade a Tootsie Roll Pop wrapper with an Indian and a Star for a free candy. You wouldn’t waste an afternoon playing video games because although Pong was fun, you could only beat that ball around so many times. Good memories.

We never had a lot of things growing up, and the things we did have were always from a yard sale. (It’s kind of funny to compare growing up with Alan, because all his toys were new from the store, but we had them later from a garage sale.) That didn’t really matter. I remember friends would see how we played together, and I think they were jealous of what we had. Each other.

Of course, with 7 kids there was also a lot of sibling rivalry and teasing and fighting. I remember one of my brothers said to me, “I’m the only one that gets to pick on you.” This was after he defended me from a mean boy at school.

I was thinking about this yesterday as I finished up a calendar I have been making with pictures of all of us from this year. Now that we are all grown, we live in separate states and towns. I was filled with a sense of gratitude for these reasons: Even though we live many miles apart, we still see each other as much as we can. (I have many pictures of us gathered in varying numbers through out the year.) The other thing that I am most thankful for is that we have healthy relationships. I know I’m not the best at keeping in contact with them (and vice versa), but when we see each other there aren’t any guilt trips about not keeping in touch. There are no awkward moments of time passed. We’re family, and that’s enough.

Today I’m thankful for my siblings.