Generation Connection

...sometimes joy, sometimes seriousness. Life calls for both, doesn't it?

Perhaps it has always been so, the older members of the clan finding threads of family color repeating in succeeding generation. It is a pleasant diversion this viewing of connecting threads. At times, it is in the facial similarities. There is always that game to play it seems. But the repeat patterning of temperaments, of developing character in the young that echos those passed into family history, that is the real game.

Today's family 'snapshot' is that of one of this newest generation juxtaposed against an afghan crocheted by the little ones great-great-great-grandmother. (Of side interest perhaps is the fact that their given names are of similar origin).

The afghan, a fragment of my childhood was created by my maternal grandmother. This afghan has always delighted me. It is not at all of the shades of color I'd have chosen. But its boldness reflects the character of Grandma. No, she was not bold in the dominant, outgoing or outspoken sense. Rather, she was bold in her courage, her unending ability to go through great difficulties that presented themselves in her long life.

From a human perspective, much that she faced throughout her life could be declared 'unfair'. Yet Grandma faced each dark thread squarely, chose the course of her action and went on with a quiet joy. She was a woman of no nonsense strength balanced by immeasurable grace. She came to faith in Christ as an adult and never looked back. All that she was, all that she chose, all that she did was governed by that fact.

Truly her life was a handsome tapestry of balanced beauty. It took all shades, all colors to produce the final record. Grandma was an overcomer of the highest order. She was also my best friend.

This little one pictured before this ancestoral fragment has already shown herself to be one of this overcoming tradition. This child "with the humming bird heart" has already gone through open chest surgery with a stoicism that was astounding. She is a serious child but also a child of joy both in the exhibiting and in the giving.

How deeply moved I always am by this present day one and her connection with the long gone but remembered dear one.

What delight Grandma would have taken in her, as do I.

So for Today I am feeling so blessed to be marking the place at the center of their lives, holding on, if you will, to the thread of the larger tapestry that connects them.

That's what family is all about after all, isn't it, a tapestry of connected threads of assorted color and hue?