I've always been fascinated with and attracted to Agent Wife's family here in Saskatchewan.
They're very close-knit and have recent ancestors who were some of the pioneers of this province. I guess that's not too impressive as Saskatchewan is very young. It just celebrated it's 100th birthday a year ago or so. But even in the 1940's and 50's when my father-in-law grew up, it was still a very outdoorsy, roughing-it kind of life.
His family basically had to build and maintain most everything they had. I think he had to go to a creek, bust ice, and haul water on occasion. And he always brags about how tough they were with the cold. Like how a glass of water 3 feet from his bed would be frozen by morning.
Agent Wife has this inbred knack of making things work with what you have. She can improvise most anything under any situation.
Me - I grew up in the Houston suburbs, the birthplace of consumeristic wealth and waste. When something broke or became annoying, we just threw it away and bought a new one.
Agent Wife grew up with cousins and second cousins as best friends. They were real close and still talk to each other today.
Me - I just discovered I had second cousins last year. I'm an only child. And my handful of first cousins are scattered or recluses. So it goes.
The newest thing I've discovered about Agent Wife and her family is reflected in her recent post about her parent's household. I never realized how much they welcome in the stragglers and misfits to be a part of their household. The day we flew in they were welcoming in a 10 year-old foster child girl who happens to be a new Canadian resident. She spent most of her childhood in a Ghana refugee camp fleeing Liberia.
This young girl spent christmas with us, travelling the city making the rounds with Agent Wife's family.
Funny: words like "community" are the latest buzzwords in the church realm, like maybe it's a new concept. I think my in-laws have been living community for years without making a big intellectual stink about it.
Agent Wife and I celebrated our 9th anniversary last week. And I can remember back when we first married how we were youthful and slightly arrogant. We wanted to chart a different path than our parents. Like maybe we had it all figured out or something and maybe they were bad role models.
This trip, we're discovering that we want to be more like our parents.
4 comments:
nine is good, congrats!
we just zoomed right past our twenty-second. :-)
good post.
Thanks Nancy.
Yeah, it doesn't seem like it's been 9 years. Time flies I guess.
This was an emotional year for us in the marriage world. Ours is great, but at least 5 couples we know in 2007 split up and divorced - all after 5-10 years of marriage each.
They were all casual acquaintances. But it still stings.
Nice post, Agent B. Being more like our parents sounds awfully redemptive. I always figured that those geneologies in the gospels were trying to say something more than just a crummy list of names, after all.
Congrats on 9. Cheers. That is funny about community. I believe many of the roots of old are hidden to current generations especially in urban areas. I think we reach a season in life, 30's, where we long to bring redeeming qualities to an ugly world and look to those that reflect that. I can honestly say, I believe you do that. Your children will desire to reflect your agent ways- your Jesus ways.
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