Family: flash forward

Obviously, the holidays are usually full of time spent with family.  This year was no different for the Johnson clan.  We spent hours and hours with our extended family, playing wally-ball, card/dice games, doing puzzles, eating, and reminiscing.  It was wonderful.  I love each member of our family and it's always such a blast.  Not having ever experienced anything but the fun of these gatherings, I hadn't really ever appreciated it.  This Christmas though, our cousin Sam told us all that one of the things she doesn't like about working over the break is you can see the families that SHOULDN'T get together.  What she meant was that certain families get together - only once a year - and they start fighting and pretty soon, somebody calls the police and she gets to deal with it (she's a police dispatcher).  Anyway, that made me pretty grateful - we've been having these get-togethers for as long as I can remember and I don't recall any fights.  Maybe a few squabbles among the children due to games gone awry or some prank played by a mischievous cousin, but never anything serious.

During a few of the nights we spent together this past week, much of the conversation was between my dad and his three younger brothers - affectionately (and creatively) known as "the brothers."  They would reminisce about this and that.  What their childhood friends were up to these days, what foolish act of youth they remembered committing and getting in trouble for, what happened the one time grandpa got mad at them, etc.  It gave me a "flash forward" moment where I imagined myself and my two sisters 25 years in the future, sitting around a fire talking about what WE did as children and seeing OUR children take such an interest in our past.  It was rather fascinating actually, the whole thing.  So those are my holiday thoughts.  Kind of random, but there you have it.  I'm so grateful for the family I've been blessed with and I look forward to starting my own and continuing the tradition of strong ties to the rest of the family.

True Friend

I've often wondered what is meant by the description "true friend."  I think each of us can probably think of someone in our lives who we've felt has been a true friend to us.  It's just tonight I am kind of in awe of our Heavenly Father's plan.  How He provides for us in such an ingenious way.  We don't have any way of knowing what lies ahead, but in His infinite wisdom He places people in our lives who will stabilize us and compliment us.  I am grateful for these people.  I am grateful that God has blessed me with good friends.

I have a friend who is vastly different from me.  We don't see eye to eye on many subjects.  It is the most fulfilling friendship I've ever had.  He is in every possible way a "true friend."  Despite our differences our friendship only grows stronger.  I think the fundamental issue is that neither of us ever really want to change the other.  We care about the others happiness and often our discussions are to help one another see things more clearly and from a different viewpoint.

Anyway, I guess the point of this musing post is just for you to think a little deeper about the friends you have.  Be grateful for them.  Do what you can to reciprocate the influence they have on your life.  And realize that just as they probably don't realize the full effects they have on you, so also you never know what your caring example means to them.

I am now an official blogger!