Every Friday, my cousin Ann picks me up and we go garage sale hopping.  It's fun.  I never buy anything--I don't need anything.  The thing I love about it is meeting people.  Ann was a music teacher in the Edmond system for twenty-five years and knows everyone.  Now, she teaches piano to twenty or more students.  She is a wonderful musician.  Someday her students will know how God blessed them by letting them have such a wonderful teacher.

Our mothers were sisters, and both of them were determined that Ann and I would be totally and completely competent in everything.  They drove us--to play musical instruments, to speak in public, to have all the social graces, etc.  Which I am glad for now, but then we both hated it.  We lived on the same street so it was a combined effort.  What one of them didn't push us to do, the other one did.

It's fun to talk about old times.  The thing both of us remember is how much our fathers loved us both.  They were such kind men.  But of course, they didn't have to make us do anything--our mothers took care of all that.  I couldn't tell the difference (nor could she) in the way the four parents treated us and loved us.  It was a wonderful extended family.  I am so thrilled to once again live close to her.  She is the sister I didn't have.  (Until 21 years later when Lisa came along--but she was like one of my children, not a sister.)

Proverbs 16: 44-46 "...As is the mother, so is her daughter.  You are you mother's daughter..."

Looking back, I am so thankful for my parents.  God could have plopped my soul in deep dark Africa in the mud.  But no, he blessed me with Christian home.  And....in America.  None of us deserve the great blessings he has bestowed on us.  No, we find ourselves complaining about what's wrong rather than getting on our knees and praising him for his loving kindness in what he has given us.

Get some knee-pads.