If you knew they had a list of abbreviations and titles behind their names but thier souls were lonely pits of isolation, would it break your heart? What if they struggle financially and don’t have all the luxuries and toys that their peers do? Will they sink into lapses of depression feeling sorry for themselves and resenting the hand they’ve been dealt? I want my children to know they don’t need “stuff” to make them happy. They can find true happiness in people and keeping fun loving deep relationships. You see, it just dawned on me that I spend a lot of time talking to my kids about what I think will make them happy successfull adults; getting an education, staying close to God, saving money, taking care of their bodies and more. All of these are important, but I realize there is one more area I need to really emphasize, loving people, and taking the time for them! And more than that, but finding the good in people despite age, status, irritating habits, race, religion or any other differences.

THings have changed so much since I was growing up. We didn’t have a lot of money. We didn’t have much at all, but what we did have is tons of fun, loving and healthy relationships. There wasn’t a weekend that went by that we weren’t making taco’s with friends, camping on the Verde River or having a potluck at church. My parents went through very hard times, but when looking at photos you would never know. I see their friends sitting on our raggedy couches with their big polyester collars and bell bottomed jeans. They played silly games like charades and the “Ungame” and made homemade ice cream with fresh berries that we spent the afternoon picking. My parents friends came in all shapes and sizes, rich and poor, educated and uneducated, some cool, some were geeks, old and young! They didn’t worry about their house looking like a pottery barn magazine, and they didn’t try to serve five course meals with gourmet appetizers of five different cheeses. No one had to ask if they should take their shoes off when they walked in and no one even knew what a “coaster” was! It’s called hospitality and this generation is greatly lacking and the next generation will pay dearly. This Martha Stewart perfectionist mentality has taken it’s toll on American’s and now many of us don’t even try.

During the day after our chores were done we would pile into the pinto and go visit mom’s friends. Some were lonely shutin’s that lived in a tiny shack, or I remember a widow that had just lost her husband with three kids. I remember bringing her food and hating to go in the un-insulated cinder block house that had dirt floors and sheets on the windows. It smelled of poverty and I hated it, but my mom didn’t care. SHe would make us sit there and visit with the widow and her kids, reaching out to them in their grief and loneliness. On other days we would go visit our “wealthy” friends. They lived in what we thought was a mansion and had a candy drawer chocked full that we would raid like scavengers. We would take long vacations with them caravaning in our blue pinto behind their fancy limousine Oldsmobile. We had to stop at every town so one of us kids could rotate off the “hump” and into the back of the Lincoln. I’d pretend I was a rich movie star, never looking back at the crazy family hangin’ out of the ford pinto wagon following behind us.

And when it came to family…..nothing ever stopped us from seeing them. My grandparents smoked like chimney’s, their house was gloomy and dark from the tar buildup on the windows. The only light sometimes would be the flashing lights from both television sets that were constantly on. We were regularly dragged over there to visit and if I was lucky my grandma would give me a dollar to clean out the moldy containers in the back of her fridge. When my mom couldn’t make it over and it had been awhile since we had seen them, she would tell us to go on our own and we would have to find something to talk about. Not visiting our grandparents because they lived differently or they had alternative forms of cleanliness was NOT AN EXCUSE to have not have a relationship with them. It wasn’t always fun, sometimes we would have to sit and just listen to my mother and them talk and if we got to restless or rowdy my grandmother would scream “Children should be seen and not heard!”. We learned to deal with it and we had to take the good with the bad. The good, many times being able to stay up all night watching t.v. (which we didnt have) when we would spend the night.

So looking back, I see now that my mother was doing so much more than just being a good daughter to my grandparents and a good friend to her shut-ins. She was teaching us to accept people for who they were, finding the good in them and forcing us to reach deep within ourselves and learn to love people we had NOTHING in common with. If that doesn’t make for some well-rounded people….well then….okay I don’t want to brag but I’m just going to say it, my brothers and I all don’t have any problem in any social settings. I don’t take any credit, we can get through any difficult or awkward social situation farely easily. Can anyone see an even more important lesson that she was teaching us….one that she will reap the bountiful rewards of one day? That’s right, making our realtionships with her parents and our grandparents a priority. She of all people could have come up with a million valid and justifiable excuses why we should make our visits a little less often. Days could have turned into weeks, and weeks turn into years and soon we would no longer know our grandparents. But that didn’t happen. So what I am going to tell you now is this….are you making it easy for your kids to neglect their relationships with you when they are older with families of their own? Is there bad blood, misunderstandings, hurt feelings or irritating habits (like smoke) or even conflicting personality traits that keep you from reaching out? I understand sometimes relationships need to be severed and our childrens safety needs to be a priority. Are you tolerant of your families little quirks, and personality differences? Your children are watching and keep in mind you’re setting your own destiny. If you think you won’t have quirks and differences that they find hard to tolerate, your’e kidding yourself. It’s up to us to teach them now the value of people and their worth. Loving people regardless of their flaws, hurts, and hangups and to cherish deep rich relationships finding the good and overlooking the bad. Because if we don’t……you just might end up a very lonely person.

By beckycollins