FW Write now!

Please forgive me if I brag a bit on my family. I'm proud of them. I used to think that everyone was like them. But time and reflection have made me realize that they're rather unique.

Take Grandma for example. She dropped out of high school to attend BYU back when campus was still below Maeser hill. Graduated with a degree in chemistry and was contacted by Los Alamos to do work for them. I suppose they figured that a mormon girl from southern utah was a pretty low espionage risk. Curiously we never knew about her work until a few years ago when she go a letter informing her that it been declassified and she could talk about it. You never know. And she's still going strong. She asked for (and got) a table saw for her eightieth birthday this last summer.

Then there's her grandchildren, mostly college educated. The occasion several nights ago was goodbyes to two of them. One grandson is leaving for Afghanistan, the other to serve as an LDS missionary. Both brothers from a family of thirteen kids. There's another brother/friend that has been unofficially adopted into the family. As he puts it, they fed him once and haven't been able to get rid of him since.

It make one a little reflective to see the soldier leaving for Afghanistan. There is his son, a year old, and his wife with one on the way. And he'll most likely be gone for over a year before he returns. "What if?" thoughts cross the mind: "What if he dies? What happens to his family? How would that be for his son?" True, his particular job doesn't require him to be in the action as much, but the danger is there nonetheless. His wife grew up in the military, and knew he was a soldier when they married. But it's as radically different kind of a life as being LDS is from the rest of the USA.

The missionary is excited to go. He too is a little reflective, understanding that he'll never come back to the world he's leaving. When he returns, his younger sisters will be in college. There's a very real possibility that other siblings will be married, and that he will have more nieces and nephews. And then there's the extended family, back to Grandmas siblings and their descendants. It's between four and five generations when you get the whole lot together. He's started using facebook to keep in touch better. Not that we don't see each other at the reunions, or write each other a few times a year, but it's nice to be more current.

Even without daily contact, it's the family that keeps us together. Inevitably the branches will grow too large to keep together, especially as the older generations die. But there's a level of trust in the gospel and in a common dedication to each other. Hundreds of people, many who look familiar, but I really don't know b name: it makes me wonder sometimes. But it also is a great security to know that I can rely on them.