“You’re so blessed.”
When my husband and I started seeing one another seventeen years ago and I started to get to know his family I said these words to him often. I was brought to tears more than once as I watched how his family supported, encouraged, and respected one another. That they welcomed me–insecurities, awkwardness, baggage, and all–seemed almost too good to be true.
Over the years there have been moments with each one of his siblings, cousins, and their spouses, that have touched me deeply. Simple gestures, words said in passing, snippets of time that were I to speak of them would be brushed off as nothing out of the ordinary. That’s the thing. These moments I hold precious in my heart would not be thought to be out of the ordinary for people such as this and that makes them all the more special to me.
Today is Thanksgiving Day here in Canada. Yesterday Gerry and I journeyed to the city, not far from here, where he grew up and where his parents and his older brother and wife still live. His brother and wife were away, but graciously gave us use of their home where I cooked a simple–albeit non-traditional–Thanksgiving dinner for us and my parents-in-love.
We visited, ate, laughed, and played a couple of games after dinner. It was a low-key and simple afternoon. Then we bid farewell with hugs and kisses–keenly aware as always that, at ninety-four, every goodbye could be the last. Gerry drove his parents back to their retirement residence and I started the post-dinner cleanup and we prepared to pack up and come back home.
This morning as I sipped a first cup of coffee in the afterglow of yesterday’s busyness I considered the rich legacy that the Hoye children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren are blessed with through these two people. I thought about stories I’ve heard about how extended family and other friends and acquaintances have been touched by their generosity and kindness.
I imagined again what it must have been like for my husband to grow up with the kind of love and support of a family such as this. I was reminded again that he is, indeed, blessed. Then I realized something that I may not have put into words before.
So am I.