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any real sense of stability.
The result of this separating has
created a whole generation who
don' t know "who they are." When
you grow up under the influence
of your parents and your grand–
parents, there is little doubt of
who you are. l f you have a quick
temper as your grandfather did ,
you ' ll know it if you saw him yell
at the cow when she kicked over
the pail.
r
f you have a fine voice
for singing, you well may have
inheri ted it from your g randmoth–
er. l f you heard her singing tulla–
bies, you will know for sure where
you gol your voice.
Many have become more aware
of their heritage as a result of the
Alex Haley book and televis ion
series,
R oots.
lt
has made many
want lo search out their back–
grounds and ancestry. Mr. Ha ley
created a need to find out who we
are and where we carne from.
This knowledge of one's family
heritage seems to be missing in so
many families today. Grandpa may
have been forced into early retire–
ment while he still had years of
productivity left in him. Perhaps he
died prematurely from the lack of
purpose and inact ivi ty. Like as not
grandma was put into a rest home
to rock away her final years of life
in boredom. What a tragedy! And
all t he time they could have helped
so much.
Don't Jet the opportunity for
your children to know and love
t heir grandparents' go by. Plan a
fami ly reunion as soon as it is prac–
tica!. lf the grandpare nts are not
living, make ita practice to visit the
cemetcry where they are buried.
Tell the children stories about their
grandparents and the "good old
days." You
' JI
be surprised al the
greater sense of identity it gives
them.
Nontraditions
Instead of positive traditions, do
you know what many families in
today's societ y have? Nontradi–
tions. What are nontraditions? Let
me give you an example.
The typical Western breakfast.
Years ago when societ ies were
mainly agraria n , breakfast was
qui te an affai r. The entire family
sat around the table. Mom pre–
pared a hear ty mea! of cooked ce-
s
real, toast from homemade bread,
fresh fruit , scrambled eggs and a
hamburger patty. Dad outlined the
day's chores. That was a tradi–
tion.
A nont r ad i tion is quite the
opposi te . T oday, dad probably
g rouches his way through the
morning prepari ng to fight the
traffic jams. He may or may not
bo lt clown a cup of coffee and a
piece of toast.
Where's mom? She may have a
job of her own and hurries through
the blow dryer and hair cu rlers to
be ready for her ride to work.
And the kids? Left to them–
selves, they take the easy way out
and gobble clown a bowl of pre–
sweetened cold cereal.
That's breakfast. That's wbat
we mean by a
nontradition.
Noth–
ing of Iasting value comes out of
this life-style. There is nothing
here to pass on to the next gener–
ation. No positive fami ly relation–
ships are built.
The chances of the dinner hour
having any greater family value are
between s lim and none. The majar
difference in the evening, com–
pared to breakfast time, is the blar–
ing of the television- that g reatest
of all conversat ion destroyers. Star–
ing at production -l ine si tuat ion
comed ies or old movies whi le eat–
ing a pop-in-the-oven prepared
mea!, the average family spends lit–
t ic time getting acquainted with
each other, much less the g randpar–
ents and t he cousins.
That's hardly the kind of bonds
that build strong family t ies.
A Personal Example
Something that happened in our
family nearly three years ago really
forced home the point to my wífe
and me how important fami ly
bonds are. We had not needed to
think about it before then.
At that time our daughter Jeft
for college.
Jt
was amazing how
much we all mi ssed her. W e
missed her smiling face coming
through the door every afternoon
as she carne home from school.
We missed her sitt ing next to us
at church services each Sabbath.
We found she missed us, too.
S he missed mom's home cooking.
Especia lly the homemade rolls
and the apple pie. Why, she even
missed quarreling witb ber broth–
er and s isters. She missed the tele–
vision- found out sh e had to
s tudy a lot more in college. A nd
s he m issed her fri end s even
though she had made many new
friends at college.
But there was one thing she
missed more than anything else.
Friday night dinner!
We had n' t deliberately planned
it that way, but over the years, Fri–
day night dinner bad become a
famíly custom. The girls were in
cheerleading, had after-school jobs
and of course homework. My job
required frequent nigh ts away from
home. Likc many families we were
going 1
O
different directions a nd
did not spend nearly enough time
together.
So Friday night became special.
We all agreed we would do nothing
e lse that night- it was family
night.
It
soon became a habi t. My
wife would spend a special part of
Friday preparing the meal. And
was it super. Gourmet cooking. For
severa! years it has been our very
best family custom.
The next year our second daugh–
ter left home to make her way in
the big wide world. We missed her ,
too. And she missed us. But most
of all she missed ... you guessed it,
Friday night dinner.
We also found another family
bond had been built. T his one an
annual custom.
Our daughters at this point in
time both lived about 1. ,000 miles
from us. They could not afford to
join the remaining members of t he
family for another tradition that wc
have- a week of ski ing during the
J anuary school vacation.
We al! once had sorne delightful
days together. In skiing we found
an activity that tied the family
together. U nlike t he routine at
home where each of us had our own
thing to do, when we were skiing
we were together, helping each
other. S ince we all started learning
at thc same time, we were at about
the same ability leve!. We could
laugh together as we tumbled clown
the slopes. The big kids helped the
little kids and we aH have pro–
·g r essed into reasonably good
skiers.
While we all cannot get together
every year a nymore, we fondl y
The PLAIN TRUTH