Giving Thanks

This Thanksgiving, as always, we have so much to be thankful for. It seems the list grows bigger each year. In the past two years we have had the worst of times and the best of times. In fact, the worst was responsible for some of the best. After all it is the storm that teaches us to appreciate the calm.

One of my boys once remarked about the number of pictures we have that were taken through the years around the dining room table. This is one of those things that unconsciously has become a Chilson family tradition. This is how we document the holidays and other special occasions of our life. It was never planned that way, it just happened to be the best opportunity to grab a group picture of those in attendance. Now I realize that I could probably line up all of the pictures taken around that table and make a flip book of the years passing by. The people around the table vary according to the occasion and the era. There are many who are no longer in our lives due to death or distance, but have left indelible footprints upon our hearts and those pictures remind us of those times. These are more than just pictures, they are a history of our lives.

This Thanksgiving, we spent the holiday at home enjoying our traditional turkey dinner with a few relatives in the most wonderful way. We had two nieces and a brother for dinner, and my nephew and his family joined us later for dessert.

  

The next day we all piled in on Don and Amy in Green Bay along with Bob and Gretchen and family from Minnesota. The place was packed and Don continued taking pictures around the dinner table of the next generation. Maybe they will be able to start their own flip book someday.

It's About More Than Just the Football

Fall has always been my favorite time of year. I enjoy the cooling down of the temperatures along with the warm Indian Summer days, and this year we have had a surplus of those. We were on the golf course three times last week and here it is the middle of November. There is no more beautiful season than when the changing colors of the deciduous trees appears in stark contrast to the green of the evergreen trees and the leaves on the ground crunch under your feet.

Last Saturday was the last Illini home game. Our season tickets were a real treat again this year. Our team did better than expected but it is about so much more that just the football. The tailgate parties with the family and friends added the best season ever. It is the time of the year when we connect with the Illini loving Pattersons and occasionally old friends. Recently in a sermon at church, the minister used sports and especially football as an example of something that brings people together. He was so right.

This year we were delighted to have our friends Grace and Dick join us for a game which doubled our pleasure. Grace and I have been friends for 40 plus years. We met at a time before Don and Dick came into our lives and  we dreamed of being cruise directors on a European bound ocean liner. Does anyone remember "O Susanna"? (not the song but the television show). Maybe it was called "The Gale Storm Show". At any rate it was about cruising long before the "Love Boat" arrived on the scene. Grace and I splurged our senior year on a trip to California ( does anyone remember student stand-by half priced air fare?) Right after that we became engaged about the same time, got married a month apart from each other, and started having babies about the same time with the same obstetrician. After a few more years our lives took  diverse paths when she moved to St. Louis. Over the years raising families left very little time in our separate lives for each other, but we never lost touch. Now that our families are on their own and we are concentrating on grandchildren we are able to take up where we left off with one of the world's great friendships. It is like the years never passed. I am so happy to have her back in my life again.

Can Life Get Any Sweeter?

It doesn't get any better.  We finally made it up to Green Bay for a week-end. We arrived on Friday with Papa's Pizza in hand; double decker for Don, cheese for Jack, Pepperoni for Ella, and cheese and sausage for Grandpa. The children each greeted us with gusto, especially Ella with her abundance of hugs and kisses. They presented us with a joint birthday gift which they had obviously been anxiously anticipating. They seemed to get as much joy out of presenting gifts to us than any I have seen them receive. It was a new coffee pot and they had to set it up for us, teach us how to use it,  and make coffee from it for us all week-end.

Saturday we saw Jack play in two hockey games and we had a bit of a Wii tournament and then it was family movie night.



Jack's also not crazy about posing for pictures

 Jack is at the age of like. It is embarrassing to him to use or hear the word love. Little does he understand that like is actually more of a compliment than love. Love between family members is absolute and unconditional. That is why it is so beautiful. It is safe. It says one can be oneself and always know that they are loved.  It comes with the blood bond. Even when families treat each other horribly somehow the love persists.

Like has to be earned. We don't necessarily like everyone we love. Christ chastened us to love our neighbor. He never said you have to like them. So when I hear the words "I like you" coming from a 9 year old boy, that is as good as it gets.

So there I was on movie night reclining in Jack's bean bag chair with a grandson who considers himself to old for cuddling, trying his best to get comfy on the edge of it and a granddaughter who would rather be with her mommy than anyone else in the world, making her nest with her pillow and blanket on the other side. This is their version of cuddling; the former considering himself too old to sit on your lap getting as close as he can, and the latter trying to do the same while pleading with her mommy to join her. I felt like they were liking me an awful lot that evening.

We stayed over Sunday just to spend a little more time with the crew. Amy and I took a bike ride with the children  through some of the wooded trails with an extended stop at a park and we had a Packer's Party in the evening.

The week-end was filled with simple activities and just spending time with the people we like.

Birthday Celebrations

I have always believed that birthdays are something special and certainly something to celebrate. It is a time not only for the individual having the birthday but a time for all those whose lives he touches to celebrate his life.

No one celebrates more than I the birthdays of my own children. The anniversary of their births represents the anniversary of the most memorable and life changing events of my life - mostly for the better. Why wouldn't they be cause for me to celebrate?

The absolute first and most significant life changing event of my life was my wedding day. I often think how different my life would have been if I had not married Don. The scenarios are amazing and none of them as beautiful as the one I have lived.

Today was Don's birthday and from beginning to end I helped him celebrate his life. We have all seen "It's a Wonderful Life" or one of the many imitation programs based on the same premise. What would the world be like if one had never been born?

Without Don for sure there would be no Bob, Don, or Mike. Then of course the seven grandchildren would have never been. I like to think the world is a better place because we created three good citizens for it who, in turn, are well on the way to creating more.

I'm not quite sure how I myself would have been redefined. I kind of think I would have led a single life. That in itself would probably not necessarily be a bad thing. I'm sure I would have had a distinguished career as a nurse. The one I had was pretty significant, but with more time to devote to it I may have expanded my accomplishments tremendously.

My friendships would be based on the nurses I worked with (of course I have those friends anyway) rather than on people we share a common bond with through our faith.

The Peace Corps lost out as that was in my ultimate plan, but I have had a couple of opportunities to exercise my missionary ambitions in different ways. 

The Navy also lost out because when we started dating, I was dieting to make the weight requirement to join the navy during my final year of college. I possibly would be a Vietnam vet today with a lot of the angst that goes along with that.

Most of all, I would never have found my soul mate. The person who is not only my husband, but the best friend in all the world. He always sees me as beautiful, smart, clever, intelligent, good, etc. He has never seen my warts. As long as I have him I know that I can count on support from him whether I am right or wrong. I always know that someone loves me unconditionally. Most of all I always have someone to play with and this is from the girl who was always picked last for the baseball team.

Without him there would be no travels, camping, nightly dinner conversation, bike rides, and certainly no Grammy's Adventures.

So tonight, here's to the guy who broke the mold and set the bar when it comes to being a husband, a father,and a friend. And I celebrate his birthday because that is to celebrate his life.