Siblings

Siblings

Growing up in a large family gave me plenty of opportunity to find fault with my brothers and sisters. I have memories of situations where, as the oldest, I felt slighted, misunderstood or taken advantage of by my younger brothers and sisters. The problem is they have their own list of offenses against their older brother. It must be part of the growing up process.

Recently, one of my sisters came to visit. She is the second oldest in the family and in many ways, we share the same memories of growing up in a large household. The nice thing is that now that we are older our perspective of those earlier years has mellowed. We can laugh and cry about all those times when we thought the world was going to end or at least a major meltdown of family life.

It is amazing that so many individuals can come from the same parents. Yes, we share some of the physical characteristics but in personality and temperament we are individuals. Grown up, married, raising families and in some cases making a geographic move away from the homestead, all of us maintain the identity as the Semsch family.

How our parents survived raising eight children continues to be a mystery to me. Not only the financial responsibilities but the challenge of individual personalities and problems must have driven them to the edge more than once. As I have often said, our parents gave us life, they didn’t give us perfect!

I look forward to those times I can get together with my siblings. I enjoy all the memories, happy and sad, because they give me the opportunity to relive those days long ago. These adult relationships keep alive the family life that I appreciate even more. Those memories enrich my life; a life that I want to pass on to my kids.

To my brothers and sisters who are faithful readers of my weekly blog, I say “thanks for all the memories.” Keep them coming!