Ah… Hope you all had a great 4th of July – America 250 – and that this jovial spirit will continue!

I know that we talk about “the American Dream” in a self motivating manner – WE need to achieve and get out there!!! We also self envision a lifestyle and well like everyone would have their own place – usually… As we leave home and yeah we also imagine kids who fly the coop – and then we are sometimes surprised that children come back home – or never leave – but this is not new… This is not new…

Every situation is unique and works (or doesn’t work). I know that many people would like their lives different – but we deal with what we have. Honestly, many famies have benefited from multi-generational families – not just Grandma living with us watching us – but also like my grandparents and aunts babysat me when I was young. And yes sometimes the whole family is together in one house. I know grandkids who have THRIVED MORE because of Grandma and Grandpa. This is the norm in other countries, so why do we tend to let the media or society tell us it is not “normal” here… It’s all good – and as the song goes: “Anything goes”…

The truth here is that LOVE is what makes a family into family – and being together is a functional but fundamental structure and off-shoot of Love that works.

I’m entrenched in the reading of the census of NYC 1900-1950 and know from reading incoming ship manifests of my family members that we are the recipients and results of them entrenched in the “American Dream” – they essentially were “taking care of family business” first even though they themselves left home. They were immigrants making it and then making it work out for their better – and the betterment of their children in America – by their hard work… (and for my family, at least one set of adult children sent back for their adult parents to come to America too. Taking care of their extened family and I can imagine great neighborhoods of families together).

We found American flags that would have been my great grandparents – and have their naturalization papers too. Reading my extended family letters from the farmhouse – I do see family growth into the “American Dream” – but also financial sacrifices. In the readings and in the Census reports, I have read often of examples of family members moving back in – kids to parents – parents to kids – siblings and cousins to each other… MY grandparents built a house for my great grandparents to move into – down the road from their farmhouse. My other great grandfather on that side built houses and as he built one particular one, he moved in with my great grandmother because this was her “dream house” and then he built or renovated another house for one of his sons, just across the street. Family helped family. 

For this current treasure trove of letters in english (from the America-residing generations after their parents settled in NYC after coming from the old country), the letters do talk about these multi-generational homes. The letters show the love and sometimes the strife of these households (probably because it is tougher to have conflict when you love someone than when you don’t)…  In all these structures, it is LOVE which is the glue that holds life together.

And they mostly took care of each other. (with the exception of a family dispute only lightly touched upon). In one letter in 1931, the talk is about Great Grandmother’s brother, who was a baker in NYC when the family business was booming, now not working much mid depression – and instead making lunch for his grandson as the other daughter works:  “Dad isn’t working much, maybe 2 days a week, but he always has something to do, he cooks he cleans and gets (grandson) lunch for him. (Other daughter) is working but not the whole week but it is better than nothing.”   The rest of the letter states there are thousands of people out of work in the depression…

“I go by my Father every day as he isn’t working much now as pretty near all the bakeries are closing no business. (Daughter) is working so Dad takes care of (grandson).”

A different cousin writes: “I was glad to hear that your Mother and Father are able to take it easy now…” – “We are all well here, (sister) and I are working, my Father is home and does a little cooking and marketing. He has the time of Riley, but I guess he has worked hard enough for one life time…”

Well, these letters do often conclude with love and kisses – and well wishes to their extened family… I am glad that the letter recipients, my Grandma and Great Grandparents, felt this love. I hope we all do – and that we share love with whomever God has put in our paths.

Our American Dream shouldn’t forget who brought us to this place where we could thrive… God bless America…

AMEN

Romans 12:10: Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.

Hebrews 13:1: Let brotherly love continue.

1 Corinthians 13 NKJV – The Greatest Gift –Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.

And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.