3

three

Have you ever thought about how certain things define us, and our families?

Lately, I have spent a great amount of time thinking about our family. Not just my immediate family, my parents, my brothers, and my sisters families! I have decided our family is defined by the number three.

I have often heard tell of the recurring number "40" in the Bible, of it's significance.

For our group, that number is "3".

Numbers have always fascinated me, at least to a certain degree. I have milestones "etched" in my mind with numbers. Pepa-29, Memama-31, Jjm-48, Krl-49, Ff-51, Me-53, Ldf-53, Paf-55, Sdh-56, Sdf-58, Tjt-64, Trc-69, Jkf-75, Jpf-76, Rrf-77, Jef-78, Scf-79, Mlf-80, Jsf-80, Maf-82, Kef-82, Sah-82, Ch-85, Kf-85, St-85, Kph-86. Whew, my mind is spinning. Along about here I begin to have to really think because nieces and nephews begin mixing with grand children.

Now you might wonder with all those numbers, how did I come up with the number 3 as our family's defining number? If you take all of the intitials and count through the alphabet to see what numerical postion corresponds to them, then add all of the initial numbers and then add all the corresponding years of birth and divide the latter by the former, and multiply by the reciprocal of my birthday, you come up with the number 3.

Just kidding. It just seems like the number 3 recurs over and over again in our family. Three of us kids had three children (Me, Pat, and Coach, although I have a bonus in Trc). So far three of the children have three children (Jason, Rian, and Colby four if you throw Trc in the mix). We had three groups of three kids sharing the same school grade or class. Colby, Makai, and Joni. Merrit, Kelsi, and Steph. Chris, Kirby, and Shelb. Of course this doesn't account for if someone held their child back a year.

In other words, there was a lot of togetherness, especially when everyone lived in Roscoe! Probably too much at times. Trc did a solo act as did Jeri, Jake, Kyle, Robyn, Wee, and Rollo, while Rian and Jason did a duet. Of course as we age, any age gap narrows.

Just to put any possible question to rest, my lucky number is 4. But that is another blog.

Continuing with 3. Krl and I have seven grand children. 4 girls and 3 boys. O.K., you say, that doesn't work. But, Trc has three girls, Rian has three boys. The only single is Addison.

And at this minute, we have 3 dogs and I have three pair of clean unawares in my drawer. O.K!, enough is enough.

Krl and I have had a good time talking about the parallels of our children and nieces and nephews, but without a doubt, the most intriguing is Rian and his family, and Colby and his.

Rian has three boys, Colby has three girls. Surprisingly, their ages correspond very closely. Reid and Avery, Holt and Gracie, and Drew and Kennedy. Krl and I had opportunity at Pepa's birthday party to observe.

Colby's girls are very pretty, very polite, and very well be-haved.

Rian's boys are handsome, ornery, and little hooligans!

Krl has asked me over and over, what makes little boys and little girls so different. My only answer is the old nursery rhyme, "What are little boys made of?" Frogs, and snails, and puppy dog tails! And "What are little girls made of?" Sugar and spice and every thing nice!

Uh oh, three ingredients. There is that number is again!

I've told Krl I don't know why little boys are so rough and tumble and why little girls are prim and proper. Now I will go on the record and say boys can have their sweet moments and girls can have their shrills and shrieks.

Of course age grouping has a great deal to do with relationships, and this was true with Avery and Reid, even though they did have some cultural differences. I observed Reid come banging through the back door of Memama's house, making his way through the kitchen and its maze of people when he saw and approached his cousin Avery. Just as he was walking up he belched. Big time. "Gross", Avery said. "Nuh uh", Reid replied. And away they went to play.

Later in the day, the big boys (O.K., they aren't boys, they are men) were all standing and sitting around the back patio visiting, when Jason directed everyone's attention to the cellar door. There stood Holt, no shirt, pants piled around his ankles, peeing on the cellar door! Actually it was quite reminiscent of a Charles Beckendorf print we have hanging in our house. All of the group erupted in laughter, yet not even this distracted Holt from his "business". Colby told Rian, "Little girls don't do that!" Rian called Holt over when he was through, and Rian told him, "Good job Holtie, you didn't wet your britches!" (By the way, Holt just turned-................ 3.).

To be honest, the hooligans come by it honest. As far as what makes little boys and little girls different, I don't really know! But they are both very precious in their own right!

It was good to see the kids, our kids, nieces and nephews, cousins, grand kids, great nephews and great nieces, interact at the party. There is a tie that binds. And I am thankful for that!

For a change, yesterday I spent the day in the home office. At least until about four when I made a dash to the post office. I worked on over-axle over-gross weight tolerance permits for a couple of trucks, then I worked on payroll summaries! Today, if things go well, I will install some new tax software, and print the W-2's. That is a tall order, but I can hope!

Have a day!

FATHER, thank YOU for a good day, I was truly blessed. Thank YOU for the tie that binds, both our earthly families and our HEAVENLY family. Bless-ed be.