Vox

The Big One

Well, A big one anyway. My step-dad's birthday ~ the big 6-0 ~ is at the end of the month. This man has been such a blessing in our lives - not just to our mother, but to all of us. And marrying into this family was quite an undertaking....we are many and we are....unique. He is a brave soul, I hope we have never given him reason to regret it ;-)

Why do I mention his birthday now, when it is still weeks away? Because I just got around to turning my calendar from August (yeah, so sue me) and noticed an anomaly that had never struck me before. September is almost devoid of family birthdays. There are only 2, and both of those are "married in's" In a family the size of ours, you'd think we'd have managed a September birth or two.

And the calendar? One of the greatest gifts I get each and every Christmas, from another man who has been an incredible blessing in all our lives ~ my brother-in-law. My sister started the tradition decades ago of gifting everyone with a calendar, pre-populated with all the family birthdays & anniversaries, each year (nope, no anniversaries in Sept, either. Odd). When she started doing it, that meant writing all the data, on all the pages, by hand. The task was eventually made easier when she could load all the relevant dates into a computer and print out labels, though they still need to be individually stuck in the right block on the right month. When she died, her husband stepped up and took over. It is a testament to the type of man he is that he still carefully shops for those calendars, making sure we each get a unique one which fits our interests and personality - and I can only imagine him with his assembly line of open calendars, peeling & sticking label after label from his printed sheets.

It is a great gift, and a great tradition, from a great man - and it reminded me that I have 3 weeks to come up with something for another great man in my life.

and 2 months to come up with something for THE great man in my life - D's birthday is in November. Along with 6 other members of the family :-)

Posted by Vox at September 7, 2009 05:28 PM | family