Across generations

My brother sent a photo of Mom holding his newest grandchild. Yes, the same grandchild who has been featured before in this blog.

New life gives me hope. And there is something about Mom holding little Jenna that makes me think of history and time and family of course and also connection.

The photo speaks of one generation presenting the next with the wisdom and skills, training and knowledge they need to grow and prosper. Mentoring, parenting, mothering, fathering, nurturing -- all words alluding to our responsibility to raise up the next generation.

Have we been remiss at these duties? Just because a child comes with parents, doesn't mean we the extended family or the community at large have no responsibility, no calling, to help this child be all that he or she can believe.

Ahhhh the things my mother could teach Jenna. Pie baking? Quilting? Crocheting? How to hold your tongue, how to deal with difficult people, how to survive, and thrive, and find humor in even the most difficult of times? What it is like to ride in a horse and buggy? How to make maple syrup, tap the trees, boil the sap. How to be a neighbor. How to bloom where you're planted.

I so hope Jenna gets a chance to learn these things, if not from her Great-Grandma, perhaps from the rest of us who were taught by her.

What do you have to teach the next generation? Don't let it slip by. Dust it off and present the wisdom, knowledge, skills, insights, hard-won victories -- don't let them die with you or your generation.