My mom grew up on a dairy (then beef) cattle farm and the backyard looks like this:
It reminded me of a conversation Julianna and I had a few months ago.
Me: Julianna, have you ever seen a cow?
Julianna: No. [Not an entirely accurate answer, but she's three, so not all answers are accurate :) Besides, it was definitely her best guess ... I only remember one time I am sure she saw a cow, she visited my grandmother's farm when she was about 5 months old. Perhaps she saw one of the cows in the above photo!]
Anyways, back to the conversation. We'll take it from the top.
Me: Have you ever seen a cow?
Julianna: No. [long, thoughtful pause] But one day my daddy and I rode an elephant.
Well, she had me beat with that one. Sure, at age three I had seen plenty of cows, often from the cozy front seat of my granddaddy's beat up red farm truck as we cruised through the pastures. But the closest I got to an elephant was probably a Babar the Elephant book.
In a seemingly unrelated event, she is now sitting beside me at the table, coloring a picture of a Christmas tree (apparently coloring is not seasonally-bound) and I can hear her muttering under her breath, "sheng dan shu sheng dan shu".
Sometimes I can feel like my life is so 'normal' as defined from a western-standpoint. My kids love spaghetti, read The Little Engine that Could, play with blue-eyed baby dolls and sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
Other times I feel like we are anything but normal. I wonder how our children will deal with the tricky crossing of cultures - the crazy differences between the blog my dad writes and the riding of elephants. The coloring of a Christmas tree while saying its name in a language where few native speakers celebrate Christmas.
One thing is for sure, it will probably be an interesting journey - and part of it might just include another elephant ride!
PS - Sheng dan shu means Christmas tree :)
5 comments:
What amazing experiences your kids are able to enjoy! love, Susan
A wonderful post, Laura - your family is definitely having an interesting journey! And just to remind you that your parents (Julianna's grandparents) helped plow (and we not talking row crops) the way - we and your grandparents (Julianna's great grandparents) Doris and Clinton Crissman were at that same elephant farm in 1975 in Thailand! We're thinking the elephant Julianna and Matt rode was one of several baby elephants that were at the farm then and that the elephant we rode in 1975 may have been the mother of theirs? (We're going to find those photos one day!) We love you and we miss you.
Julianna, Lydia and Isaac are all on a very wonderful journey, as we all are, theirs journey a bit less normal than most, but I am so glad you do work at keeping it as normal as you do. btw - we here in "normal land" often remark about their journey and experiences and speculate as to where they will lead.
love from their GrandDad, who looks forward to watching (and sharing some experiences too)
Wow! What neat experiences. Can't wait to hear of more fun things you guys do. love JUlie
What's normal anyway Laura - I think it is great your kids will have a breadth of experiences to draw from - only the Lord knows where they will end up and how these shaping experiences will be used in their lives in the coming years - take strength in that! Truth is if you grew up in an inner city in the States you may never have seen a cow either - although I doubt you would have ridden an elephant :)
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