You know to have a family is to have Gold; It's true riches for sure. Hard times puts this truth in proper perspective. It's the places you can go and the people upon which you can rely in tough times that gives your soul it's salt of survival. These folk need not be blood relatives to be called Family, and many times as we know, they are not. We must treat our families well however, blood and otherwise, for we are nourished by them and through them. To forget this truth is to isolate oneself from the greater good of Family and Community.
I remember when I traveled a little through Latin America years ago, the second question I was seemingly always asked upon first meeting a native Latin person was, "Do you have a Family?" At that time I did not have an immediate family and so I would reply with "no, not at this time", knowing what they meant. Immediately they would sincerely lament, "Ooh,...I'm so sorry", and they meant this from the bottom of their hearts; you could see it in them. That has always stuck with me, and the health and stability that they derived from a culture rooted in a strong tradition of family was overwhelmingly aparent in their day to day ways and actions. The importance of this way of life and the obvious solidity that it gave to their culture made a deep impression upon me. This combined with their reverent religiosity gave them a solidity that I haven't seen since, not as a culture at any rate. The first question that they would ask me was, "What is your name"? These people knew that Family was Gold. They were really poor too, so maybe that helped them to see what true riches really are: the Spiritual and the Familial.
I remember when I traveled a little through Latin America years ago, the second question I was seemingly always asked upon first meeting a native Latin person was, "Do you have a Family?" At that time I did not have an immediate family and so I would reply with "no, not at this time", knowing what they meant. Immediately they would sincerely lament, "Ooh,...I'm so sorry", and they meant this from the bottom of their hearts; you could see it in them. That has always stuck with me, and the health and stability that they derived from a culture rooted in a strong tradition of family was overwhelmingly aparent in their day to day ways and actions. The importance of this way of life and the obvious solidity that it gave to their culture made a deep impression upon me. This combined with their reverent religiosity gave them a solidity that I haven't seen since, not as a culture at any rate. The first question that they would ask me was, "What is your name"? These people knew that Family was Gold. They were really poor too, so maybe that helped them to see what true riches really are: the Spiritual and the Familial.
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