A Different Fourth

I didn't have internet access last night, so here it is:

July 4, 2015

It almost felt like a normal Fourth of July: there were no fireworks. For the past nearly twenty years, we've been in Canada for the Fourth. Almost as soon as school was out, we'd pack up and head north across the border to spend a week at McMillan's, a family run camp with fourteen little cabins and a big dining hall where home-cooked meals were served three times a day. Our daughter-in-law Debbra had gone there with her family since she was a little girl, and once she and Nate were married, we picked up and carried on the tradition. Until this year. When we started out, the exchange rate and the price made it a super deal, but the exchange advantage has all but disappeared, and the cost has continued to escalate, prompting the decision to stay home this year.

For years, it bothered me to not be home for the Fourth of July, but we did get to celebrate Canada Day on the first, singing their national anthem at dinner and watching the fireworks in Killaloe in the evening. But here we are in the USA on the Fourth, and I haven't seen so much as a sparkler. We had family and friends over for a picnic lunch, then headed to Churchville to spend some time with my mother prior to her family reunion tomorrow. Only she won't be there. She's caught a nasty cold and doesn't feel like leaving the house, so I guess we'll be going without her.

We missed Canada Day, too, as well as some of the friends we've made over the years. The highlight of my week in Canada was going to the Wilno Tavern for Blues Night on Tuesdays, talking with Grant Fraser, the lead guitarist and knife maker who got Matt started in the business, and bringing home a few bags of loose tea from the shop down the road in Golden Lake, a small crossroads community about five miles away from McMillan's.

This is all pretty ordinary stuff--spending time with people we love, eating hot dogs and potato salad, talking, and watching the kids play. But it is ordinary only to us. For most people around the world, a day like today would be an exquisite treasure. We have plenty of food, live in peace, and are surrounded by those we love. We don't live in fear or want. Our granddaughter Alex is in Uganda working with kids in a boarding school. She phoned and we talked today. We talked about the experience she is having that most kids she knows cannot even imagine. She is seeing first hand what poverty is really like. When I commented on American kids who constantly complain about petty issues, she responded with, "That's SO infuriating to me!" We are truly blessed by the sacrifices people endured to give birth to this nation so we can remember today in such an ordinary fashion as having a picnic. What an unusual gift this is! As it says in the Psalms, Let us give thanks to the Lord for his lovingkindness to the children of men!