Tuesday, March 23, 2004
Blogger Idol Week 9 - Childhood Treasures
This weeks topic is "Childhood Treasures"
Visitors for Sunday Lunch
All my life as a kid, I can barely remember a Sunday where we didn't either have visitor's for lunch or special rarity - we were invited somewhere. My parents had a policy of either planning to invite someone for lunch, or finding whoever didn't have somewhere to go. For most of my teens I (as the eldest child) was in charge of preparing Sunday roast. I prepared the meat, floured and salted it, put it in to the oven to cook, peeled and washed spuds, pumpkin, carrots, parsnips and sometimes kumara and put them in the roasting pan. Then it was off to church and let's see who we can bring home today. Often one of my school buddies came regardless of who else might be invited. His family were not Christians, so Mum and Dad took it on themselves to provide a home for him to be welcome in after church, to discuss spiritual matters and to hang out with me and my sister.
I met many fascinating and diverse people from all nationalities, creeds, social standing, political leanings and religious persuasion. We had eastern philosophy people, naturists and commune dwellers, hitchhikers and backpackers, over seas tourists, visiting preachers and missionaries as well as folks from our own area.
Consequently I learnt my racial tolerance from my parents, who truly love all men as their brothers and sisters.
In the last few years we have started to do the same thing with our family, starting small and building up. We have held BBQ's after church in a local park next to a dam where there are great facilities and a cool playground. We are teaching our children the value of a stable home and friends the same way I was taught.
This Sunday just gone we invited some friends from church (met the week before - but have known of for many years.) They have been in Ukraine as missionaries (in fact he is from Ukraine) and we had a great time with them.
On Saturday we are going to McDonalds with some visiting speakers to our church from a couple of weeks ago.
This Thursday we extend further, we are starting a weekly discussion group for some of our neighbours.
Thanks Mum and Dad for the lessons learnt, the relationships formed and the experiences of meeting all those people.
We look forward to continuing your legacy.
