I like the holidays. Families all assemble; someone (or everyone) cooks; friendships are renewed. It’s all good! The celebrations are very traditional. At Thanksgiving we eat turkey with stuffing and gravy (and everyone pigs out.) At Chanukah we light the candles, eat latkes (and everyone pigs out.) At Christmas someone sets up the trains (mine from a thousand years ago), and the kids open their presents, and run around making noise. My daughter-in-law’s mother makes amazing flan, my daughter-in-law makes apple fritters (hundreds of apple fritters) and her brother makes chestnuts wrapped in bacon, mmmmm, bacon, (and everyone pigs out.)
I guess many of us these days belong to families that include LGBQT members. And our family is no different. We are fortunate in that they are all welcomed along with their significant others and their children. And, if you think about it, why shouldn’t they be? I can certainly remember all of them as bright smiling children. They were loved then and, having done nothing wrong, nothing to harm anyone, they are the same people that we loved as children.
I have a gay cousin whom to know is to love. She is nothing but good. When she walks into the room, the sun comes out. (I am smiling just thinking about her.) We have another cousin who, with his partner, has a set of twins that are biologically theirs thru a surrogate. He was a great kid, a great brother, a great son and is proving to be a great dad. (And the twins are adorable.)
We have an in-law who is one the best guys going, also gay. He always spends the holidays with us (extended family) and is totally accepted, included, appreciated and treated no differently than any other member of the family. There are others (it’s a big family), but I must say that people are treated with the respect they deserve, whether they are jerks (gender preferences aside) or sunshine. I guess, in this family, you get what you earn. And, as the Aaron Tippin song says: “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Holiday Joy
In The Time of Change
By Dave Bresler