Paint away!

Thanksgiving!  A day with tradition.  Turkey, favorite side dishes, favorite deserts, football, cold weather, warm drink, and family.

But what do you think of when I say Thanksgiving?  We all seem to have similar traditions, but not the same.  It reminds me of the difference between equality and equity.  Our traditions have the same value (equity) but are not necessarily the same (equality). 

Today is our first blended family Thanksgiving with me and my kids and Denise and two of hers.  We are thankful for what we have.  We are thankful we are together as a family.  We are thankful for God's provisions in our lives.  But, we are also blending our traditions.  We put lights up before Thanksgiving and are decorating the tree today while all together.   These are Denise's traditions.  We went to a u-cut tree farm, have photos of each of us cutting down the tree we picked as a family, and have the movie Elf on while decorating the tree.  Those are my traditions.  As we created these new blended traditions, new memories, we are forced to face the old as well.  We remember previous holidays, the way we used to do things, with people we used to spend them.  When digging out the ornaments, we find ones that belong to people we used to spend the holidays with.  The meaning we already have coming into this year's Thanksgiving was created in the past, which brings up old memories, old laughs, old hurts.  And, we are creating new memories, new laughs, and trying to prevent new hurts.

And we miss family we aren't able to be with on this Thanksgiving, and hope to see them soon.  We are thankful we are together, and we are sad we are apart.  Same level of feeling, but different result.

Equitable, but not equal.  We all have equitable value, equitable traditions, equitable memories.  But they are not equal.  They are different.  Blending is quite a challenge.  It requires a ceremonial paintbrush to blend and paint the new vision, new memories, new traditions.

Paint away!