Thoughts Because of a Cleveland Wedding

Four weddings in thirteen months!  Our family has been busy celebrating and it has all been wonderful.
These weddings have been very diverse.  One Jamaican themed, the next green and Catholic, the third an outdoor wedding barely managing to stay dry, and the last held in a Cleveland courthouse.  All centered on love, family, and fun.

This last wedding, the Cleveland one, was grand but I felt a touch of melancholy as it will be the last excuse for the five brothers and their families to come together in celebration for a while.  No more weddings on the horizon.  There may be intervening events, perhaps a graduation or two, that will bring us together but those are not a sure thing.  I don't mean the graduation part.  I know the sister-in-law, nephew, and niece in school will all graduate.  That's a lock.  I mean grand celebrations held in their honor that we are all able to attend.  Those may or may not happen and we all may or may not be able to attend. 

Maybe because I am working on our family tree, maybe because I'm retired, maybe because my adult son is married and well launched in life, and maybe because of all three, I find myself valuing family together time more and more.  Finding out about the history of our ancestors surely made me aware of the importance of family in the 1800's, especially those families relying on farming for survival.  Children were numerous and not just because birth control was pretty much non-existent.  Children were needed to help with the farm and the home.  They were loved, yes.  They were cared for, yes.  But they were also relied upon and needed.  Back then, families were together.  I mean they worked together, they dined together, and they celebrated together.  Grandparents, parents, children, and their children.  Often they all lived in the same town and on the same farm.  Getting together was their way of life.  For us in the 21st century with family scattered from Florida to Michigan, Illinois to Kansas, Montana to Arizona, well it takes events like weddings to make that happen.  Getting together is expensive and takes time, time away from work.  So, having family in the same place at the same time in honor of a loving couple, then dining and dancing, talking and laughing into the wee hours of the morning -- these are special to me.  I wish for more such times.