Day 11: Tradition

It's been on my mind a lot lately - the idea of tradition.

What is it?

Why does it matter?

What do we do?

In a lot of ways I am a traditionalist. I like order and structure and knowing that at the same time of year, or for a particular event or holiday, the same things will happen year after year. Cake at birthday parties, Friday night burgers at Hires, reading a good book before bedtime. It's that stuff that helps keep me sane.

But at the same time - I don't believe in doing things just because they've been done for so long that no one even remembers why it started in the first place. Just because we've always done it that way.

Quite the conundrum if you ask me.

My life is in this transitional phase right now - where I've got my own family to create what I hope are meaningful traditions with and yet at the same time, still try to conform to old family traditions that I may or may not like, and that may or may not have lost their luster.

It's tough being a wife, mom, daughter, sister and gran-daughter all at the same time. I want to be part of the old, but I'm desperate at the same time to break tradition and forge ahead.

I'll tell you though one of my favorite traditions - Sunday dinner. I grew up in a family where we always tried to eat dinner together and even now, we still do Sunday dinner at my moms house, 90% of the year.

I look forward to Sunday dinner. I start looking forward to the next Sunday dinner as soon as a current one has finished. I like that my sister and I sometimes get to take the lead and host a Sunday dinner at our own homes.

In sifting through some old movies on my computer I came across a video from a Sunday last summer, 2008. It completely epitomizes a Sunday after dinner - everyone in the same room, but doing their own things.

Mom sitting and enjoying the music, Willie lounging on the couch, Dad reading and falling asleep, James eating late (must have been a guard weekend), Haley with Elliott, Ross not in the room because he was probably at the computer checking some fantasy sport scores and me, behind the camera.



This is one tradition that I never want to part with. Sure, over the years it will change, and require a much larger table or two, but I hope that we always do it.

I love my family. And we all love to eat.